Page 77 - Greystones Archaeological Historical Society

GREYSTONES ARCHAEOLOGICAL & HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 8

and grandson of Robert French (1841-1917), the noted
photographer.

Across the road, St Brigid’s was the family home of the
builder, Patrick Joseph Kinlen, while Thornbank, on the corner
of the pathway known as Turnpike Lane, was the home during
the 1970s of songwriter, Jimmy Kennedy (1902-1984). Born in
Omagh, Co Tyrone, Kennedy’s songs included Red Sails in the
Sunset, Harbour Lights, The Isle of Capri, South of the Border
(down Mexico way) and Teddy Bears Picnic. Awarded the OBE
in 1983, Kennedy was posthumously inducted into the
Songwriters’ Hall of Fame in 1997.

On the other side of Turnpike Lane is Knockeevin, whose first
occupant was civil engineer, James Price (1831-1895), whose
projects included a number of important railway and dock
developments. Price and his wife, Frances, had eleven children,
and they and the young Synges were friends: Samuel Synge
remembered his brother, John, sharing a ‘gipsy tea’ on the Little
Sugar Loaf with the Prices, and later one of the Price daughters,
Ellen, married Edward, another of the Synge brothers. While two
of the Price sons, James and Alfred, became engineers like their
father, another, Ivon Henry, joined the RIC, and in 1914 was
appointed head of the Intelligence Department at Dublin Castle.
On Easter Monday 1916 he was in a meeting with the Under-
Secretary when the Castle was attacked by a thirty-strong
raiding party of the Irish Citizen Army. Hearing shots, Price
dashed down to the Castle Yard, revolver in hand, firing at the
half dozen Volunteers he found there. Remarkably, it appears
that he was the only armed man in the Castle at that moment, as
the sentries had not been provided with live ammunition.
However, the insurgents, who had already gained control of the
guardroom, failed to press their advantage and were driven out,
taking up their position instead in the nearby City Hall. Price

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