Page 82 - Greystones Archaeological Historical Society

A WALK AROUND GREYSTONES

About thirty cottages which once stood north of the Harbour
Café were washed away during severe storms in 1929-1932.
The families who lived in them had been evacuated in 1928, and
rehoused on higher ground, a number of them further up the hill
towards Bray Head, in The Grove.

The earliest references to Greystones mention it as ‘a noted
fishing place’, and there were early suggestions that a harbour
should be built to facilitate the industry. However, it was not until
1883 that construction began. It was completed five years later
at a cost of £12,000, but almost immediately there were
complaints about the influx of shingle and its exposure to
storms, and its condition deteriorated rapidly: by 1907, a mere
twenty years after its construction, it was reported that the
harbour was silted up and the walls ‘crumbling and falling to
pieces’.

On the south side of today’s redeveloped harbour is a plaque
commemorating the tragedy of 14 October 1892, in which three
local men, John, William and Herbert Doyle, were drowned.
During a north-east gale, the schooner Mersey, moored in the
harbour, threatened to break up, and the two Doyle brothers and
William’s son, Herbert, went out along the jetty to cast a rope to
the vessel. As they were returning all were engulfed and
drowned. An appeal was subsequently launched on behalf of
their families, and a ballad, The Heroes of Greystones,
composed in their honour.

On 25 October 1910 the harbour was the site of an encounter
between Chief Secretary Birrell, on a visit to the town to inspect
its ruinous condition, and suffragettes Hanna Sheehy-Skeffing-
ton and Hilda Webb. According to Sheehy-Skeffington:

‘The local dignitaries … were furious, for we managed to get
between them and their visitor – and on his other side was
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