Page 37 - GAHS Journal Volume 9

GREYSTONES ARCHAEOLOGICAL & HISTORICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL VOLUME 9

chairman of the National Children’s Society. He retired to Ireland
in 1974 and died in 1987. Both he and his wife, Ruth, worshipped
in Calary Church.

Dame Ruth King (1913-2004) devoted her whole life to
music. She received a CBE in 1954 and was made a Dame of
the British Empire for founding the National Youth Orchestra of
Great Britain. The first of many musical evenings in Calary
church was arranged by Dame Ruth and friends in 1984. It has
been restored to become an annual event for Calary.

Dame Ruth’s father, Rev David Railton, was a chaplain in the
First World War, and was responsible for bringing the body of the
Unknown Soldier for burial in Westminster Abbey.

Two memorial plaques in the church recall Hilda Bisset, one
of the first women veterinary surgeons to qualify in Ireland, and
a former organist in Calary church. The other is dedicated to Dr
Bob Collins (1900-1975) who, among his many other talents and
achievements, was the first Irish doctor to enter Belsen
concentration camp after the Second World War. In the adjacent
churchyard are buried such diverse character as Dr Tony
Farrington, who in 1928 was appointed Resident-over-Secretary
to the Royal Irish Academy and devoted his life to the study of
the glacial geology and geomorphology of the Wicklow
mountains.

Outside the church we saw two ancient stiles that led through
the churchyard which children used years ago to walk to the
school in Myers’ field. Looking south-east, we could trace part of
the original Calary point-to-point races, and beside us could see
the ‘Church Bank’, one of the jumps. The races were founded in
1898 by the Bray Harriers, who still hunt regularly in North
Wicklow.

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