HISTORICAL ACCOUNT
OF THE
CITY OF ARMAGH.
ARMAGH, a city of Ulster, the ecclesiastical metropolis
of Ireland, and the capital of the county of Armagh, is situated
on a hill, surrounded by a highly cultivated and picturesque country,
and within less than a quarter of a mile of the river Callan,
to whose banks it once extended. It is the seat of the consistorial
court of his grace the archbishop of Armagh, who is the primate
and metropolitan of all Ireland. The see of Armagh extends into
five counties, .Armagh, Derry, Meath, Tyrone, and Louth, being
75 miles from north to south, and from 12 1/ to 32 in breadth.
Armagh was, in the middle centuries, an extensive
and populous city, and was celebrated as a place of learning,
having had, at one period, according to the Irish historians,
seven thousand students at its college. The city, with the cathedral,
a large Gothic building, one hundred and ninety feet from east
to west, and one hundred and twenty five from north to south,
was built in the year 445, by St. Patrick. It was afterwards destroyed
by fire, and ravaged by the Danes, who took off or annihilated
the archieves of this ancient place. It was also often plundered
or laid waste, in the repeated wars between the natives and the
Anglo Normans and, in 1642, it was set on fire by Sir Phelim O'Neil.
From the time of the suppression of the abbeys,
with which Armagh abounded, it had dwindled into a very insignificant
and neglected town; and in this state it remained until Dr. Richardson,
afterwards Baron Rokeby, was promoted to the primacy. By the princely
munificence of this prelate, the cathedral was repaired, and the
town altogether renovated. He built and endowed an observatory,
with an excellent astronomical apparatus, a library, and a palace,
with a neat chapel, on the glebe adjacent to the city. To his
liberality Armagh is also indebted for a parish school lately
built, and for a school, where children are educated gratuitously,
according to the modern improved systems. The school is in a flourishing
condition, and is endowed with 1530 acres of fine land, which,
in 1804, produced a gross annual rent of £ 1144 10s. 5 1/d.
A very elegant county courthouse, in which the business
of the assizes, quarter sessions, is transacted, has been lately
built, at the foot of the gentle acclivity on which the observatory
stands. In front of this building, there are very pleasant public
walks, surrounded by trees, planted in an eliptic form: these
walks seem to be half encircled, on the .eastern, northern and
western points, by public buildings, while on the eastern side,
the houses of the city appear ascending gradually one above the
other, until the view is terminated by the cathedral.
A few years ago, a handsome church was erected,
on a gentle acclivity, between the barracks and the free school.
On the western side of the city there is a charter house or eleemosynary
poor school, of considerable magnitude, founded in 1758. In addition
to the churches already mentioned, the places of worship are,
a large Presbyterian meeting-house, a meeting house for Seceders,
a tabernacle for the Evangelical congregation, a large Roman Catholic
chapel, and two Methodist preaching-houses. The city, before the
union, sent two members to parliament; it now sends only one.
In Armagh, an association for the suppression of
mendicity was lately formed. It is supported by voluntary subscriptions.
His Grace the Lord Primate contributes £50 per annum, and
about £780 are subscribed by the inhabitants, by whom a
committee has been appointed to manage the distribution of the
money. A society for the relief of sick poor meet once a week
in the market house, and appoint a number of persons out of their
body to visit and relieve the indigent. A short time since, a
Savings Bank was established, under the most respectable gentlemen
in the neighbourhood.
The county infirmary is a handsome edifice, situated
at the junction of Abbey street and Callan street. The number
of intern patients who receive surgical aid in this institution
may be averaged at one hundred and sixty, and the extern patients
who are supplied with medicine, at three thousand.
A public bakery has been lately established in English
street, which promises to be of considerable utility in regulating
the assize of bread. The public news room is situated in the same
street. From a basin convenient to the city, the inhabitants are
supplied with water, which is conveyed by pipes into their dwelling
houses, at the rate of £1 per annum.
Armagh has a very large market every Tuesday. The
principal commodity sold in it is linen cloth in the brown state.
The average weekly sales of this article amount to 7000 pieces,
which, valued at £1 9s, per piece, would amount to £10,150.
There is also a market every Saturday for grain and all kinds
of provisions.
By a census taken a few years ago, the number of
inhabitants are 7010, of which 2001 are of the established church;
dissenters of different sects, 1501, chiefly Presbyterians, and
3413 Roman Catholics. Number of Houses, 1300. Distant from Dublin
62 miles, from Belfast 30, and from Newry 14 1/2. Longitude, according
to the most accurate observations, 6o 87' 57" west. Latitude,
54o 20' 55" north.
