Inland Lighthouse

There is a hill in Meath with ‘the only inland lighthouse in Ireland’.  It is 30 miles from the sea.

It all began in 1653 when Thomas Taylor of Sussex came to Ireland as assistant to Sir William Petty, commissioned by Cromwell to list all lands belonging to Catholics and other troublemakers that their property might be confiscated and sold to cover Cromwell’s expenses. The resulting ‘Down Survey’ is still a valuable document for historians but in its time made men like Petty and Taylor very rich. They knew exactly where good land was located and bought it cheaply.

Taylor sold his family’s Sussex land to buy 21,000 acres in Meath and Cavan. In 1771 his grandson built Headfort House in magnificent style near Kells and the family lived there until 1949. They received a succession of British titles from Baronet to Earl to Marquess. 

In 1791 a spire was added as a ‘folly’, a fashionable architectural ornament that acted as a focal point in the landscape while emphasising the importance of the family in the neighbourhood.  It stands on a hill on the opposite side of Kells, several miles away but visible from the house. The land it was built on was part of the Commons of Lloyd attached to Kells town but the town council was in no position to refuse a request from the Headforts.

The Hill of LLoyd, on which the spire stands, was once crowned by a Bronze Age ring fort guarding the way from the Kingdom of Bréifne to the ancient Kingdom of Midhe. Now it is a small public park with the spire as is centrepiece.  They say that Strangford Lough, 160 km away, is visible from the spire but it was cloudy the day I was there.

The spire itself is 100ft high and indeed looks like a lighthouse. Inside there are 164 steps leading to the top from which there must be impressive views. It is open to the public at designated times.  

A few hundred yards from the spire is a sombre reminder of another side of the hill’s story -- a memorial to the many ‘paupers’ of the area who lived or were buried there during the Famine.

Between 1841 and 1851 the population of Meath fell from 183,000 to 140,000, a drop of 23%. This decline continued into the following decades with the population dropping to 95,558 due to emigration.

During the famine starving people from the area lived on the hill of Lloyd and in 1861 when the local Kells graveyards were overflowing a section of land adjoining the tower was given to the Workhouse to be used as a paupers' graveyard. ‘Paupers’ were given the job of arranging the graveyard and making a road into it.

Today the Paupers Graveyard stands with solemn dignity on its side of the Hill. Since 2009 each Christmas Day a short memorial service is held there.

A stone plaque tells its story:

‘Here they are buried, the poor of our race,

Removed from the workhouse to this lonely place.

Neath the Tower of Lloyd on the top of the hill,

A graveyard so lonely, so bleak and so chill.’