borrisoleigh

Borrisoleigh ( the burgage or Norman borough of Ileigh barony), a small market town on the Nenagh-Thurles road, has some Georgian architecture and traditional shopfronts. As you enter a pair of red sandstone houses catch the eye. Through the arched gateway beside them is a ruined rectangular 15th century tower house - a de Burgo fortress. Of most interest is an inscribed slab inserted into the gable of the sandstone house with the names of Richard Burke and Ellice Hurley, 1643, clearly legible . This is Chapel Street - a legacy of the imposed penal days term 'chapel' to denote the Catholic place of worship.

Walter Dolin was the architect of the church in the main street as he was for the contemporary St Mary's of the rosary, Nenagh. Local builder , Thomas Williams , completed it in 1895. The cream sandstone of the window and door surrounds, quarried at Drombane 12 miles away, is similar to that used in Cormac's chapel, Cashel, the parish two missionary bishops, Joseph Shanahan of Nigeria and Thomas Quinlan of Korea, are commemorated inside.