Church (in ruins) — Garrincreen

On W-facing slope, a stream runs N-S c. 180m to the W. The church, orientated ENE-WSW, is situated in the S portion of the roughly rectangular graveyard (KK019-014002-). There are good views to S-W-NW. Described by Carrigan (1905, vol. 3, 263) as, ‘Temple-Fennell’, who states that, ‘The name by which this church is now generally known is the “Church of Gorrychreen”, that is, the Church of the Field of the Withered Tree; but some of the old people still call it “Fennell’s Church,” recte Fennell Church. It is mentioned in the Red Book of Ossory as “ffynnel,” “Fynel,” “ffynel,” and “ffynell.”’. The church was still relatively intact in the early 19th century when described in the OS Letters (1839) as, ‘The gables and small portions only of the side walls remain. It was sixty nine feet [21m] long and twenty three and a half [7.16m] broad. There is a window in the west gable but it is so thickly covered with strong ivy that none of its architectural features can be seen. There are two curvilineal pointed windows in the east gable, seven feet [c. 2.1m] high and three feet eight inches [1.12m] wide inside. The front broken away but the arch stone in each alone. It is rather a modern building remarkable for nothing but its having been often seen to go to the neighbouring stream to drink water at night and come back again. There is no burying ground here’ (O’Flanagan ed. 1930, vol. 2, 81). Carrigan (1905, vol. 3, 263) notes that the walls are ’23 ft. in width [7m]. There was a doorway in the south wall, 13 ft. [c. 3.9m] from the east end, but only one of the casing stones, a cut and chamfered block of freestone or grit, remains in situ. All the windows have been destroyed’. When visited in 1994 only the sod-covered wall-footings of the rectangular church (int. dims. 15.5m E-W x 7m N-S) were visible, with the gables surviving to a maximum H of 0.75m. Compiled by: Jean Farrelly Date of upload: 21 September 2020