Our nation’s biggest graveyard lies offshore
I can still recall, though, that lump-in-the-throat moment when hundreds of mourners gathered in the parish church at Ardmore, Co Waterford, to reflect on the life and mourn the death of a young fisherman.
He had everything to live for: a beautiful wife, a newlyborn son and a job he loved. He shared a small trawler with his first cousin — and best friend. They fished together when weather allowed and socialised when it didn’t.
On the day they left harbour the seas were tranquil, but there was a small craft warning. Nonetheless, they headed out, mindful of the forecast but also conscious of household bills to be paid, mortgages to be met and payments to be made on the boat. Fishing for a living is never easy. It is one of the most dangerous occupations.
Within hours of venturing out of harbour, the weather had turned foul and, in the rush to safety, they both drowned within sight of shore.
For months afterwards, villagers, friends and family tried to figure out what happened. The best guess was that a rogue wave struck and that one of the men fell overboard and became entangled in the net and that the other man jumped in to save him. There was no way of telling who did what first, but those who knew them both also knew each would risk life and limb for the other.
The first inkling of impending doom was when the married fisherman’s wife became worried and rang his mobile. “I knew it must have been submerged,” she said. “He always answered at the first ring or two.”
Even in a village used to such tragedies, the funeral in Ardmore was harrowing. There, next to the altar rails lay the coffin and, right beside it, a tiny Moses basket containing the fisherman’s son. One funeral. One christening. One box cradling a body, the other carrying vibrant life. Two sacraments, one tragedy.
It is almost impossible to imagine any scenario other than that one man died to save the other. That is not unusual among fishermen, as tales of heroism abound.
In 2005, 27-year-old Ian Tierney made desperate efforts to save his colleague Jimmy Meyler, 46, after he was thrown into the seas when their lobster boat became unstable and was partly submerged off the Saltee Islands in St George’s Channel.
After huge effort, he managed to drag Jimmy on board the section still afloat and when the boat sank he lashed them both together as they waited for rescue.
Ian kept Jimmy’s spirits up by chatting, telling stories and even singing songs. He knew if his friend slumbered, his body would succumb to hypothermia and he would not survive. They were finally rescued and brought to Kilmore Quay. Ian survived but Jimmy died later that night.
We tend to have a schizophrenic relationship with the sea — one part fascination, the other a fear of the unknown.
The real map of Ireland covers our continental shelf which is one of the largest seabed territories in Europe and extends to 200 nautical miles from the coastline, yet have never fully embraced the bounty of the ocean that surrounds us.
The biggest graveyard in Ireland is not Glasnevin — it doesn’t even come close. Our national cemetery lies offshore where tens of thousands of Irishmen and women have met their doom. Thousands more Irish rest on the bottom of the world’s oceans — from Famine coffin ships to vessels to wartime tragedies like the Lusitania and great liners like the Titanic.
As the people of Union Hall try to make sense of their loss, they share a melancholy familiar to other ports such as Kilmore Quay, Ardmore, Killybegs in Donegal, the Aran islands, Achill and many more. The real tragedy of those fishing communities is that death becomes them.
