Islands of Ireland: Impressions of a shooting on Chapel Island, Bantry Bay

Bantry Bay: A beautiful vista with five green islands of various sizes decorating the harbour.

One tranquil summer’s evening in 1907 there was barely a ripple on the water. It was like a scene from an impressionist painting. Into this tranquil paradise, accompanied by his mother, rowed a young jeweller and silversmith from the town of Bantry named William O’Callaghan. He would never return.

Also boating that evening in the vicinity of Chapel Island was an English miner, Charles Phillamore Roscoe, who was working in the baryte mines near the town.

His hobby was shooting. After the two parties passed each other, Roscoe took aim at a gull perched on a rock. He can’t have imagined the consequences.

The bullet missed the gull, ricocheted off a rock or the surface of the water, and struck the jeweller in the chest, fatally wounding him.

The Southern Star reported that the only other occupant of the row boat was O’Callaghan mother, “a lady of advanced years, who was shocked and alarmed beyond description”.

Mrs O’Callaghan’s screams were heard and responded to by a passing steamer, the Lady Elsie, which plied its trade between the town and Glengarriff. Mr O’Callaghan, 22, still alive, was lifted onto the steamer but expired immediately.

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The newspaper reported that the shooting “caused the utmost sensation in the town”.

The impact of the accidental shooting was exacerbated by the fact that exactly a year to the day in 1906 that the baryte mine, where the accused and his brother worked, had had another tragedy where several men drowned after a pillar in a shaft collapsed. Roscoe was later acquitted.

Chapel Island is a slender glacial remnant between Bantry and Whiddy joined by a short stony isthmus. There is the ruin nof one house on the eastern side. The Topographical Dictionary of Ireland in 1837 records five inhabitants on the Island. This tome states:

It comprises about 24 acres of extremely fertile land, which is in a high state of cultivation, and as part of the Bandon estate, in which parish it is locally included, is the property of the Duke of Devonshire.

This brief mention also notes that Chapel Island and the adjoining Hog and Horse Islands which also belonged to the duke, “are more than 30 miles from any other portion of the Bandon estate”.

The proximity of the island to Bantry Bay and Castletownbere where it had a base for its fleet, proved very attractive to the British navy, which established a firing range on Chapel Island. Several guardships and cruisers anchored in the bay in the late 19th century including the HMS Howe, the HMS Collingwood and the Warspite.

Ruin on the island

The Cork Examiner in 1894 reported the latter’s “object in coming here was to avail of the almost unsurpassable ground which is here to be found for carrying out the practice of ball-firing”. The ‘officers and men’ were delighted with the area and “are becoming extremely popular with the

inhabitants”, reported the Cork Examiner.

One of the most important sources for historic information on Bantry Bay was local historian Paddy O’Keeffe, whose collected papers comprising 22 boxes was presented to the Cork City Archives after his death. There are voluminous references to Whiddy Island, Bantry House and many other points of interest.

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There is scant reference to Chapel Island. However, it does note that Mr O’Keeffe was advised by a reverend JM Cronin of a reference in a 12th century papal document to Pope Innocent III to Inis Cuinge, now Chapel Island.

The reverend had speculated that Chapel Island and Whiddy Island were once the one island and that a church the historian mentioned was in fact on Chapel Island and hence was so named.

Today nothing remains of this church. Is it possible its walls were used for target practice by the British navy and the rubble later removed for construction elsewhere?

Bantry Bay’s is one of three chapel islands in Ireland, the others being at Strangford Lough and Co Galway.

There are several other church islands, indicating a strong connection between Irish islands and Christianity. Who could have guessed?

• How to get there: Kayak on the Bantry Bay blueway: bantrybayport.com
• Other: Paddy O’Keeffe papers in Cork City Archives. corkcityarchives.ie