Parliamentary borough

Tulsk was previously a parliamentary borough, one of three in County Roscommon from the period 1663 to 1800 and was a constituency represented in the Irish House of Commons. Under the co-monarchs William III of England and Mary II of England Tulsk was first represented in the Commons by William Caulfeild and William Neave in 1692. The year marked what was to be the beginning of an extended period of dominance for the Protestant Ascendancy. One of the two seats was effectively hereditary in the Caulfeild family.

Visit of Gabriel Beranger 1779

In 1779 the artist Gabriel Beranger travelled throughout Ireland to paint the 'antiquities’ of Ireland for the Hibernian Antiquarian Society. On his travels he passed through Tulsk and Rathcroghan. He noted that on May Day he witnessed a scene ‘peculiar to this locality’: <<It was that of ‘driving in all the black cattle from the surrounding plains to the great fort of Rathcroghan Mound, and bleeding them for the benefit of their health, while crowds of country people, having brought turf for firing, sat around and cooked the blood mixed with oaten meal, and when they could be procured, onions or scallions.>>^[3]

Visit of Samuel Lewis 1837

In 1837, Samuel Lewis published a topographical dictionary [21] which included the following contemporary description of Tulsk:

"TULSK, a post-town (formerly an incorporated market-town and parliamentary borongh), in the parish of OGULLA, barony and county of ROSCOMMON, province of CONNAUGHT, 8 miles (N.) from Roscommon, and 79 ¾ (W. N. W.) from Dublin: the population is returned with the parish. O'Conor Roe erected a castle here in 1406, and during the same century a Dominican monastery was founded either by MacDuil or O'Dowell, or by Phelim, son of Phelim Cleary O'Conor, who was interred here in 1448. The castle was for a long time one of the strongest in the province, and was garrisoned by the Earl of Kildare when he led his forces into this province in 1499.

The monastery continued to flourish till the reign of Elizabeth, but for some time prior to the dissolution its possessions were usurped by the Corporation of Galway. A Dominican abbey was also founded at Toemonia, near the town, by O'Conor Roe which in the reign of Elizabeth was found to be in the occupation of Franciscans of the third order, on whose suppression it was granted by the Queen to Richard Kyndelinshe. The inhabitants were incorporated by Charles II., in the fourteenth year of his reign, by the designation of the "Portreeve, Free Burgesses, and Commonalty of the Borough of Tulsk:" the charter also conferred the elective franchise, with power to hold a court of record and a weekly market.

Under this charter the corporation consisted of a portreeve, 15 free burgesses, and an indefinite number of freemen, assisted by two serjeants-at-mace and other officers appointed in the usual manner. The portreeve and free burgesses continued to return two members to the Irish parliament till the Union, when the borough was disfranchised. The court of record, which had jurisdiction to the amount of £5, has been long discontinued, and the corporation has become extinct.

The town has dwindled into an insignificant village, consisting only of a few straggling cottages and one shop. Fairs are held on Easter-Monday and the first Monday in November (O. S.); a constabulary police force is stationed in the village, and petty sessions are held weekly. There are some remains of the ancient abbey, situated in a large cemetery which is still used as a burial-place; and also of the conventual buildings; but the chief feature is a double-arched doorway, divided in the centre by a round pillar, which is of elegant design and in good preservation. The surrounding district is extremely rich and affords luxuriant pasturage".

Bianconi system

Started in 1815 by the Italian immigrant Charles Bianconi the system of horse-drawn Bians grew from one initial route in Munster to daily travel of over 3,000 miles of road in Leinster, Munster and Connacht. Tulsk was one stop on a route from Ballina to Longford and vice versa. Leaving Ballina each morning at 10 a.m. (circa 1842) a mail coach with passengers would arrive in Tulsk at approx. 6 p.m, taking on average a further hour to reach Strokestown and reaching Longford at 9 p.m. In the opposite direction, a Bianconi car passed through Tulsk at approx. 8.50 each morning. It would then be due to arrive in Ballinagare one hour later. What travellers may have seen is open to question, but this was at a time when Tulsk was particularly ravaged by poverty and suffered death and emigration on a large scale in subsequent years. For instance, as recorded by Maynooth University Population Change Atlas, what we now know as Tulsk parish had a population of 11,101 in 1841. Ten years later that figure dropped to 6,955. In 1861 Tulsk's population had more than halved from that of the eve of the Famine, with 5,539 persons. The Bianconi system grew less popular in the 1850s when rail service began, but many routes such as this one continued for some time.^[4]

Outdoor Rallies

Closer in time – at the start of the 20th century – in October 1903 the leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party John Redmond held a mass outdoor rally or "National Meeting" in Tulsk, for the people of County Roscommon. The party's dominant ideology was legislative independence for the country (Home Rule), with land reform also central to their mandate. On this particular inclement October Sunday, held in a field beside the village; Redmond addressed thousands on these two issues, both on local level and national level agendas. Tulsk was decided as the venue as it was geographically central to the county. Redmond arrived in the afternoon on a horse-drawn sidecar from Roscommon town, where he had spent the previous night, after a train journey from Dublin. The culture of mass meetings in 19th century Ireland had begun with Daniel O'Connell's quest for Catholic emancipation, and between 1880 and 1920 there had been (at least, as recorded) eight to 10 such meetings in Tulsk. At this time (1903) Tulsk parish's population has been recorded at 3,275, having dropped further from the 5,539 recorded in 1861.

World War I

Tulsk was no different from most other British and Irish villages and towns during World War One, in that it contributed to the Allied effort of resisting the Central Powers' threat to European stability. John McGrath, from Tulsk, as published in Ireland's Memorial Records, is registered as a Private in the North Staffordshire Regiment – 12th Battalion – and was killed in action in France on 28 July 1918. His grave, amongst 370, can be viewed at Borre British Cemetery in northern France (grave number 11.F.6). Another WW1 soldier is Mark Phibbs of Corbally, Tulsk. He served in the Leinster Regiment, died of post-traumatic stress disorder injuries sustained during battle while in France, and is buried in Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin. Both McGrath and Phibbs are some of between 30,000 and 35,000 Irish who perished in the Great War. Two other men, Henry Armitage and William Garry were RIC officers in Tulsk during that same war and went to the front after an outdoor send-off in the village (from contemporaneous newspaper reports). Their fate is unknown, like that of half of the men who died in World War I (over 9 million), scattered as they are beneath the green fields of mainland Europe. The Cenotaph memorial, erected mostly in England and France – out of the ashes of the first global catastrophe of the 20th century – goes some way to remember these dead. (re. Jay Winter, Lecture 18 – Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning – from Yale Open Courses, European Civilisation, available online).

On Saturday 29 August 1914, an article appeared in the Leitrim Observer newspaper reporting on spies appearing in the districts of Roscommon. Along with two suspected Germans arrested on suspicion of "some evil design", over the Tarmonbarry bridge, the following was also printed:

"The Tulsk police arrested a foreigner, supposed to be a German, convenient to the royal ground at Rathcroghan on Wednesday last. He had a sketch book and a box of water colours in his possession but stated that he was only on a holiday, and was sketching for pleasure. We understand he was detained pending inquiries."

War of Independence

During the Irish War of Independence, on 14 November 1920 George Kelly, who was a shop keeper in Tulsk, drove to Roscommon town in his truck to collect goods for his store. His vehicle was apprehended and Kelly was arrested and held in Roscommon. Later that night the same truck made its way to Four Mile House in the possession of RIC officers and members of the Black and Tans. Here, in the townland of Rathconnor, John Conry was marched from his house and shot twice in the head, twice in the chest and once in the stomach. The killing was in reprisal for the Four Mile House ambush, which had occurred three weeks previously. His death was just one in a total of 58 fatalities associated with the Irish revolution in county Roscommon from the years 1917 – 1921 (from 'Counting Terror' by Eunan O'Halpin in 'Terror in Ireland 1916–1923' ed. David Fitzpatrick).

Thomas Brady, Intelligence Officer of 2nd Battalion, North Roscommon Brigade stated in the Bureau of Military History that while the RIC barracks in Tulsk had been evacuated in Autumn 1919 – Spring 1920, it wasn't burned to the ground until after Easter 1920, without any trouble; "We had no trouble in destroying [it]." The barracks had been a busy one for a rural outpost, and in 1911 had no fewer than 10 RIC officers stationed – this at a time of particular agrarian unrest in the area (albeit with a population of 784 in Tulsk DED at the time, as opposed to 215 in 2002 for instance – NUI Maynooth Irish Population Change Atlas (available online)).