Kilkieran Graveyard. Part 3: Walsh of Belline, Piltown

The magnificent sarcophagus erected to the Walsh family of Fanningstown which is in Kilkieran graveyard leads us on to write about one of their most famous members of the same family,  Peter Walsh of Belline.   Peter Walsh was born about 1740 and died 1819,  the son of  John Walsh (born 1710) of Fanningstown and his first wife Katherine Butler of Knocktopher who died 1760 (see also post on Fiddown dated 7th October 2017).  He has been described in The Houses of Ireland as an eccentric but that is really very far from the truth.  He became the Agent for Lord Bessborough and a zealous and knowledgeable antiquary and lover of the arts, as well as a JP for county Kilkenny.  He came from a Catholic family but he may have converted to the Protestant religion. Some of his family remained strong Catholics but as was the way in those days, some also made Protestant marriages. Peter Walsh is recorded as giving a donation  of £1.1.0 to the Protestant British and Foreign Bible Society in 1806.  Whatever his religious outlook he was the complete gentleman and scholar building a beautiful property called Belline at Fiddown circa 1786; this was later sold to Lord Bessborough circa 1800.  The connection with Lord Bessborough who had his seat Bessborough House nearby is important.  Bessborough House contained a fine collection of paintings and its architect, Francis Bindon  had studied in Italy and on his return to Ireland worked as a portrait painter as well as architect.  These influences must have affected was happened here in this corner of Ireland when in the late 18th century there was an enormous flowering of both art, Irish poetry and Irish literature around the area of Piltown, county Kilkenny.   It was quite extraordinary and quite different to anything else happening elsewhere in the country and largely due to the patronage of Peter Walsh.  You can read about the support for the ancient Irish language and the collection of manuscripts from this corner of the country during the 18th and early 19th century in our post of 2nd October 2018 about Ahenny graveyard.   But here is a report lauding Peter Walsh, written some 40 years after his death, which appeared in The Tipperary Vindicator 28th March 1849 and described the blossoming of  the decorative arts around Fiddown:-   "Some 70 years ago Peter Walsh was entrusted by William, then Earl of Bessborough with the superintendence of his extensive possessions on the north bank of the Suir in county Kilkenny.  Peter Walsh was a good and faithful agent. ……….the country lads were instructed at his expense in literature, music and the refined arts......a studio was erected at Belline and numerous musicians and painters of the Italian School from Venice, Genoa, Florence and Rome were employed by him to train the sons of the villagers in accomplishments till then little known by them.  That the benevolent agent's attempts were crowned with success no one can doubt who is acquainted with the locality.  Many of the pupils who trained under Peter Walsh's patronage are now artists of eminence, one of them is curator of the picture gallery at Hampton Court.  Others who "the thrust of high enterprise"  lured them away from their homes are scattered over America, Germany, France and Italy, whilst only a few remain to show the results of his teaching and example".  This newspaper report appeared as the then Earl of Bessborough in 1849 was trying to break the leases to the tenants as set up by Peter Walsh seventy years earlier.  The account of the art school can only be regarded as quite extraordinary; presumably the painters and artists from Italy were initially employed to work on beautifying Belline House or other grand houses in the area.  Hampton Court is a Royal Palace just south of London.  That one of Peter's pupils would end up there as the curator of the picture gallery indicates just how well these "county lads" had been trained and educated in the fine arts.  It is impossible to say how true this story is or if the Fiddown man was really the curator or employed in a lesser post, but it was reported in 1849 so not long after the event. Sadly the report does not name him.   Hampton Court had since 1760 and still has, a number of Grace and Favour residences; that is a number of apartments that are made available rent free by the crown to a chosen few courtiers, military widows or former employees in need of accommodation.  The story has some sort of ring of truth to it.  A Mrs Annie Walsh was resident on one of these apartments in 1771 but nothing else is known about her so she may not be related to Peter Walsh BUT Caroline, Countess of Bessborough resided there in the mid 18th century, so there does appear to be a south Kilkenny link with Hampton Court.  Brett Dolman, the current Collections Curator says there was a curious collection of important art works at Hampton Court together with unfashionable paintings not wanted elsewhere,  with devotional art works hung side by side with bawdy Dutch scenes of everyday life.
James Norris Brewer in his book Beauties of Ireland (1825) reported that Peter Walsh had established a detached gallery at his house Belline, that was known as the Drawing School.  Brewer reported this was in fact an academy for students of the arts and several children of the peasantry in the neighbourhood having evinced a considerable degree of genius for drawing were taken under the protection of Mr Walsh and supported by him in the pursuit of the art to which they aspired.
The Liverpool Daily Post (as reported in the Limerick Reporter of 5th Jan 1868) 15th Jan 1868 carried the following article "Peter Walsh was a magnificent patron of the arts.  The agent and friend of Lord Bessborough he enjoyed a large share of the cultivated taste and appreciation of artists for which the noble Earl was famous; and in addition to all this he sent not a few lads to Rome to perfect themselves in art.  One of these whose name was Bresnahan was engaged some years afterwards by a well known picture dealer in Waterford in painting copies after Moreland and others (Moreland painted very romantic and idealistic scenes of country life in the 18th century).  To these the dealer was accustomed to impart an aged tinge by subjecting them to a process of which only he knew the secret. And these were brought forward at periodic sales and disposed of to the highest bidder.  Poor Bresnahan was a lover of art but I can not add that his skill was remuneratively rewarded by his knowing employer.  He lived in a garret in Arundel Square and supported his wife and 5 or 6 children on the slender weekly proceeds of his palette.  Peter Walsh possessed a very fine collection of his own and Belline was ever open to those who wished to feast their eyes on the art treasures with which it was crowded".  
The entry in Lewis (1837) for Carrick on Suir refers to the erection of a new RC chapel in 1804, St Nicholas,  and a painting of the Crucifixion scene which hung above the altar, the work of a "native artist" of that town. Of course the native artist is not named but it seems highly probable that he was a product of Peter Walsh's Drawing School.  The 1804 church was replaced in 1879 by a new building and so far we have not traced the whereabout of the painting nor the identity of the painter but we would very much like to find both......
Peter Walsh was quite a learned scholar.  The London and Paris Observer (Paris 1825) states he was a man of great research and superior understanding. One of the mysteries he applied himself to was the discovery of the identity of the man in the iron mask.  The author of this article about Peter Walsh was General Cockburn of Her Majesty's Service, Paris,  who states that Peter Walsh had given him most of his papers on this subject and that he had printed an abridged copy of Peter Walsh's research about the man in the iron mask and circulated it amongst his friends.

A cherub from Piltown

This passion for the arts around this area spilled over to the proprietor of the local Piltown village inn; its owner, Mr Redmond Anthony ( 1768-1848) was an avid collector of paintings, antiquities, archaeological and geological materials.  He was reported to have had a collection of paintings that included pieces by Rubens, Vandyck and Tintoretto.  Mr Anthony also had a custom made bog oak cabinet fitted with two trays full of Bronze age gold ornaments and including items of medieval jewelry which he bought either from jewellers to whom they had been sold by people who had found them or from people who had literally dug them out of the ground.  Mr Anthony called this collection "my museum" and allowed visitors to view his collection of art and artefacts for a donation,  the benefits of which were used for the Fever Museum, Carrick on Suir, county Tipperary.  Lewis (1837) states the proceeds of the small charge to view his collection averaged about £40 per year. His collection was put up for sale in Sotheby's  London in 1848 and the sale catalogue described this as "A Valuable Assemblage of Irish Antiquities, Armour and Curiosities".    The next year one of his sons, William Anthony who was working in London as an art restorer, sold a number of gold, silver and bronze antiquities to the British Museum.  The quality of Redmond Anthony's collection must have been very impressive indeed.
The pedigree for Walsh of Fanningstown is printed in Burke's Landed Gentry of Ireland 1912.  Peter Walsh married Eliza, daughter of Matthew Hughes of Drinagh, Wexford but they had no children.  She died 20th January 1830 as reported in the Dublin Morning Register.  His brother Philip Walsh of Fiddown married Mary Smith and had at least 5 children.   Peter's father John Walsh (1710-1793)  of Fanningstown married secondly Katherine Connell and had a further two sons by this second wife.  Burke's Landed Gentry only list one of these sons - Thomas Walsh of Fanningstown (1760-1827) from whom the John Walsh who is buried in Kilkieran descends. The second son remains unlisted but we have now found him, John Walsh (1764-1812) and his wife Mary (1762-1833)  in the graveyard at Aghaviller, county Kilkenny.  At Aghaviller there is a worn altar tomb whose flat top is very faded in parts but it reads:-    "DEO OPTIMO MAXIMO. Gloria.  This monument is erected to the memory of Mr John Walsh of Belline who departed this life on May the 15th 1812 aged 48 years.  This sincere Christian highly respected during his life and deeply regretted in death was eminently distinguished for his strict probity, extensive charity and kind and endearing manners.  Also his wife Mrs Mary Walsh who departed this life on the 5th February 1833 aged 71 years. Requiescant in Pace." (We thank Stephen Cassin of the Aghaviller Historical and Cultural Society for his co-operation over this).  This is obviously a Catholic burial.  There remains a mysterious Patrick Walsh Esq.,of Belline whose death aged 48 years is reported  in the Waterford Chronicle dated 7th January 1843 but also reported in The Tipperary Free Press of 31st December 1842 as dying at his residence Belline, aged 50 years!  This paper also reported "his spirit was truly enshrined in the love of a happy tenantry - Mr Walsh had been appointed in early life to the office of under-agent to Lord Duncannon, an office he had  up to his demise.  Duncannon is a Bessborough title so there is clearly a connection but where this Patrick Walsh (1795-1842) fits into the pedigree is almost impossible to say with any accuracy.

A cherub from Piltown

Further reading
1. Aghaviller Historical and Cultural Society,  Aghaviller Graveyard Inscriptions. 2007.
1. Cahill, Mary.  Mr Anthony's Bog Oak Case of Gold Antiquities in Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy: Archaeology, Culture, History, Literature. 1994.
2. Brian de Breffny and Rosemary ffolliott. The Houses of Ireland.  Thames and Hudson, 1992. 
3. Lewis, S.  Topographical Dictionary of Ireland. 1837. 
3. Parker, Sarah.  All in Grace and Favour: a handbook of who lived where at Hampton court Palace. 1750-1950. Historic royal palaces 2005. Seen online 22nd Nov 2018.