County Longford Guide (An Longfort)
“The Slashers” - in the province of Leinster. County town: Longford.
Quiet midlands county on the Royal Canal, Goldsmith country.
A small, gentle midlands county on the Royal Canal and the upper Shannon, Longford is lakeland Ireland at its most peaceful. It’s Goldsmith country - the poet Oliver Goldsmith drew on its landscapes - and home to the remarkable Corlea Trackway, an Iron Age bog road built in 148 BC and preserved for over two thousand years.
Longford rewards the traveller who slows down. One of Ireland's smallest counties, tucked between the Shannon and the drumlins of the north midlands, it was for centuries the Gaelic kingdom of Annaly, ruled by the O'Farrells - a name still everywhere in the county. Its western boundary is the Shannon and the broad waters of Lough Ree, its southern reaches are Goldsmith country, and its bogs concealed one of Irish archaeology's great treasures: the Corlea Trackway, a massive oak road laid across the bog in 148 BC and now displayed where it was found near Kenagh.
For a quiet county, Longford's literary and revolutionary footprint is remarkable. Oliver Goldsmith grew up around Ballymahon; Maria Edgeworth wrote her pioneering novels at Edgeworthstown; Padraic Colum, poet of the Irish revival, was born in Longford town. The 1798 Rebellion ended in tragedy at Ballinamuck, where the Franco-Irish army made its last stand, and General Seán Mac Eoin, the Blacksmith of Ballinalee, made the county famous in the War of Independence. Today the restored St Mel's Cathedral crowns Longford town, and Center Parcs at Ballymahon has brought a new wave of visitors to a county long overlooked.
Cities, towns and villages in Longford
- Longford - The county town on the River Camlin, dominated by the magnificently restored St Mel's Cathedral and long a garrison and market centre.
- Granard - A hilltop town crowned by one of Ireland's finest Norman mottes, known for its harp festival and as the home of Kitty Kiernan.
- Edgeworthstown - Home of the remarkable Edgeworth family, where novelist Maria Edgeworth lived and wrote Castle Rackrent.
- Ballymahon - A broad-streeted town on the River Inny at the heart of Goldsmith country, with Center Parcs Longford Forest nearby.
- Lanesborough - A gateway town where the Shannon enters Lough Ree, long known for its power station and its hot-water stretch beloved of anglers.
- Ardagh - An award-winning heritage village associated with St Mel, who founded a church here in the fifth century.
- Newtownforbes - An estate village beside Castle Forbes, seat of the Earls of Granard and one of the longest continuously occupied family castles in Ireland.
- Drumlish - A village at the foot of Cairn Hill with strong traditions of country music and emigration.
- Abbeyshrule - A tranquil village on the Inny and the Royal Canal, home to a ruined Cistercian abbey and a well-known small airfield.
- Kenagh - The village closest to the Corlea Trackway visitor centre, where an Iron Age bog road is preserved in situ.
Famous people from Longford
- Oliver Goldsmith - Author of The Vicar of Wakefield and She Stoops to Conquer, born at Pallas near Ballymahon and reared in the county's south.
- Maria Edgeworth - Pioneering novelist who spent most of her life at Edgeworthstown, where she wrote Castle Rackrent, often called the first regional novel in English.
- Seán Mac Eoin - The Blacksmith of Ballinalee, celebrated IRA commander in the War of Independence and later a government minister.
- Kitty Kiernan - Granard woman famous as the fiancée of Michael Collins, whose letters to her are among the most read documents of the revolutionary era.
- Padraic Colum - Poet, playwright and folklorist of the Irish literary revival, born in Longford town in 1881.
- Albert Reynolds - Taoiseach from 1992 to 1994 and a key architect of the Northern Ireland peace process, who built his business empire and political base in Longford.
- Ray Flynn - Longford-born athlete who has held the Irish mile record since 1982 and became a leading international athletics agent.
- Declan Nerney - Country music star from Drumlish, one of the best-known figures on the Irish country scene.
- St Mel - Fifth-century bishop, traditionally a nephew of St Patrick, who founded the church at Ardagh and gave his name to Longford's cathedral.
Did you know?
- The Corlea Trackway near Kenagh is a massive Iron Age oak road built in 148 BC - the largest trackway of its kind uncovered in Europe, with an 18-metre stretch preserved under cover where it was found.
- The 1798 Rebellion effectively ended at the Battle of Ballinamuck in north Longford, where the combined French and Irish force under General Humbert was finally defeated.
- St Mel's Cathedral in Longford town was gutted by fire on Christmas morning 2009 and reopened in 2014 after one of the largest church restoration projects ever undertaken in Ireland.
- The county takes its name from the Irish longphort, a fortress or stronghold of the O'Farrells, who ruled the territory as the kingdom of Annaly for centuries.
- Maria Edgeworth's Castle Rackrent (1800), written at Edgeworthstown, was admired by Jane Austen and credited by Walter Scott as an inspiration for his own novels.
- The Royal Canal completes its 146-kilometre journey from Dublin at Richmond Harbour in Clondra, where it meets the River Shannon.
- Center Parcs Longford Forest, opened near Ballymahon in 2019, was one of the largest single tourism investments in the history of the Irish state.
- The Norman motte at Granard is among the highest and best preserved in Ireland, marking the north-western limit of the early Anglo-Norman advance.
Surnames from Longford: O'Farrell · Flood · Fox · Gaffney · McCormack