Royalty, presidents and hurlers: The fascinating history and architecture of Kilkenny Railway Station

With Kilkenny being a city of Royal Charter by King James I in 1609, legend has it that the city was prioritised for a railway line as far back as 1837.

One of three Parliamentary Acts passed in 1837 was for a line from Dublin to Kilkenny. The first public steam-powered railway in the world was the Stockton and Darlington Railway in England, which opened in 1825.

The first railway built in Ireland was the Dublin to Kingstown line built in 1834. Its claim was that it was the oldest commuter line in the world. The Kilkenny line joined the Dublin-Cork line at Cherryville Junction just south west of Kildare town.

The first section of the Kilkenny to Waterford line built by Messrs Wright & O’Toole for the Waterford to Kilkenny Railway Company commenced construction in 1846 and opened as far as Thomastown on May 11, 1848. Kilkenny Station had been completed in 1847.

The Kilkenny-Waterford line joined the Dublin-Cork line at Cherryville Junction just south-west of Kildare town. The Board Minutes for August 5, 1846 report that Captain Moorsom, the engineer, presented a ‘Design for a terminus station at Kilkenny which was generally approved of.

On May 12, 1847 Moorsom reported that a modified plan for the station had been made by Sancton Wood to permit it to take traffic of the proposed Kilkenny to Carlow track (operated by the ISER) which opened on November 14, 1950.

The first plan of the station was estimated at €14,000 but when finished in late 1847 costs had risen to €30,471. The original main passenger entrance to the station was through the western façade but this was later adapted to facilitate the new Kilkenny to Maryborough (Portlaoise) line which opened in 1867.
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This line was further extended to Mountmellick. It had originally opened for a brief three-month spell as far as Abbeyleix in 1864 but this service was not economically viable. This line joined the Dublin-Cork line at the Conniberry Junction just south of Portlaoise.

The engineer and the architect
Captain William Scarth Moorson: An English military and civil engineer, Moorsom first came to Ireland as a young man in 1823, when he joined the 79th Regiment, then stationed in Dublin.

In addition to carrying out his regular duties, he made a trigonometrical survey of Dublin and its surroundings which was used in the Quartermaster General’s Office until it was superseded by the Ordnance Survey of Ireland.

He left the army and became a civil engineer, specialising in railway work. His skills were much in demand during the great burst of railway building in the mid-1840s, and he was brought into contact with Ireland again when he laid out the Great Western Line from Naas to Galway, the Waterford and Kilkenny line (from 1846), and the South Eastern Railway from Carlow to Kilkenny (1848-50).

He designed the station at Kilkenny and the viaduct over the River Nore near Thomastown for the Waterford and Kilkenny Railway Company. His original design was adapted by Sancton Wood.

Sancton Wood (April 27, 1814 – April 18, 1886) was an English architect and surveyor, known for his work on railway buildings. Wood obtained work in the office of his cousin, the architect Robert Smirke, as a pupil.

He later worked for Robert’s brother, Sydney Smirke. In these positions he was trained in classical architecture, which led to his early recognition.

He set up his own practice in England and obtained work designing stations for the growing railway networks in Great Britain and Ireland. He designed one of London’s first train terminals in 1837, for Eastern Counties Railway at Shoreditch.

In 1845, he won the competition to design the Kingsbridge terminus and Company offices at Dublin (now known as Heuston Station), winning against 65 other designs. Wood continued to work in Ireland for a number of years, designing stations between Dublin and Cork for Great Southern and Western, and on the Limerick Junction.

He was also engaged to design a stand at the Curragh racecourse. He also designed the Bagenalstown, Thurles and Portlaoise Railway Stations.

NIAH ENTRY
The National Inventory of Architectural Heritage describes Kilkenny MacDonagh Station as follows: “The remains of a once-extensive Classically-detailed railway station built as a terminus to designs prepared by Captain William Scarth Moorsom (1804-63) and as modified by Sancton Wood (c1814-86) who was also responsible for subsequent modifications to adapt the building to use as a through-line station to Maryborough/Portlaoise....

“The construction in yellow brick produces a distinctive palette while refined dressings in County Kilkenny limestone displaying expert masonry enhance the design aesthetic of the composition.

“The station remains of particular importance for the associations with the development of the Waterford and Maryborough [Portlaoise] Branch extension of the Great Southern and Western Railway line by the Kilkenny Junction Railway Company in 1867.”

Royalty, Presidents and Hurlers
Notable figures to have travelled by train to Kilkenny were King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra in 1904 on a three-day visit to the Butler’s at Kilkenny Castle.

They also visited St James’ Park for the Kilkenny Agricultural Show. Queen Margrethe II of Denmark also stopped off on her way to Waterford in 1978.

Presidents De Valera, Robinson and McAleese were frequent users of the rail network during their terms in office. The Kilkenny hurling team for many years travelled by train to and from Croke Park for All-Ireland hurling finals.

With the formation of the Irish Free State in 1922 a gradual change began to take place in the Railway Company to make what had been up to then a very British institution. Many of the Station Masters had been ex British military personnel.
CIE was formed as a private company by The Transport Act 1944 and it incorporated the Great Southern Railways and Dublin United Transport Company. CIE came into being on January 1, 1945.

The year 1966 was a very significant year in terms of the ‘Irishness’ of the company when many of the major stations around the country were renamed after executed leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising. Kilkenny was renamed MacDonagh after Thomas MacDonagh a native of Cloughjordan, Tipperary, who had been a professor at St Kieran’s College in the early years of the 20th Century.

A major reconfiguration of the Station took place in 1997 when the ticket and parcels office, station master’s office, café and so forth moved up track to a repurposed former Goods Shed building.

The year 2005 saw a portion of the old railway station complex acquired by the developers of MacDonagh Junction Shopping Centre. In fairness to the developers they restored, refurbished and repurposed the historic railway buildings on their property such as the former main Goods Shed, waiting rooms and offices.

Then, 2009 brought further significant change with the introduction of the push and pull locomotives by Iarnrod Eireann, thus negating the need for locomotives to decouple from the train to do the runaround.

The old station complex was now closed off completely and abandoned by CIE. The Victorian platform footbridge linking the two platforms was also closed off at this time.

Military Connection
In December 2021, a beautiful War Memorial Plaque featuring the names of many of the 3,271 soldiers from County Kilkenny who served in World War I was unveiled at a seated shelter at the Railway Station by Bishops Nulty and Burrows in a joint ecumenical service.

The connection between the military and Kilkenny Railway Station probably dates as far back to the Crimean War 1853-1856 and the Boer Wars 1899-1902. Certainly, many soldiers who served at Kilkenny military barracks would have also served during these wars.

Seven trees were planted at the station in 2016 to commemorate the seven signatories to the Proclamation of the Republic in 1916 one of whom was Thomas MacDonagh. In 2023, a commemorative plaque was unveiled to mark the 175th anniversary of the opening of the station.

Sources
National Inventory of Architectural Heritage, Railways in Ireland 1834-1984, Kilkenny Its Architecture and History, Kilkenny People Newspaper and Wikipedia.