School: Finea (roll number 10599)
- Location:
- Finnea, Co. Westmeath
- Teacher: Kathleen Hackett
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0719, Page 005
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On this page
- The Black Fever
About 73 years ago a black plague or fever visited this district. It first broke out in a family named Uictory's who lived in Cornacrievy Finea. Two of them died and when they died they turned black. At first the people did not seem to mind about it. It was only when some others got it the people became afraid.At the shore of the Lake Sheelin in the middle of the bog there was a family named Sherdans. They all got the fever and the father and mother died. No one would go to the funeral and two men carried it on their backs across the bog until they reached the road where they put it on a cart and brought it to Castletown graveyard and buried it. The priest wouldn't go to the funeral. Along with those people named Gilchrists died in Finea, also a boy named Galligan and another man named Stratford.
- Collector
- Nellie Reilly
- Gender
- Female
- Address
- Finnea, Co. Westmeath
- Informant
- Miss Annie Coyle
- Gender
- Female
- Age
- 76
- Address
- Williamstown, Co. Westmeath
