Mayo history: Rivalry between Belmullet and Binghamstown recalled

By Tom Gillespie

THE Irish Fishery Board was set up in 1819 to promote the development of the Irish fishery industry. The board received a grant of £5,000, from which it paid bounties for boats and on catches and issued loans for boat building and net-mending.

The board employed the pioneering Scottish engineer Alexander Nimmo, who came to Ireland in 1811 and remained in the country until the time of his death in 1832.

During this time he was employed by a number of government bodies in various key road building projects.

Clifden born author Kathleen Villiers-Tuthill, in her 2006 book Alexander Nimmo and The Western District, described his visit to Mayo and in particular the construction of piers and roads in the Mullet region in 1820.

He wrote: The construction of piers and the laying down of new roads in the Mullet peninsula prompted William Henry Carter, the proprietor of one-third of Erris, to visit the estate. It was now possible to make the trip from Castlebar to the Mullet in one day, ‘about 50 English miles’, and the possibilities for further developing the region were becoming increasingly apparent.

Carter was only the second member of his family to ever visit the Mayo estate, although it had been in their possession for almost a century.

Accompanied by his agent, Rev. Cecil Crampton, and with Patrick Knight acting as his guide, Carter quickly recognised the advantages of building a town on the isthmus of Belmullet and instructed Knight to ‘make the necessary plans’.

Carter instructed Knight to build a pier at Belmullet. Nimmo, on viewing the pier while under construction, declared it inadequate for the needs of the town and he convinced the Fishery Board to raise funds, in addition to a smaller contribution from Carter, to complete the works to a more satisfactory state.

Knight decided to take the task even further and contributed funds of his own (£227.1.1d) to ensure that his pier at Belmullet would be of similar standard, if not superior, to any other on the peninsula.

The town developed rapidly and by 1824 boasted a store, several small shops, and almost all the building lots had been taken.

The store was full with oats and barley and two cargos had already been shipped that season.

Over the years there was a certain amount of rivalry between Binghamstown and Belmullet and officials lined up behind Binghamstown and Carter to offer opinions on the advantage of one over the other.

Knight was, needless to say, very much in Carter’s camp and was inclined to downgrade Binghamstown in his book, Erris in The Irish Highlands, while at the same time paying tribute to Bingham as an improving landlord.

The Fishery Board inspector William King was supportive of Bingham’s efforts to establish Binghamstown and of Nimmo’s choice of site for a pier at Saleen.

Donnell, in 1826, praised the location of Saleen pier over that of Belmullet, for the advantage of the fisheries.

He felt Binghamstown should be viewed as a supply centre for the fishery and a market for fish. But just two years later he was favouring Belmullet.

He was obviously impressed by the rapid growth of Belmullet: ‘A few years back there were only some scattered thatched cabins about this place, and a single boat of 60 or 70 tons was found sufficient to take away the whole agricultural produce.

‘At present there is a regular village, which is rapidly expanding; most of the houses two stories high, and slated. There are also respectable stores for merchandise imported, including all materials necessary for boat-building, fishing, etc.,’ and fish and corn were exported.

In the previous December a large schooner had taken shelter at the unfinished pier during a storm, without sustaining any damage: ‘She was taking in a cargo of corn; of which there is now a considerable export’.

A large number of boats were built in the district in 1825 and these sold to fishermen on credit, ‘payment being taken in fish, oil, or any other exportable commodity’.

Binghamstown was not advancing to the same extent; ‘a street, containing many houses (was) built; some public buildings, and a large store were also commenced, but they as yet remain unfinished’.

Nimmo supported the establishment of both towns and of both piers; indeed he suggested other piers for the west coast of the Mullet, but the Fishery Board did not sanction these.

However, as developments continued he came to the conclusion that Belmullet was better placed that Binghamstown for the material development of the district.

The extension by Knight of the Central Erris Board to Belmullet completed the domination of this town over the latter, and convinced Nimmo to terminate his north coast road at the same place, and not at Doonkeeghan as was previously planner.

William Knight was the first to suggest to the Fisheries Board that a channel be cut across the isthmus of Belmullet from Broadhaven to Blacksod Bay, although the notion had been tossed about for many years.

In 1822 the Fisheries Board considered his suggestion, but decided that they had insufficient funds to carry it through.

Nimmo put the suggestion forward in 1824, for the improvements of communications along the coast. The channel would, he wrote, permit boats to pass at high water from one haven the other, as each of its inlets dry to a considerable distance at low water, and Broadhaven (sic) in particular is shallow at the head’.

He outlined the works needed and estimated the cost at about £5,000.

He attached a plan of the isthmus, and the probable direction of the cut. He indicated that the ‘cut would permit the passage, in most tides, of such vessels as use the Forth and Clyde Canal, and would certainly be a great convenience in the time of the fishery’.

The Sound of Achill, he pointed out, ‘permits vessels of the class of coasters to pass at high water and with the proposed cut at Belmullet we would have a kind of inland navigation from Westport to the bay of Donegal’.

The work was later carried out under the Board of Works during the Great Famine; it was funded by government and local contribution and completed in 1851.

A swivel bridge was put in place to maintain land communication with the mainland.

A fixed bridge more recently replaced this, once again cutting off sailing access from one bay to the other.