Lahardane

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Lahardane (Irish: Leathardán)(Mayo) is a small village in the parish of Addergoole County Mayo, Ireland, adjacent to Lough Conn and to Nephin, and close to the towns of Crossmolina, Castlebar and Ballina. Population is about 500, but rising rapidly due to new housing developments.

Historically, the people of Lahardane and the surrounding area helped the French army under General Humbert during the 1798 uprising when the local priest, Fr Andrew Conroy, led French and Irish forces to Castlebar though the Windy Gap, a passage though the Mountains. The British forces had been expecting the French to go to Foxford first, and were caught off-guard. This led to the "Races of Castlebar". After the uprising was put down, Fr Conroy was hung on the Mall in Castlebar, and buried probably in the old abbey in Addergoole cemetery. A Celtic cross now stands proudly in Lahardane as a memorial to his bravery.The cross was erected in 1937 by Michéal Ó Tiomanaidhe, the famous Gaelic scholar, Irish writer and folklore collector who was born in Cartoon in the parish of Addergoole on 20th September 1853.

Addergoole parish suffered the largest proportionate loss for any locality probably in the world when the RMS Titanic sank in 1912. The Addergoole Fourteen boarded the ship at Queenstown (Cobh). Three survived the disaster. There is a plaque in St Patrick's Church, Lahardane to the memory of the fourteen.

There is more than one Lahardane in the Irish Republic. The location of Lahardane (Mayo)is at coordinates: Latitude 54° 1'49.30"N Longitude 9°18'49.18"W

[edit] Lahardane in Fiction

Lahardane is the name of the house in the 2002 novel, The Story of Lucy Gault, by William Trevor. The novel is set on the south coast of Ireland and, other than the name, there is no connection with the Mayo village.