A WICKLOW resident whose bank collapsed amid revelations that as chairman he availed of large personal loans and engaged in dubious financial practices, will be remembered in Enniskerry, Co Wicklow next April. As part of celebrations to mark their 150th anniversaries, three parishes will launch a “graveyard trail” taking in some of the famous – or infamous – people buried locally. William Shaw’s grave is among those on the trail.
Shaw was chairman of Munster Bank when a run on the bank happened in 1885. It emerged that Shaw, who was also a politician, received a personal loan of £80,000, while dividends that were seen as too generous were paid to him and other directors at a cost to the shareholders.
The New York Times reported on July 14th, 1885, that the directors’ conduct had amounted to “plain fraud”. The Munster Bank was liquidated but was quickly replaced by the Munster and Leinster Bank which took on much of the business. It was subsequently subsumed into Allied Irish Banks.
Shaw, who represented Co Cork in the Westminster Parliament, did not contest the 1885 general election, which took place just months before the collapse of his bank. He was ruined and reduced to working in journalism before retiring to Enniskerry, where he settled with his sister in a house on Church Hill, passing away in September 1895.
Prior to the collapse of his bank, Shaw had been a well-respected businessman and independent Liberal MP, a nationalist and leader of the Home Rule movement between the tenures of Butt and Parnell.
More than 100 years after his death, he is to be commemorated by three local churches – St Patrick’s Church of Ireland at Powerscourt where he is buried, St Mary’s Catholic Church in the village and Kilbride Church of Ireland at Kilcroney.
As well as Shaw, those who rest in St Patrick’s include artist Paul Henry, who died in August 1958. Henry was a Northern Irish artist who painted the west of Ireland landscape with a spare post-impressionist style. In the 1920s and 1930s he was Ireland’s best known artist. The National Gallery of Ireland held a major exhibition of his work in 2004.
The graveyard also houses the remains of Lieut Gen Sir Arthur Purves Phayre, a career army officer who was the first commissioner of British Burma, 1862-1867, governor of Mauritius, 1874-1878, and author.
St Mary’s Catholic Church and St Patrick’s Church of Ireland were built with the financial support of the seventh viscount of Powerscourt.
St Mary’s replaced a temporary building in the village called Dixon’s Barn in 1859. The two Church of Ireland buildings date from the same year.
A 64-page yearbook with features about the history of the village and the three churches over the last 150 years has also been published to mark the anniversaries.
Enniskerry – Celebrating 150 Years of its Three Parish Churches is available (price €10) from the parish offices.
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(Source: IT)