Forkhill

Forkhill or Forkill is a small village and civil parish in south County Down, Northern Ireland, in the ancient barony of Upper Orior. It is within the Ring of Gullion and in the 2011 Census it had a recorded population of 498. The name is pronounced either or and comes from the Irish foirceal, meaning "trough" or "hollow". This may refer to the village's position on flat land between the large hills of Tievecrom (to the east) and Croslieve (to the west). HistoryThe land in the parish was awarded by Elizabeth I to Capt. Thomas Chatterton and by James II to Lord Audley on condition of English settlement, but by 1659 it was still almost entirely occupied by native Irish people. Following the terms of a trust set up by a subsequent owner, Richard Jackson, much of the property was declared waste and resettled in 1787-91 with a view to encouraging the linen industry, most of the new settlers being Protestants. This was followed by serious breaches of the peace, which have been attributed not to sectarianism but by L. M. Cullen to political disputes among the gentry, and by David Millar to weakening social disciplines on the increasingly independent class of skilled linen weavers, both Protestant and Catholic. The Defenders emerged around Forkhill in the early 1790s, and were responsible in 1791 for an attack on the family of the local schoolmaster, Alexander Berkley, which was so savage as to be remembered with horror and indignation for over hundred years, both in the village and (although the Berkley attack was not provoked by sectarian motives) more widely across the Orange community. Belmont, a military barracks, was set up in the parish in 1795, and a Forkhill Yeomanry in 1796; and a clash with United Irishmen in May 1797 along with the torching of Forkhill Lodge was followed by a policy of military terror which locally undermined the planned 1798 rising to the point of paralysis.

Forkhill or Forkill is a small village and civil parish in south County Down, Northern Ireland, in the ancient barony of Upper Orior. It is within the Ring of Gullion and in the 2011 Census it had a recorded population of 498. The name is pronounced either or and comes from the Irish foirceal, meaning "trough" or "hollow". This may refer to the village's position on flat land between the large hills of Tievecrom (to the east) and Croslieve (to the west). HistoryThe land in the parish was awarded by Elizabeth I to Capt. Thomas Chatterton and by James II to Lord Audley on condition of English settlement, but by 1659 it was still almost entirely occupied by native Irish people. Following the terms of a trust set up by a subsequent owner, Richard Jackson, much of the property was declared waste and resettled in 1787-91 with a view to encouraging the linen industry, most of the new settlers being Protestants. This was followed by serious breaches of the peace, which have been attributed not to sectarianism but by L. M. Cullen to political disputes among the gentry, and by David Millar to weakening social disciplines on the increasingly independent class of skilled linen weavers, both Protestant and Catholic. The Defenders emerged around Forkhill in the early 1790s, and were responsible in 1791 for an attack on the family of the local schoolmaster, Alexander Berkley, which was so savage as to be remembered with horror and indignation for over hundred years, both in the village and (although the Berkley attack was not provoked by sectarian motives) more widely across the Orange community. Belmont, a military barracks, was set up in the parish in 1795, and a Forkhill Yeomanry in 1796; and a clash with United Irishmen in May 1797 along with the torching of Forkhill Lodge was followed by a policy of military terror which locally undermined the planned 1798 rising to the point of paralysis.