Dublin’s Historian in Residence: sharing our city’s forgotten past

‘One photograph, many stories’, the uncovering of forgotten parts of Dublin’s past by Dublin City Council’s Historian in Residence Catherine Scuffil.

In the small Dolphin’s Barn Library, a crowd of about fifty people pulled up their chairs on a dreary Monday evening. All were there to hear Dublin City Council’s Historian in Residence, Catherine Scuffil, present an excavation of Dublin’s past, lost in time.

The piece is Scuffil’s latest contribution to Dublin City Council’s seventh volume of History on your Doorstep. The printed editions follow the works of the Council’s Historians in Residence in conjunction with the libraries of Ireland.

This event has been delivered in libraries across Dublin over the past few months, highlighting the valuable work of Ireland’s Historians in Residence in the discovery and documentation of forgotten elements of our rich cultural heritage.

Scuffil’s research is entitled ‘One Photograph, Many Stories’. She details how she stumbled across a photograph of Padraig Pearse at a museum. A Dolphin’s Barn native, the description caught her attention, with the photograph apparently having been taken in Crumlin. The discovery of the picture and her recognition of Pearse led to the uncovering of forgotten history, both nationally and internationally.

Scuffil delivers a fascinating account of how following the paper trail of clues from the picture led her to uncover the stories and lives of the Dolphin’s Barn locals in the early 1900s. She hunted down the original image in the archives of the County Library in Tallaght, hoping that someone would have scribbled some information on the back of the original photograph, “like your granny would have done”.

Someone had, with the back of the picture confirming the first appearance of Pearse in uniform in 1915 in Dolphin’s Barn. It was evident that there was a gathering of sorts taking place in the photograph, with Pearse leading it. Pearse being in uniform denoted a political element.

The historian trawled through newspapers and maps from the decade and discovered that Dolphin’s Barn was once a hotspot for elusive events known as ‘aeraíochta’. These events, run by Conradh na Gaeilge, were celebrations and promotions of Irish heritage with traditional music, dancing, prose and speakers and were hugely social affairs. While the discovery of Pearse’s presence is intriguing in itself, Scuffil dove deeper to uncover who was there with Pearse that day and why.

Aided only with maps and newspapers from the era, she delved further into the stories of the locals, and this led her to research one family, the McCanns. Having encountered the name of one of the sons, Alexander McCann, in a World War I death notice previously, Scuffil trawled through census and newspapers, piecing together the timeline of the McCann family’s lives.

The stories of the family, spanning decades and countries, are those of war, illness and death. They are fascinating, albeit devastating. Their names can be found on plaques in the Dolphin’s Barn Church, seen by hundreds over the years, but their stories were unknown until now.

From just one picture, Scuffil has uncovered the many intertwined stories of famous historical figures and the ordinary people of Dublin’s past.

At the end of her event in Dolphin’s Barn Library, Catherine Scuffil encouraged the audience to chase down paper trails and uncover the stories hidden in the past. The annual publication History on your Doorstep is available in Dublin City libraries and to download online.