Medal Society of Ireland

Kilkenny is an ancient and populous city situated on the banks of the beautiful River Nore, seventy-two miles to the southwest of dear, dirty Dublin. The town is divided into two portions, Irishtown and Englishtown, and previous to the Union each returned a couple of members to the Irish Parliament, having also their own Municipal Government. The city, even at a remote period, was of great ecclesiastical standing, as may be seen from the venerable fragments, so thickly strewn, of churches, abbeys and monasteries; and that it was, moreover, formidable in a mility point of view is testified by the remains of its gates, towers, walls and bastions, and thus its annals corroborate in the obstinate resistance of the feeble garrison, commanded by the intrepid Sir Walter Butler, against the mighty Cromwell, who besieged it in March 1650. The castle, built early in the 13th century on the site of one destroyed by the Irish in 1175, was well calculated for defence from the natural strength of its position, being on the summit of a precipice overhanging the bend of the Nore. On the riverside, the natural barrier was rendered more formidable by the erection of a wall of solid masonry forty feet high; the remaining parts were protected by towers, bastions, curtains and outworks and the castle stood in the centre. It was purchased by James, third Earl of Ormonde, in 1371, from the Earl of Bloucester, and the present castle, the princely residence of the Marquis of Ormonde, hereditary Chief Butler of Ireland. Vice-Admiral of Leinster, Lieutenant and Custom of the County of Kilkenny, retains three round towers of its ancient predecessor. The barracks are situated in Barrack Street, being headquarters of the 5th Battalion Royal Irish Regiment, better known, however, as the Kilkenny Fusiliers, the garrison, as a whole, consisting of one Line regiment. The environs of the city are very picturesque, particularly in the direction of the river, by the banks of which is the beautiful Canal Walk. But few, perhaps, have heard of the peculiar characteristics of Kilkenny, which are: