From the pages of the Down Recorder, August 19, 2002

From the pages of the Down Recorder, August 19, 2002

17 August 2022

TYRELLA – Plans have been unveiled this week to turn Tyrella into a ‘Blue Flag’ standard beach at a cost of up to £150,000. European funding is to be made available to assist Down District Council to enhance the facilities for tourists and visitors.

The council is to receive assistance at a rate of 75 per cent to help provide a new toilet block and warden’s office. There will also be preservation work to help protect the sand dunes at the beach.

Councillors agreed in principle at a meeting on Monday night to upgrade Tyrella, with consultants given a brief to prepared a detailed plan and costings.

However, Ulster Unionist councillor, Mr Walter Lyons, said he believes it could be “a waste of money” as Tyrella is no longer “a jewel on the beach front”. He is demanding that council officers produce figures to show current usage of the beach.

Party colleague, Mr William Brown, says he is “very disappointed” by the current standard of the beach. He believes it is “very second rate” and in need of improvement.

Mr John Doris (SDLP) said he welcomed the commitment of funding to Tyrella which will help bring the beach back to its former glory with the possibility of attaining Blue Flag status.

QUOILE – From beneath the  normally quiet waters of the Quoile River, evidence has emerged which sheds new light on Downpatrick’s historic past.

Divers working with a team of DoE archaeologists close to Inch Abbey have uncovered an array of preserved artefacts, including a dug-out canoe, believe to date from the Bronze Age.

Archaeologists say the finds are “significant” and add weight to the belief that Downpatrick was an important trading centre 2,000 years before the birth of Christ.

They have also discovered remnants of a 16th century bridge or jetty across the river which may provide a clue as to the abbey’s demise more than 400 years old.

They are working on the theory that the bridge may have been used to transport huge amounts of timber, stone and other valuable commodities from the abbey following the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VII in the 1530s.

Members of the Irish Underwater Archaeological Research Team spent ten days combing a section of the river from the abbey to the bridge over the Belfast Road. 

NEWCASTLE – The RUC has issued a warning following the robbery of a prominent Newcastle businessman last week.

Garage owner, Mr Damien Small, was beaten unconscious by a three-man gang who attacked him at his Tullybrannigan Road home.

The gang made off with an undisclosed sum of money and a number of personal items after tying up the businessman and his family and stealing the family car.

It is the second such robbery of a businessman in Newcastle in recent months following an attack on a coal man as he returned to his Middle Tollymore Road home, also late at night.

Police investigating Tuesday night’s incident are appealing for businessmen in the town to be careful when carrying around sums of money, particularly if they intend carrying them home.

“Businessmen who have a large sum of money in their possession should be careful if they intend carrying it home on a regular basis,” he said.

“It is unfortunate that businessmen are forced into taking precautions because of those in our society intent on plundering the good fortune of others,” he added.

The spokesman added that the RUC’s crime prevention officer will be glad to offer advice to any businessman who would like to improve security around his home.

DOWNPATRICK – A fourth Downpatrick family had fled the town’s Flying Horse estate, it emerged this week.

The family, which includes four young children, left its home in the estate. The man was a brother of the three sisters who fled last week.

The disclosure of a fourth family quitting was made when the petrol-bombing attacks were raised as an emergency item at this week’s meeting of Down District Council.

Downpatrick SDLP councillor, Mr John Ritchie, said he was sure his personal feelings of “outrage, anger and sham that such barbaric acts could take place in our town and district” is shared by every councillor and the public generally.

He said the families have lost their homes in the “most brutal circumstances.”

“Nightly as we watch on television the plight of refugees driven from their homes in Bosnia and Croatia, can we contemplate without feeling of revulsion the plight of defenceless women and children cowering in terror as their homes are violated by firebombs, injuring one woman and her young niece?

Mr Ritchie also criticised “the rumour mongers” who seek to justify any atrocity in society. “I repudiate their lies and slanders, and I call on every person of goodwill to face up to the reality of this appalling injustice.”

KILLYLEAGH – Two brothers are the toast of Killyleagh after leading the Field Marshal Montgomery Pipe Band to world success.

Richard and Gordon Parkes are the driving force behind the Carryduff-based band which won the Grade One World Championship in Scotland at the weekend.

It is only the second time piping’s top prize has gone out of Scotland and is the culmination of years of endeavour which has seen the band become the best in Northern Ireland and now the world.

Within minutes of the historic victory, the brothers were on the telephone to their mother, Mrs Jean Parkes, who lives at the Toye, a couple of miles outside Killyleagh off the main Comber Road.

“They were always in with a good chance, but you can never be totally sure. I’m so proud of them,” said a delighted Mrs Parkes.

Richard, pipe major, and Gordon, drum sergeant, have been involved with Field Marshal Montgomery for almost 20 years.

However, their involvement in piping began much earlier as young members of the now defunct Pikestone Band.

The chairman of Killyleagh Town Committee, Mr Gerry Walsh, has expressed his congratulations to the brothers and the band on the achievement.

KILLOUGH – Well known Killough Coastguard officer, Paul Button, knows better than most the standard of care at the Downe Hospital — he was a patient there for 42 weeks.

In 1975 Paul was involved in a serious traffic accident near Kilclief which left him with multiple fractures and only a slim chance of survival.

So serious was his condition at the time that the ambulance men who rushed him away from his wrecked Land Rover told Paul later if they had been going to Belfast he would have been dead by the time they reached Crossgar.

His experiences have convinced him that the Downe Hospital must be retained in Downpatrick if an increased number of fatalities among accident victims is to be avoided.

RAHOLP – Eight new dwellings are to be built at Raholp, outside Downpatrick, in May next year, the Housing Executive announced yesterday.

The Executive said the go-ahead for the “unique scheme” demonstrates its commitment to providing new homes in rural areas.

The new greenfield development will be made up of five three-bedroom houses and three two bedroom bungalows.

An Executive spokesman said: “What makes this scheme unique is that we are responding to a latent, as opposed to existing demand. Normally new build is carried out in response to an existing housing need.

“In this instance, the Executive after carrying out extensive consultation in the locality is confident that a latent demand will emerge for the house to be build in Raholp.”