I
remember going to school by boat. We lived in a remote area in
Co. Fermanagh near the border with Co. Cavan on a farm on the
shores of Lough Erne. Before the building of Galloon Bridge in
1926 we would have been an island community. Our farm was not
linked to a road; we were about a mile and a half from the
nearest road walking through the fields or half a mile across
the “Lough”. The Lough was our highway or road and the boat
our principle mode of transport. There were many advantages by
going by boat, it was certainly faster and weight was not a
factor once the cargo was aboard. Before the Lough Erne drainage
scheme was implemented many farms including our own was prone to
flooding. We lost about 10 acres under water from November to
April each year.
Our
boat would have difficulty in traversing the shallow flood
water; it was then that the Fermanagh Cott came in to its own.
For those not familiar with this type of craft it was basically
an oblong flat-bottomed craft with no keel allowing it to travel
in shallow water and was rowed with very long oars for better
leverage obliging the oarsman to row or “pull the Cott” with
crossed arms, an acquired technique. There were three sizes of
Cott, the most popular and the one most us families used was the
“Wee Cott” capable of performing most domestic chores
relating to the small farm including ferrying us kids to school.
Some larger farms made use of a slightly larger Cott this craft
was known as “A lump of a Cott” capable of transporting a
few young calves enclosed in a “Rail” around to prevent any
unfortunate animal for going for an unpredicted swim. The
largest Cott and the only one I knew about at that time was the
“Big Cott” which was housed at Crom Castle we called it the
“Crom Cott” and was used by the workers on Crom Estate to
transport larger cattle to their outlying farms. Our Cott was
prominently a winter craft performing a wide range of duties
ranging from taking the daily milk churns across to the creamery
stand, transporting meal rations for the animals; the hens to
which I seem to remember we had quite a lot of required their
special brand of meal. Egg production was a vital part of the
farm income at that time. Everyone had a role to play and chores
to do, from parents to the youngest member of the family.
Egg collecting being one of my after school chores,
cracked ones were used in the home made soda bread cakes. I
think we were reared on these; a shop bought loaf was a treat in
those bygone days.
Saturday was my favourite day of the week not because we were
off school (as I happened to like school and my teacher, but
that’s another story) but we got to go to town on a shopping
trip. This necessitated downing on our Sunday clothes and
Wellingtons, tying out shoes around our necks and carefully
making our way to the Lough shore into the Cott and across to
“Darlins landing” where we carefully (under pain of being
left there if we got dirty) made our way up to the lane which
after half a mile or so walking we arrived at the tarmac road
where we had our hiding place, there we placed our Wellingtons
and changed into our shoes. My father and mother had bicycles
which were kept in “Rehills barn” but by the time they
bicycles wheels were pumped and the bikes cleaned after Rehills
hens, which seemed to take delight in using they handlebars as
convenient perches, we had walked more than halfway to town. We took delight in being able to
name all the houses and lanes leading to off road farms on our
way to town, if we by chance were to meet someone we were
careful not to speak first, be seen and not heard was one of the
lessons we were taught. Cars were few and far between in the
early 50`s and we knew the sound of each vehicle long before it
came into view.
Treats in those days was usually a tupanny (two penny) bag of
sweets in the winter or an ice-cream in the summer which I
remember as being made in the shop and was always lumpy but
delicious and well worth the trip. Looking at the shop windows
and seeing all the delights which we could never afford was high
on the chatting list at school the following week, from Davie
Crockets hat to Bowie’s knife to Hopalong Cassidy’s six
shooters. I am sure the girls had there favourite dolls to talk
about as well.
Our
needs were simple because we knew no better, we were in harmony
with nature because we had to be, we had respect for everybody
and their property because we were taught so, but most of all
despite all of our hard ship we were happy.
