Bagenal’s Castle (SLP)

This post gives links to material prepared by a Shared Learning Project between members of North Down & Ards and Newry U3A, in association with the Bagenal’s Castle Museum in Newry was undertaken in 2012/13.

The first part of this pack entitled Ireland in Tudor Times  , contains material presented to and accepted by the Newry and Mourne Museum in June 2013.  The SLP group agreed to research the Elizabethan history pertaining to Bagenal’s Castle, on the site of which the Museum is housed and their findings were to be writte n up in a form which would appeal to twelve to thirteen year olds.

Extra material wasoriginally written for the project but, for a variety of reasons, the museum has decided not to include.  Reasons range from being slightly outside the period to be covered, eg Ronnie’s work on the Plantation and the trail prepared by Peter O’Hanlon of Newry U3A, to unsuitability owing to the age of the target audience, for example the play .  Hence the accompanying music, which also ran the risk of infringement of copyright, also had to be omitted, but a copy of the disc is available on application to jhe.gibson@gmail.net.

However I’m very pleased to say that all these omitted sections have already been well-used and appreciated on several occasions but most notably on June 6th 2013. On this beautiful summer day, at an event held at the castle, the original work as a whole was presented to the Museum’s Curator Noreen Cunningham for the first time. About fifty people including members of a number of U3As, the museum staff and other visitors including the Mayor of Newry, were present and were treated to a lively performance of the play and its music. This followed a two-hour long morning bus trip by some of the members to sample the accompanying trail.

We felt therefore that in recognition of the vast amount of time and expertise donated by all members of the team, it was fitting that a copy of the whole project should be made available to all those interested. We hope you enjoy it.