Portions of the Parishes of St Catherine and St Nicholas Without

The portions of the parishes lying outside the City or Dublin include the townlands of Argos, Cherry Orchard, Haroldscross, Haroldscross West, Mountjerome, Rathland East and West. **

Harold’s Cross**

The suburb of Dublin known as Harold’s Cross, in which the cemetery of Mount Jerome is situated, lies to the east of the parish of Crumlin between that parish and the modern Rathmines. It is included in the Rathmines township, and during recent years many of its ancient characteristics have disappeared owing to the increase of houses, and the transformation of a bare and unattractive common into a public garden.

Harold’s Cross stands on lands which formed, like those of Rathmines, part of the manor of St. Sepulchre, and its name is said to have originated in a cross which marked the boundary of the lands of the Archbishop of Dublin, and warned the Harolds, the wild guardians of the border of the Pale near Whitechurch3 that they must not encroach.

As mentioned in the history of Whitechurch, the lands which the Harolds occupied extended at one time almost if not quite to Harold’s Cross, and the relations between them and the Archbishop of Dublin did not permit generally of friendly intercourse. If by any chance one of the border men dared to intrude he found at Harold’s Cross a rude reminder of the power of the Archbishop’s courts, for it was the place of execution for the manor of St. Sepulchre, and a gallows which stood there warned the wrong-doer of the fate that might attend him.

From very early times the road through Harold’s Cross, which until the last century was the direct route to Rathfarnham and the mountain district beyond, is mentioned, and from it some of the Harold’s Cross lands were called in the fourteenth century the Pass. Other parts of the lands were then known as Campus Sancti Patricii and Russel Rath, which has been corrupted into Rathland, and amongst the tenants we find William Moenes of Rathmines and Nicholas Sueterby.

The name Mount Jerome occurs first in a Commonwealth Survey. It is not improbable that it was derived from the occupation of part of the Harold’s Cross lands by the Rev. Stephen Jerome, now known as the author of one of the rarest of English printed books, and in his day a writer and preacher of some celebrity.

For, although not mentioned in any notice of him Jerome, who was a graduate of Cambridge University, was for some years a beneficed clergyman in Dublin, and in 1639 was vicar of St. Kevin’s parish in which the lands of Harold’s Cross then actually lay. He is said to have come to Ireland as a chaplain to the great Earl of Cork.

After the Rebellion Jerome was appointed a special preacher at St Patrick’s Cathedral “to stir up the devotion of the congregation and to instruct the soldiers in those times,” and brought on himself the censure of the Irish House of Lords by his advocacy of Puritan opinions.

During the Commonwealth the lands of Mount Jerome were held, together with other lands to the west of the highway, by Sir Adam Loftus of Rathfarnham, and the lands to the east of the highway, between “Acres alias Harold’s Cross” and Rathmines, by Sir William Ussher of Donnybrook.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century the lands of Mount Jerome, which had become the property of the Earl of Meath, were the site of a substantial house. This house is doubtless incorporated in the handsome old mansion now to be seen in the cemetery, and was approached like the latter by an avenue “lined on each side with trees and quick sets.”

It was occupied in 1706, when his death took place, by Mr. Daniel Falkiner, the father of Mr. John Falkiner of Nangor Castle in Clondalkin parish.. From him also descend the Falkiners of Abbotstown on whose last representative a baronetcy was conferred.

Harold’s Cross was then a very rural village with two houses of entertainment known respectively as the “Cat and Bagpipes” and the “Cherry Tree,” and near it there were several mills, including the upper mills and the wind mill, the way mill, and the wood mill.

During the next hundred years Harold’s Cross was a favourite summer retreat for the Dublin citizens, and physicians considered its air specially beneficial to invalids.

About the middle of the eighteenth century Mount Jerome was the residence of the Wilkinson family now represented, as mentioned under Terenure, by Sir Frederick Shaw of Bushy Park. It belonged to Mr. Abraham Wilkinson, who died while residing at Mount Jerome in 1764, and who was father of the owner of Bushy Park, but other members of the family are mentioned in connection with the place, including Mrs. Peter Wilkinson, whose death is announced in 1759 as taking place at Mount Jerome, and Mr. George Wilkinson, who died in 1786, while residing at Harold’s Cross.

The family of Weld was also for many years resident at Harold’s Cross, the most prominent member of the family being Dr. Isaac Weld, who was minister of a Baptist meeting house in Eustace-street, and “a gentleman of exemplary piety and virtue”.

Amongst other inhabitants we find the last Earl of Roscommon, a man of the most excellent and charitable disposition, who died at Harold’s Cross in 1746, and Arthur Rochford, a brother of the first Lord Belvedere, who died there in 1774.

Before the close the last century, about the year 1784, Mount Jerome, which is described in his time as “a venerable mansion embowered in trees,” was purchased by Mr. John Keogh one of the leaders in the early movement for Catholic emancipation. He is said to have been a man of great natural ability endowed with much power as a nervous and persuasive speaker, and a great fortune acquired by his own exertions bears witness to his talent for business.

Mount Jerome was his constant residence until his death in 1817, and it was from his descendants that the Cemetery Company in 1835 purchased the house and lands. About the year 1789 the Harold’s Cross inhabitants found it necessary to establish a patrol to guard the roads and received high praise for “their spirited endeavours to bring offenders to justice.”

Wire mills which then stood near the green attracted much public attention, and inns with the signs of the “Royal Oak” and the “Old Grinder’s Joy” restored, which are still recollected, were probably at the end of the eighteenth century popular resorts.

Harold’s Cross continued to be frequented by invalids for many years after the opening of the nineteenth century, and the house so celebrated as providing a refuge for Robert Emmet must in his time have been quite a country one.

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