Carrickfergus History

28/02/2024

New photographs have emerged that show the bones of more than 140 people discovered during the excavation of a site close to where an abbey once stood centuries ago in Co Antrim.The Irish News revealed that the skeletons, 120 complete and 26 partial remains, were found during the “very complex” ...

19/08/2022

Today is World Photography Day.
This is the date that recognises the invention of the Daguerrotype, a process devised by the French artist and photographer Louis Daguerre in 1837. His idea was sold to the French Academy of Sciences who basically gifted this invention to the world on the 19th of August 1839.
I have posted what I believe to be the oldest local photo that I have in my collection. I think this was taken in 1860 - just 23 years after the invention of the Daguerrotype.

24/05/2022

Carrickfergus Military Detention Barracks - Can You Help?

Can you provide any information relating to the Detention Barracks at Sullatober?

This building was a "Royal Naval Detention Centre" and was operated as such in 1942.

Royal Australian Navy "Admiralty Fleet Orders" of January 1943 state "Offenders sentenced to detention in Northern Ireland should be sent to the MILITARY DETENTION BARRACKS, CARRICKFERGUS"

ANY information would be very much appreciated.

11/11/2018

27/10/2018

Gifted to Carrickfergus by Lord Shaftesbury, Shaftesbury Park was previously called Deer Park. The land was owned by the Chichesters going back to the 1600s, and going back further may have been associated with the Franciscan Friary.

24/10/2018

St. Nicholas Church grounds

03/09/2018

03/09/2018

28/08/2018

Not Carrick, but the historic Bank Buildings in Belfast City Centre have now been essentially gutted right down to the ground floor, after a fire broke out on the roof at about 11am this morning.

Aside from the fact that the building had been recently refurbished by Primark, and a new extension to the store due to open, the building is an historic landmark building for Belfast and Northern Ireland in general, dating back to the late 1700s, and immediately recognisable in many early photographs of High Street and Castle Place.

The main thing is that the building was successfully evacuated.