Thurles Information

“And, as an hare whom hounds and horns pursue, Pants to the place from whence at first she flew,
I still had hopes, my long vexations past, Here to return – and die at home at last.”

Lines taken from “The Deserted Village,” by Oliver Goldsmith

Reading the inscriptions on headstones is now fast becoming a great contributor to our Irish tourism sector, both domestic and foreign, as more and more people have begun to trace their family’s history and now seek out the burial places of their long, often lost ancestors.
Most old headstone markers are difficult to read as they have become, through neglect, covered in decades of grime and various other surface lichens.  Examine your grave marker therefore carefully at first to ascertain if it is indeed cleanable or if best left alone. If the stone shows signs of chipping, scaling, flaking or any other forms of obvious deterioration, do not clean. Your actions will do more harm than good and in most cases you will only further accelerate its future demise.

How Best To Read That Old Neglected Family Headstone

Before cleaning the discovered headstone, best to confirm that you have uncovered a marker that genuinely belongs to your family tree. Many grave markers turn out to be the long lost property of another family, so do try to decipher names and recorded death dates shown on the surface, before interfering.

To help clarify ownership to your satisfaction, for reading and later cleaning you will need in your possession a stiff bristled brush, (Either natural or nylon but never a wire brush), a supply of water, a spray can of well shaken shaving foam, (Gillette Regular shaving foam is best) and a stiff straight edged piece of cardboard or rubber edged window cleaning wiper. Spray the foam over the words inscribed on the headstones, making sure to press into the counter-relief or sunken script, before removing the excess shaving foam from the headstone with the edge of the stiff cardboard or rubber wiper. Some of the foam should now sit into the carved script, enabling you to read most of the written epitaph. [See picture above.]

In past times a product known as ‘Heelball,’ latter a wax, coloured with lampblack, latter once used to stain and polish the edges of the soles and heels of repaired shoes, was most often used to take rubbings of stone inscriptions successfully, but alas like many such products it has now become difficult to locate. A rub from green grass or dock leaves can also assist to highlight some worn lettering less successfully.

Cleaning Your Family Headstone

First remember that old headstones can never be made to appear totally brand new.
Up to the early 1970 all Roman Catholic graveyards throughout Ireland, usually before the end of July, held “Pattern Days.” These were days when people come together to perform a kind of pilgrimage, to the burial place of their dead relatives or simply to honour their local saint, latter who had often founded their local church. This is now somewhat of a fading tradition in many graveyards, but perhaps should again be resurrected. Relatives of deceased persons worked well to spruce up their cemetery for weeks beforehand, decorating many graves with fresh flowers and wreaths, scrubbing headstones and weeding burial plots.

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