Horsemen Awaited at Bunlahy

Jack B Yeats illustration from Big Tree of Bunlahy - it was a focal point of the village, some say it blew down on the Night of the Big Wind
Jack B Yeats illustration from Big Tree of Bunlahy – it was a focal point of the village, some say it blew down on the Night of the Big Wind

Background – Sean Mac Eoin told of a Tracey family related to him that had two brothers in the fight at Granard, and this tale which I have recorded in verse of their people. These probably would also be the Treacys of my great grandmothers people.

The French are beyond the Shannon
They will cross the waters
To be welcomed by the widows
To be greeted by dead rebels daughters…
The British are in Granard
Its expected they will flee
Two brothers of the Treacys
Are expected in Bunlahy…

And then was seen by eager eyes
Horsemen come towards the town
A man jumped up from his chair
From the roof took his pike down!
He ran to meet the army
But he was not to have known
It was not French but the British!
These men were not his own!

They seized him as a rebel
As the birds his mourning song they sang
By the Big Tree of Bunlahy
Young Treacy was set to hang.
It was not to be the rebels year
Freedom was a long time to come
We remember those who have all for us
In the dangerous times that they are from!

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