This beautiful watercolour painting of Carlingford Priory was painted by Henry G. Gastineau, probably around 1840 when he painted a much more famous picture of King John’s Castle and the harbour.
The Ordnance Survey 6-inch map was drawn five or six years earlier and it clearly shows the mill pond stretching from the old Abbey Tavern on Dundalk Street all along the little path that now runs by St Oliver’s National School playground.
Like most early water mills in Ireland the original mill was probably built by monks, and this one probably went out of business when a more reliable steam-driven mill was built opposite the Abbey Tavern (now an apartment building with the old winding gear wheel mounted on the outside wall).
The painting shows an overshot mill (with the water pushing the wheel clockwise from the top). Most of the building is still there. The wooden paddles have long since rotted away but part, or all, of the iron wheel frame (which has got to be at least 250 years old) is lying in the weeds and nettles by the millrace. With permission and a couple of volunteers we could cut the weeds and hang the wheel frame on the intact gable wall, so everyone can see where Carlingford once got its daily bread.
