Emily Cecilia Fetherstonhaugh who was born in 1870 and died in 1938 appears to have been a keen photographer for a long time and one album of photographs taken by her between 1887 and 1893 has survived. The pictures were lent to the Offaly Historical & Archaeological Society by a grandson now living in Scotland.

Emily Cecilia Fetherstonhaugh was the daughter of Henry Fetherstonhaugh, Governor of the Tullamore Jail who died in 1898). She married Robert Stewart Craig in 1889 (born 3 September 1864 Curate of Kilbride / Tullamore 1887/1902 and Rector of Kilbride, 1902 to 1923). R.S. Craig succeeded his father Graham who had been Rector of Tullamore over the period from 1869 to 1902.

Many of the pictures in the collection are of the Craig and Fetherstonhaugh families and some are in the old Governor's house at the County Jail (now Kilcruttin Business park). The jail was destroyed by the Republican forces retreating from Tullamore in July 1922 and the photographs of the Governor's house in this album are the only known photographs of it.

This album is interesting from many points of view as it includes pictures of houses in the Slieve Bloom, the well known big houses and castles in the Tullamore district and more interestingly , prominent local Protestant families at leisure activities in the late 1880s. A well known person today who is connected with the marriage of the photographer with R.S. Craig is Judge Catherine McGuinness who is a grand-daughter.

There are almost 170 photographs in the collection and these have now all been copied for the Offaly Historical and Archaeological Society.

Note. -- H. Godfrey Fetherstone, Glenmore, Crossmolina owned 9,261 acres in Co. Mayo in 1870. Some of the photographs were taken at Glenmore. Capt. James Paget Knockglass, Crossmolina owned 427 acres. The Miss Paget photographed at Glenmore may be from this family.

Thumbnails of a selection of photographs from the collection

Photographs taken at Glenmore, Crossmolina