The two hundredth anniversary of the ‘Bruckless Bay Disaster’ will be marked today.
Two hundred years ago tomorrow 200 curraghs capsized in a terrible storm on Bruckless Bay.
Locals said that 80 or more lives were lost on that fateful night although the official record states that 42 people were lost.
A two-and-a-half tonne engraved Drumkeelan Sandstone rock, has been inscribed by local sculptor Gary McHugh and will be unveiled by Cllr. Frank McBrearty, Mayor of Donegal and Minister of State, Dinny McGinley, T.D. in a landscaped garden overlooking Bruckless Bay at 2pm.
A local author, Thomas Colin McGinley (1830 – 1887) under the pen name of ‘Kinnfaela’ wrote a short piece about the disaster in his book, ‘The Cliff Scenery of South-Western Donegal’.
He tells a tale he heard from the locals saying it was a scorned witch that created the storm which caused the death of these people at sea.
The tale goes something like this – A wondering woman came to town. While she was there she visited the port every morning and the fishermen happily gave her some herring. After a time she came to expect this of the fishermen but eventually this offering ceased. Following that, she vowed she would have her vengeance on the fishermen. She engaged the help of a neighbouring child and using basin filled with water and a wooden bowl said some incantations over the basin while the child looked on. When the wooden bowl had capsized she seemed happy. That night a storm occurred and the ocean raged. The next morning when everything had calmed down there was devastation at the floating debris and overturned curraghs and the loss of so many lives. The woman was nowhere to be seen.
Bruckless and Dublin man Aidan McConnell, who has published research on the disaster will also be giving a lecture on the tragedy.
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