SNIPPET: In 1810 the fathers of the prospering city of Cork decided that a new facility was required to replace the centuries-old Bridewell. An area on the hillside above was chosen. The architect was Sir Thomas DEANE ( who afterwards designed the exquisite quadrangle of University College Cork) and the work was carried out by builder Richard NOTTER. In 1824 the first prisoners were taken to the new gaol, considered a model of its kind in three kingdoms. The Gaol's story encompasses innumerable lives with their own events and circumstances from the pre-Victorian days of transportation to daring deeds of passionate freedom fighters in the first decades of the 20th century. Transportation was the early favoured solution for most offenders and as Cork was the main sailing port for convict ships, literally thousands of prisoners from all over Ireland were channelled down to the City Gaol before being sent away from their homeland, forever, in most cases. The Down County Museum, for example, has records of its detainees sent south to Cork for transportation. This is what makes the Heritage Centre such as a magnet for family historians from all over the world. It can be a very moving experience to touch the very same walls where your great-great-great grandfather may have touched. Over 40 thousand were transported through the port of Cork by the 1830s alone! Crowded into huge rough wagons known as tumbrils, they were taken down to Queenstown, (now Cobh, to be herded onto the convict ships. These ships - "Elizabeth," "Lady Rowena," "Marquis of Hastings," "Hougemont" among others - were usually freighters which had brought commercial goods from the other side of the world; now they took human ballast back. Later it tended to be political prisoners who were transported. Starving Famine victims who committed petty crimes at least had food and shelter here; life outside in the early 19th century was not a good time to be poor. Famous writes served their time for the offence of loving their country. Even a Countess was imprisoned within these walls. The old Cork City Gaol nestles in the terraced wooded hills of the city between Sunday's Well (named for an ancient healing spring) and Farranree. The enormous H-shaped stone building. Dwarfing in size and extent all around, its high walls and massive archway entrance give a clue to its original identity. It last held prisoners in 1923. In 1927 Radio Eireann, the Irish national radio broadcaster, took over the top floor of the Governor's house, its lofty location making it ideal as a broadcasting station, and programmes continued to go out from the Cork station until the 1950s when a more modern studio was built in the heart of the city . Slowly the once majestic building crumbled into disrepair, forgotten and overgrown. In the late 1980s, a Cork business couple, Diarmuid and Mary KENNEALLY, embarked on a courageous project - to bring the old City Gaol back of life as a Heritage Centre that would not only tells its own story but that of the city it served. Elizabeth KEARNS is the Heritage Centre Administrator and has been involved with the project from the beginning. Living history is evident as soon as you step through the imposing entrance archway with life-like figures. In a doorway you see a shrinking woman in shabby clothes, grasped firmly by a tough female wardress. This is the unfortunate seamstress Mary SULLIVAN, being brought to see the governor, John BARRY-MURPHY, who oversaw the prison from 1856-1973, was the first Catholic to be appointed to the post and was renowned for his tolerance and humanity. Interesting, one of his descendants, Deirdre BARRY-MURPHY, worked at the Heritage Centre until she left for Spain. Everywhere you see these figures - a kind and worried doctor hurrying to the cell of a sick inmate, little Mary-Ann TWOHIG nursing her newborn babe, the prison chaplain hearing the confessions of Thomas RAILLE, etc. In the cells occupied by the Fenian or Republican prisoners, you can see the actual inscriptions scraped on the walls during long hours of confinement. Denny LANE, a member of a prominent Cork distilling family, was held here in 1848 for his connection with the Young Irelanders. The Jan-Feb 2005 issue of Dublin's "Ireland of the Welcomes" magazine has a several-page article (w/photos) on the Goal, other case histories, by Jo KERRIGAN, freelance writer in Macroom, Co. Cork. Cork City Gaol, Convent Avenue, Sunday's Well, Cork City, hours of admission, etc. - Website: www.corkcitygaol.com