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Young Visionary from Bekan |
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The following article appeared in the ‘Knock Shrine Jubilee Year Supplement’ issued with the 9 August 2000 edition of The Connaught Telegraph, a local newspaper in Co Mayo: By Michael Kelly of Lissaniska, Bekan |
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I first heard about the young visionary Catherine Murray from her nephew, Will Murray, who lived near us in Lissaniska, a townland in Bekan parish about 3 miles from Knock. Up to the 1960’s, Will was still living in the old thatched cottage where Catherine was born in 1870. At the time of the apparition at Knock on 21 August 1879, eight-year-old Catherine Murray from Lissaniska was staying in Knock with her grandmother, Mrs Margaret Byrne (née Burke), who was also her godmother. Mrs Byrne, her brother Dominick and her daughters Mary and Margaret (Maggie), were also among the 15 official witnesses to the apparition. The journalist, TD Sullivan, who interviewed all the witnesses in 1880, gave the following account of his meeting with young Catherine Murray in Byrnes of Knock: ‘She is not more than about 9 years old. I find her very shy and timid, but I gather from her that she also has seen the three figures on the gable as described, that she had been sent from the schoolhouse wall to call Mrs Byrne and Maggie, and that she had gone back again with them. While I talk to the little girl she keeps fast hold of Mary Byrne’s dress, and when I ask her what size the figures on the gable were, she answers, with an upward glance at her protectress, ‘They were as big as Mary.’ Catherine gave the following testimony to the First Commission of Enquiry set up by Archbishop MacHale within two months of the apparition in 1879: ‘I am living at Knock; I was staying at my grandmother’s. I followed my aunt and uncle to the chapel; I then saw the likeness of the Blessed Virgin Mary and that of St Joseph and St John, as I learned from those that were around where I was; I saw them all for fully twenty minutes or thirty minutes.’ Later on, young Catherine was often interrogated about the event, as we know from the sworn evidence given to the Second Commission of Enquiry in 1936 by Catherine’s former school classmate, Mary Judge (who was then 70 years of age): ‘I remember also Catherine Murray who saw the Apparition. She was going to school with me. I remember her being examined several times by priests who came to the school. She was about 8 years at the time and used to tell them the story of the apparition. I remember well hearing how she saw the Blessed Virgin with her hand extended and looking up to heaven. I could hear her easily because I was in the front desk.’ Catherine Murray was born in Lissaniska on 29 November 1870, the eldest daughter of a small farmer William Murray and his wife Eliza Byrne, a native of Knock. Catherine was baptised in Bekan church on 3 December 1870, her sponsors being Daniel Murray and Margaret Burke, presumably her maternal grandmother. However, tragedy was soon to befall the family. Just 5 years after the apparition Catherine fell ill, from jaundice apparently, and she died on 1 October 1884. She was only 14 years old. Two years later in August 1886, when another baby girl was born to William and Eliza, they named her Catherine (Kate) after her late sister. This was not uncommon practice in those days when child mortality in Ireland was very much higher than it is today. William and Eliza Murray had seven children besides Catherine. Four of them, John, Willie, Mary and Kate, emigrated to the US. The other three settled locally. Danny inherited the home place and he died there, as did his brother Jim, while his sister Kate (Mrs Forde) lived not far away in Reask. Catherine Murray was the second youngest of the 15 witnesses to the Apparition at Knock. The distinction of being the youngest witness fell to John Curry of Lecarrow who was aged 5. John later emigrated to the US and he died in New York in the 1950’s. On a trip to New York last March, I visited Ellis Island, the gateway to a new life for so many from this locality including Catherine Murray’s brother and sisters. There, on display in the museum, I saw the pages of a ship’s manifest - just one ship representing the thousands of ships that brought millions of people from all over the world to the US down through the years. The ship in question was the SS Teutonic which docked in New York on 15 April 1897. I was not entirely surprised to find that many of the 1,016 passengers were Irish. However, it was a something of a coincidence that I should happen to notice a group of 16 from the Ballyhaunis-Knock area and even more remarkable to find two familiar names in that group. One was Maria Fitzmaurice (aged 18) of Reask, my own grandmother, who lived in New York for several years before returning to marry in Ireland. Next to her on the list was one John Curry (then aged 23), the youngest witness to the apparition at Knock 18 years previously! Catherine Murray, the young visionary of the apparition at Knock, lies buried in Bekan cemetery. Her nephew, Will, who never married, died in 1986 and is also buried in Bekan. Another nephew, Jack Murray, died only last month in Manchester. The Murray holding was sold recently, thus ending a long family connection with Lissaniska. |
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This essay received from Michael Kelly 24 June 2003. |
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most recent revision: 24 June 2003 |
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