CORK CITY GAOL [NOW A MUSEUM]

Not well served by public transport but despite this you should try your best to visit the next time you are in Cork city.

A visit to this former prison in Cork is an important part of anyone’s education because you will soon learn just how badly treated the poor were by what was supposed to be a Christian establishment. What really amazed me was that when the new Cork City Gaol opened in 1824 and was regarded as being "the finest in 3 kingdoms" [I suppose that depended on your point of view].

The prison housed both male and female prisoners, whose crimes were committed within the city boundary. Anyone committing a crime outside that boundary was committed to the County Gaol, across the river from the City Gaol near University College Cork.

Many of the prisoners in the late 19th Century were repeat offenders locked up for what would not today be imprisonable offences; for example, a woman named Mary Tucker from Rathmore in County Cork was imprisoned at least three times between 1849 and 1908, for offences such as 'Obscene Language' or 'Drunkenness'.

In October 1919, Constance Markievicz, the first woman to be elected to the British Parliament, was imprisoned at Cork Gaol for making a seditious speech.

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