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Just before you reach the bridge, watch out for the steps hewn into the side of the canal bank, leading down to a small spring well which bubbles from the rock close to the water’s edge. In the days before piped water was available in the area, this well supplied the community with fresh water.
The tall unusual gothic building, on the right hand side of Kennan Bridge, was at one time Clonsilla National School. Opened in June 1853 and built at a cost of £900 it is 60 feet
high and 30 feet wide. Many legends and stories abound about the school. Legend has it that the local landlord, Luke White (Lord Annaly), refused to allow the building of a Catholic school on his property. Two brothers, James and Charles Kennedy, wine merchants from Capel Street, acquired a piece of land from the Royal Canal Company and built the school. Legend also has it that the local Catholic priest put a curse on Luke White’s castle, near Luttrelstown, “that a crow would never build a nest, a ewe would never lamb or a hare would never run on his estate”. The school closed in 1963.
See Walking the Royal Canal by Peter Clarke for more detailed information…
The Deep Sinking, being so narrow, made the passing of canal boats impossible and the horses towing the boats were sometimes dragged into the canal. In 1845 there was a serious accident in the cutting when the evening passenger boat to Longford from Dublin struck a stone on the side of the canal, heeled over and filled, drowning sixteen people.
For more information on this accident see “The Sinking of the Longford“
The 12 km long level above the 12th Lock was the first restoration project to be tackled by the newly formed Royal Canal Amenity Group (RCAG) in 1974.