A mosaic of St Andrew that survives in St Patrick’s Church in Rosslare remembers the ‘saints’ that sailed between Wales and Ireland for the first sixty years of the crossing. Four vessels were initially commissioned by the Great Western Railway: the…

Bring the past to life and reimagine the present with a range of perspectives as diverse as the connections between Ireland and Wales across the Irish Sea. Developed by James L. Smith of the Ports, Past and Present Project using project material…

Bring the past to life and reimagine the present with a range of perspectives as diverse as the connections between Ireland and Wales across the Irish Sea. Developed by James L. Smith of the Ports, Past and Present Project using project material…

Bring the past to life and reimagine the present with a range of perspectives as diverse as the connections between Ireland and Wales across the Irish Sea. Developed by James L. Smith of the Ports, Past and Present Project using project material…

There is a song by the folk rock band The Waterboys called ‘This is the Sea’. It concerns the changes in life, using the sea as a metaphor: Once you were tethered, Now you are free, That was the river, This is the sea. For some reason I had those…

History has played out on the route between Dublin and London, and the Port of Holyhead was often the critically timed step across the Irish Sea. Over an intense three-month period one hundred years ago, Irish delegations and secret documents…

The statue of Réalt na Mara (Our Lady, Star of the Sea) was erected from subscriptions from dockers, others working around Dublin Port, and a range of companies. It was sculpted by Cecil King and unveiled and blessed on 24 September 1972. Realt…

Agnes Ferguson sat down with Ports, Past and Present to share her family history of her grandfather and father working in the port, meeting her husband on a ferry to Fishguard and her own work for the tourist office.

Agnes Ferguson sat down with Ports, Past and Present and shared her memories of taking the ferry across the Irish Sea ever since she was a child, to visit family and friends living in and around Fishguard.

The St Patrick was the only ferry still sailing between Ireland and Wales during World War Two. The others, the St David and the St Andrew, had been requisitioned as hospital ships serving the European front. The St. Patrick made a regular daily…