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John McNeill Boyd
Statue
in St. Patricks Anglican Cathedral, Dublin, Ireland in Memory of John
McNeill Boyd of the Royal Navy
Ghosts
of Ireland
Capt.
Boyd's Book "Seamans Manual" at end of page (new)
Statue in St. Patricks Anglican Cathedral, Dublin, Ireland
Erected by the citizens
of Dublin
To The Memory of
John McNeill Boyd, RN (Royal Navy) Captain HMS Ajax
Born at Londonderry 1812 and lost off the rocks at Kingstown February 9, 1861 attempting to save the crew of the Brig. Neptune
photo courtesy Val Boyd Franks, Bay City, Michigan
Safe from the rocks,
Whence swept thy manly form
The tide white rush, The stepping of the storm
Borne with a public pomp, By just decree
Heroic sailor! From that fatal sea.
A city vows this marble unto thee,
And here in this calm place, where never sin
of earth great waterfloods shall enter in
When to our human hearts, two thoughts are given,
One, Christ's self-sacrifice, the other heaven
here is it meet for grief and love to grave
The Christ-taught bravery that died to save
The life not lost but found beneath the wave.
All Thy billows and Thy
Waves passed over me, yet
I will look again toward Thy Holy Temple
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Thought you all might
enjoy the following ......forwarded with the kind permission of Deb Romilly admin. of the Ireland list, George and friends
at the Irish Heritage group.
Ghosts of Ireland
St Patrick's Cathedral,
Dublin
The ghost of a black
Newfoundland dog has been seen many times at the Cathedral, sitting at the base of a memorial statue to Captain John
McNeill Boyd who was lost in February, 1861 whilst attempting to rescue drowning
seamen at Dun Laoghaire. The apparition is said to be that of Captain Boyd's devoted dog which has also been seen many times lying on his
master's grave at nearby Glasnevin Cemetery.
(According to some new data
from Cormac F. Lowth, John McNeil Boyd is buried "in a little graveyard behind St Patrick's
Cathedral")
On the night of Saturday
8th February, 1861, the Irish Sea was swept by one of the worst gales of the century. The harbour at Kingstown, now Dun
Laoghaire, was littered with debris and the wreckage of battered vessels. Scores of bodies of drowned people were found on the
shoreline. Among those who helped to recover the bodies and clear the wreckage was Captain Boyd, in command of the coastguard vessel Ajax.
Three stricken vessels,
the Neptune, the Industry and the Mary, were trying to get to the shelter of the harbour. The Neptune and the
Industry were to be smashed against the rocks whilst the Mary was wrecked further along the coast at Sandymount. Captain Boyd and some of
his men were on the rocks trying to rescue the men from the stricken vessels. Together with three of his men he was swept into the sea by a
giant wave. When a lifeboat from the Ajax later went to search for Captain Boyd and the three other men, his faithful Newfoundland dog was
in the rescue boat.
When the body of Captain
Boyd was finally recovered it was brought ashore and he was given one of the biggest funerals ever seen in Dublin.
During the funeral procession his faithful dog walked beside the coffin and followed it to Glasnevin Cemetery where Captain Boyd was interred.
When the grave was filled in the dog, so devoted to his master, lay on top and refused to be moved, eventually dying of hunger. Shortly
afterwards the memorial statue to Captain Boyd was erected in the Cathedral by the people of Dublin.
One of those who saw the
dog many times at the base of the statue in the Cathedral was Dean Wilson, who died in 1950.
_____________________________________________________________________
TWO KINGSTOWN CAPTAINS.
by
Cormac F. Lowth
During the nineteenth century, two Royal Naval captains, who were resident in Kingstown, wrote instructional material for the
benefit of young naval cadets. One was Captain John McNeil Boyd who was Master of the guardship AJAX which was
stationed in Kingstown Harbour and who was tragically lost during a storm at the back of the East Pier in 1861. The other
was Captain The Honourable Frances George Crofton who was the Harbour Master at Kingstown from 1874 until his death in
1900.
Captain Boyd was keenly interested in the welfare and instruction of young naval cadets who were in his charge.
He frequently wrote papers on a host of relevant subjects for instructional purposes which he eventually gathered together in
book form and he gained approval and financial support from the Admiralty to have it published and accepted as the official
manual for young men joining the Navy as cadet officers. Captain Crofton
had a son who was a cadet in the Royal Navy and in 1895 he wrote a series of mnemonics in verse for his son to assist him in committing to memory the complicated rules of the
road at sea. This was published as a booklet by M. H. Gill & Son of Dublin and it quickly found favour with naval personnel
and merchant seamen alike. The rules of the Road at sea were much more complicated in the days of sailing ships than those
which apply to motorships today. Copies of both of these publications are preserved today in the National Library in Kildare
Street.
Captain Boyd’s book is a hefty volume which covers a great many subjects such as seamanship, navigation, rigging,
gunnery and physics. It is well illustrated throughout with interesting line drawings and it has a beautifully illustrated
section on flags in colour which includes a unique fold out composite which explains the makeup of the Union flag. Another
most interesting section deals with the clothing and equipment needed by a cadet upon joining a ship and both the prices for
these and places where they might be purchased to best advantage regarding value for money are mentioned. It could
possibly be said that any young man who had digested the contents of this book would have received an excellent naval
education. Captain Crofton’s work is a much slimmer volume running to just a few pages and it is reproduced in full here
while just the preface to Captain Boyd’s book in his own words are included.
The preface to Captain Boyd’s book.
“The publication of such a book may seem to require explanation if not apology and perhaps the best one the Author can give
will be found in the circum- stances which suggested the work and which have led to it’s appearance in print.
In the course of a somewhat long and arduous professional career, the writer discovered, not infrequently,
considerable ignorance prevailed among naval cadets on points intensely connected with their duties. This may have arisen,
partly from their education, previous to entrance in the service, not being made to bear directly on it’s requirements, partly
from the extensive range of information on various subjects required in a naval officer, and partly from the want of some
plain works in short compass. As the writer has ever taken a lively interest in the improvement of young officers under his
command, he was induced, not only to direct their studies generally, but to assist them in those studies by a supply of papers,
diagrams and illustrations calculated to throw some light on the subject before their minds.
These papers grew upon his hands and suggested the idea that, if collected and arranged, they might be of more
extensive use to those youthful members of the profession for whose advantage they had been originally prepared, and that
without the slightest pretension of authorship. Under these impressions the writer felt it his duty to place the following
papers before the Lords of the Admiralty, leaving it to their judgment to decide whether they were likely to contribute
towards the end desired, or whether they were only worthy of a place among other well intentioned but useless writings
which never see the light.
Being himself entirely un-ambitious of the honour of authorship and conscious that his etchings had but little
claim upon the favourable consideration of the public, he was contented to leave the question in the hands of his professional
superiors, as an evidence, at all events, of his desire to serve a profession to which he has been all his life attached.
The decision of their lordships left him no choice as to further steps. They were pleased to express a judgment that the pages laid before them were cal- culated to be useful, to intimate their approval of their contents and to
evince that favourable opinion in the strongest manner in their power by voting a sum of money towards the publication of the
work, ordering a number of copies on their own account and placing it on the list of books which officers are required to
provide themselves with on joining the navy. “
Captain Boyd dedicated his book to the Commissioners of the Admiralty and the second edition was published by Longmans in 1860, the year before his death.
The story of the extraordinary bravery of Captain Boyd and the tragic loss of himself and six of the crew of the AJAX as
they attempted to rescue the crews of two sailing vessels at the East Pier at Kingstown has been well recounted in the pages
of a previous edition of this journal. Captain Boyd was interred in the little cemetery attached to St Patrick’s Cathedral in
Dublin after an enormous public funeral. The granite obelisk on the pier stands as a visible memorial to the Captain and his
men while a magnificent life-sized marble statue in his likeness, which was paid for by the citizens of Dublin and sculpted by
Thomas Farrell, stands in Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. The following inscription is engraved on the plinth.
(See inscription above) Courtesy of The Dunlaoghaire Borough Historical Society Journal and Cormac F. Lowth.
The author has a copy of a contemporary ballad about the loss of Captain Boyd. How wonderful it would be to see Captain
Boyd’s Book republished in facsimile as a further memorial to this brave man.
(CFL)
June 16, 2004 I found your site and have enjoyed reading your information. Captain John Mc Neill Boyd was my great, great grandfather. I recently saw his monument in Dublin. I would very much appreciate any more information about him and his family and any past or present Boyds that you have information about. I look forward to hearing from anyone in regards this family.
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NOTES
TO RESEARCHERS
When
you use this site, please keep in mind the difference between
primary and secondary sources and the importance of checking those
sources. Accept nothing without further checking. It is our hope
that through this collection of data from many sources, you will
find a piece of the puzzle that you are working on and that may
lead you to other discoveries.
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