The Four Courts - Dublin, Ireland
N 53° 20.740 W 006° 16.413
29U E 681488 N 5914189
Like many of Dublin's finest buildings, the Four Courts suffered the ravages of war. During the civil war, that followed the Anglo-Irish Treaty, it was almost completely demolished. An irreparable loss was the destruction of the Public Records Office
Waymark Code: WMFXCH
Location: Dublin, Ireland
Date Posted: 12/12/2012
Views: 10
The Tourist Information Dublin website
[visit
link] tells us:
"The Four Courts ("Na Ceithre Cúirteanna" in Irish) in
Dublin is the main court building of the Republic of Ireland. The Four Courts
building houses the Irish Supreme Court, the High Court and the Dublin Circuit
Court. The building was also the location for the Central Criminal Court until
2010.
The Four Courts was built between 1786 and 1796 by
architect James Gandon, while the finishing touches to the arcades and wings
were completed in 1802.
The building originally housed the four courts of
Chancery, King's Bench, Exchequer, and Common Pleas, hence its name. A major
revision in the court system in the late nineteenth century saw these courts
replaced, but the building has retained its original name. This courts system
remained until 1924, when the new Irish Free State introduced a new courts
structure, replacing the old High Court of Ireland, the Lord Chief Justice of
Ireland and the Lord Chancellor of Ireland with a new Supreme Court presided
over by the Chief Justice and a High Court of Justice, presided over by the
President of the High Court.
The Four Courts has a key role in recent Irish history.
The building was seized by Commandant Ned Daly's 1st Battalion during the Easter
Rising in 1916. It survived the bombardment by British artillery that destroyed
large parts of the city centre.
Six years later, on 14 April 1922, during the Irish
Civil War, the building was occupied by Republican forces who opposed the
Anglo-Irish Treaty. After several months of a stand-off, the new Provisional
Government attacked the building to dislodge the rebels. A week fighting in
Dublin followed and in the process of the bombardment, the historic building was
destroyed. Most dramatically however, when the anti-Treaty contingent were
surrendering, the west wing of the building was obliterated in a huge explosion,
destroying the Irish Public Record Office which was located at the rear of the
building. Nearly one thousand years of irreplaceable archives were destroyed by
this act.
In 1932, a rebuilt and remodelled Four Courts was opened
again. However much of the decorative interior of the original building had been
lost and, in the absence of documentary archives (some of which had been in the
Public Records Office), and also because the new state did not have the budget,
the highly decorative interior was not replaced.
Its exterior still shows the effects of the events of
1922, with its façade containing bullet holes, which were deliberately left to
remind people of the complex history of the
building."