Competition sees 1,900 kids bring colour back to Moatville House
THE colouring competition organised by Georgina O’Gorman of Charleville Heritage Society in conjunction with the annual Festival of History attracted 1,900 entries from children in schools in the local area.
They were asked to colour an outline of the Moatville House on Charleville’s Limerick Road, which dates back to the early 1800’s.
The outline of the house was drawn by art student Georgina O’Gorman and distributed to the schools by Evelyn O’Keeffe of Charleville Heritage Society. The prizes were presented to the children who coloured in the winning entries by Martin Roberts of the visiting Croesgoch Heritage Society from Wales, at Charleville Library on last Saturday afternoon.
The winners were: Faye White from Milford National School, aged five years; Luke McAuliffe from St. Joseph’s School Charleville, aged 6 years; Lauren McAuliffe from Shandrum School, aged 7 years; Lexie O’Halloran from Shandrum School, aged 8 years; Emily Murphy from Ballyagran School, aged 10 years, Jenny Kenneally from St. Anne’s School, Charleville, aged 11 years, and Michael Cox from C.B.S. Primary School, Charleville, aged 12 years.
Moatville House is presently the subject of talks between the owners, Kerry Group plc, and Charleville Heritage Society and Charleville Chamber, with a view to the former gifting the building to the latter for the benefit of the local community. The talks are at an advanced stage and hopefully will be completed by the end of this year.
The house is of considerable historic value to Charleville as it is built in the vicinity of the original Charleville House, which was erected by Roger Boyle after he founded Charleville in 1661. Charleville House was burned by the Duke of Berwick during the Williamite War in 1691.