Steve Lally, 2014
15
MOLL ANTHONY OF THE RED HILLS
While researching the folklore of County Kildare a name that kept cropping up was ‘Moll Anthony’. Some people said she was a wise woman, some stated she was a type of medicine woman and others claimed she was a witch. When I heard this I was intrigued; every collector of folk tales loves to be told a tale about some class of a witch. As there are many tales surrounding this enigmatic character, I have tried to put together what I heard and read about her in order to tell you her story as best I can.
Moll Anthony, whose real name was Mary Leeson (c. 1807-1878), was an Irish bean fasa (wise woman) who lived at Hill of the Grange, between Milltown and Rathangan, but was originally from the Red Hills of County Kildare. She was named after her father, Anthony Dunne and lies buried in Milltown, County Kildare, where she died in 1878. There are two headstones beside each other in the cemetery, one of which states: ‘Erected by Catherine Leeson of Grange Hill in memory of her dearly beloved husband, James Leeson who departed this life 27 April 1894, aged 64 years’.
Moll’s stone states: ‘Erected by Mary Leeson of Punchesgrange in memory of her mother, Eliza Cronley, who departed this life 11 December, 1851, aged 20 years. Also the above named Mary Leeson who died 28 November, 1878, aged 71 years’.
As the author Padraic O’Farrell pointed out in his book Irish Fairy Tales (1997) it would be impossible for Mary Leeson or ‘Moll Anthony’ who was born in 1807 to have a mother die at the age of 20 in 1851. There is a lot of speculation about this and some people in the area are still reluctant to talk about the stone. Indeed, when I went there to find the stone myself I was told by many of the locals that they did not know of such a headstone. And I was starting to doubt its existence until I did find it, but only after attending a rosary at Allan graveyard and lighting a prayer candle. When I returned I was compelled to walk straight to her headstone and was shocked to realise I had walked passed it so many times previously. Whether this is the final resting place of Moll Anthony of the Red Hills I cannot prove, but it certainly is where all the stories and research over the years has lead to.
There is one belief that Moll was born out of wedlock and the dates were tampered with to confuse those wishing to pass judgement. Nevertheless it remains a mystery, just like the character Moll Anthony herself.
One of the many stories surrounding Moll Anthony was about a sort of reincarnation of a young dead girl or a changeling left by the fairies to replace the young girl’s body in her coffin.
The archeologist Lord Walter Fitzgerald (1858-1923) wrote about Moll Anthony in the Kildare Archaeology Society Journal, describing the strange way she arrived in Mullaghmast in the County Kildare. It goes something like this.
It was a cold and windy day and the leaves were being spun through the air like butterflies. The two sons of the widow Anthony, who lived near Mullaghmast, met a funeral party on the road. As was the custom at the time, the two boys followed the cortege and even helped to carry the coffin. When the cortege arrived at the front of their house the pallbearers put down the coffin and walked off into the distance, disappearing into an ethereal mist. The boys, terrified, ran into the house and told their mother. She came out and opened the coffin, to discover a young girl there, warm and breathing gently as if sleeping. The girl recovered and she grew up with the family for the next nine years. According to Fitzgerald, the widow decided to call her Mary, a straightforward name but one with tenacity. From that day for each of the nine years, Mary was a great help to the widow Anthony. She happily did the housework and menial chores around the place. Good luck and prosperity seemed to have entered the house with her, and the farm thrived as it had never done before.
One day at the end of the nine years, the widow Anthony said to her elder son, ‘Jim, it would be no harm in life if ye had the dacency to ask that gerrel if she wanted to be buried with our people and you make a dacent woman of her’.
‘Oh! Be-God and be the Tear O’ War,’ replied Jim. ‘Do ya know I was tinkin’ o’ dat meself, shur good-luck is better nor any fortune at all, so it is.’ In the end the two were married and by the time the three children were crawling about the house, Jim said he would have to go to Castledermot to buy a filly. ‘I have never asked the like afor Jim,’ said Mary, ‘but I’m wishful to go wid ye.’
‘Shur you are more than welcome, sweet Mary,’ said Jim. ‘Shure me mother will mind the childher.’
So off they went in the ass-cart, and arrived at the fair. Seeing a suitable filly in the charge of a young lad, Jim bid to within £5 of the price asked for it, and was referred to the owner, who was in the town with his wife. When they met, Jim and his wife Mary invited the couple to a public house to settle the deal. Noticing that the old man was staring hard at Mary after the bargain was clinched, Jim asked, ‘What in the blazes are ye lookin’ in that unmannerly way at me woman for?’
‘Well now,’ said the old man, ‘if it wasn’t as certain as I have the price of the filly in me breeches pocket, I’d take me oath that that was me own daughter – the Lord have mercy on her! I buried her some years ago.’
‘Can ye give me the day and date?’ says Jim.
‘If I can’t, herself can,’ says he, looking over at his wife, whom he called over to his aid. She was so wrapped up in the gossip and craic going on in the establishment that she had not paid much attention to Mary in the way her husband had and answered the question without hesitation.
‘It was 3 May, thirteen year ago,’ says she.
‘Oh! Be the Tear O’ War, that’s fierce queer indeed,’ says Jim. ‘Shure that’s the very day I first laid me eye on me woman.’
Looking at Mary, the old woman said to her, ‘Come to the parlour wid me, alanna and I’ll soon know if himself there is right’.
‘Arrah, mother,’ said Mary, ‘don’t trouble to see me stripped, shure I’ll not deny that the raspberry mark is on me shoulder.’
‘Glory be to god, it’s true,’ said the old woman. And that was how Mullaghmast became ingratiated with the presence of Moll Anthony.
Some things are most peculiar and this was one of them indeed. And it may be explained by the belief in the power of the fairies to carry off a person and leave a behind a substitute, resembling them in every way, manner and form, but concealing hidden powers. These were known as changelings and it was widely considered that Moll Anthony was such a creature. This too would give good weight to the belief that she had dealings with ‘the good people’, ‘the children of Danu’ or ‘the fairies’.
It was well known that Moll Anthony of the Red Hills had a supernatural power for curing paralysis, fits, strokes and other sicknesses in both humans and animals. It was said that she got the gift from the good people or the fairies. Sometimes, however, she would refuse to help a person or animal, if she thought it best for the person or beast to die, or if it was their second time of seeking her help. It was also stated that before stricken people had a chance to introduce themselves and describe their symptoms, she would welcome the complete strangers by addressing them by their name and telling them their sickness.
Moll cured both people and animals with potions she created from particular herbs. Each potion was given in three separate porter bottles, two of which she gave on her first visit, the third bottle being given on the second visit. The charge was half a crown per bottle.
There were very strict rules applied to the administration, consumption and transportation of these powerful potions, and if any of the rules weren’t adhered to, the cure failed. A cure was never allowed to be used twice. So magical and powerful was the cure, that on bringing it home, the bearer was often stalled by some evil spirit, who would try and stop them from reaching their destination. This in itself was a great deterrent for people who wished to avail of Moll’s expertise, and proved that there was a lot more to her skills than mere knowledge of herbs and medicine. It was definitely a hazardous affair when you decided to take help from M
oll Anthony. However, if the doses were correctly administered, a cure was always successful. So, depending on the seriousness of the ailment and how precious that person or beast was considered, it was sometimes worth the high risks involved.
Fitzgerald recorded a story about one such treacherous journey, involving two men, William Whelan of Ballyvass, who died age seventy-two in 1901, and Simon Gleeson of Castleroe, who died aged eighty-five in 1909. These two individuals were given strict orders by Moll Anthony not to delay in any shape or form on their road home. She also made it very clear that they were to travel on foot, no matter what the distance was they had to travel. The bottles were to be kept on their person at all times and if they rested or fell asleep along the way the bottles were sure to be removed from them by some malevolent spirit or entity. Moll warned the men that at a certain place about three quarters of a mile from her home along the road a terrible fatigue would test their will-power to carry on and stay awake. If they dozed off or stopped to speak with anyone they met, the bottles would be lost forever.
And when the men reached this place that Moll had spoken of a great sense of exhaustion and weariness overcame the men. They experienced a terrible pain in their feet and a great desire to sleep. They wanted to take off their boots and relieve their aching feet, but to do this would only slow them down and cause more discomfort on the hard, cold, stony road. As bad as this first journey was, the return journey was according to the men, twice as bad. They experienced wild voices and laughter. They felt a terrible presence about them and an awful sense of foreboding. They found themselves crawling on their hands and knees, trying to get past that cursed area about which Moll had warned them.
When they were lucky enough to get back in one piece that was not the end of it. They still had to administer the cure. The dose for a human (a young girl of ten in this case) patient was always three teaspoonfuls out of the first bottle and after a twenty-four-hour period three more tea-spoonfuls from the second bottle. A part of the liquid, too, had to be rubbed on the palms of the hands and the soles of the feet of the poor patient. This all went very smoothly and without any drama or distraction. On the arrival of the third bottle (for which the second visit was necessary) a similar dose was prescribed after another twenty-four hours. In the meantime it was imperative that this third bottle was kept well guarded, preferably locked away somewhere safe until it was time for the final dose to come. This had to be done as the patient would become possessed by some terrible spirit or demon and try to smash the bottle and destroy its contents. When the time came to administer the potion, the poor child resisted violently while the teaspoonfuls were being given to her. She twisted and turned and yelled all sorts of terrible obscenities. Having been advised to have a priest present, the girl was also dosed in holy water.
What added to the difficulty and drama of this situation was the fact that none of the liquid was to be spilt if the cure was to be in any way effective. Luckily this was done but not without great struggle and complexity. What was then left of the mixture after the third and final dose was to be taken out of the house and thrown against the wind, and so scattered in such a way that it could not be trodden upon or walked over.
Any accidents or carelessness involving spilling the liquid would render the cure ineffective and it was a waste of time to journey back to Moll Anthony as she would never prescribe a second time for the same case.
The three doses were absolutely necessary for the cure to work and there were occasions where after the first two the patient seemed totally recovered and the second journey to see Moll was not made, much to the relief of those given the task to do so. The result for this complacency was that the patient became very ill again or they became what was then described as ‘An Innocent’ or ‘Harmless Simpleton’. Thankfully according to the two men the cure worked and the girl was as good as new.
Not all these excursions were as successful. There was a young woman who travelled from a neighbouring county to see Moll in the Red Hills of Kildare. A relative of hers was very ill. Moll gave her the strange potion to bring back and told her to keep her eyes open on the way home. After the girl had walked a fair distance and covered most of the journey she became very tired. It was as if her feet had turned to lead and she wanted so desperately to sit and rest, but she had been warned by Moll not to stop under any circumstances at all. She could take it no longer and sat down by the side of a ditch to rest her weary bones. All of a sudden a horrible, wrinkled old hag with no teeth, a nose like a beak and a ferocious contorted face came towards her at great speed. She seemed to fly through the air. She had a pair of very long outstretched skinny arms like great spiders’ legs swiping around, trying to grab the poor girl. The hag was howling like a Banshee and the girl got such a fright that she jumped to her feet and as she did so, the precious bottle fell to the ground and smashed into pieces. When the girl did eventually get home, she found her sick relative cold and lifeless on their bed.
Not all of Moll Anthony’s work was considered for the greater good. According to Kathleen Coffey, who wrote about the wise woman, it was believed that Moll was in cahoots with ‘Auld Nick’ or the Devil. This was recorded in the National Folklore Collection held at University College Dublin.
It was said that Moll often cast charms and spells over those who she saw as her enemies, or over those who injured her in any way, either by word or deed. As a result of this Moll Anthony was seen as a witch or fairy doctor, and struck a combination of awe, respect and terror in those who knew her. In her book, Wise Woman of Kildare, Erin Kraus states that Moll Anthony was largely left alone, unless her help was needed.
As well as her cures, Moll also made money from hexes, offering her services to those who wished to seek revenge or settle a score. She was Ireland’s very own Marie Laveau, the infamous Voodoo Queen of New Orleans. Not only was Moll considered a witch doctor or fairy doctor but she was also considered as ‘bean feasa’ or wise woman. Now this was indeed a highly recognised and revered status. For a wise woman was believed to have powers far beyond what ordinary folk have and can even see into the future, like the oracles of Greek mythology. She was on communication terms with the fairies and their ancient wisdom and their power worked through her. She was a force to be reckoned with, and no one would dare cross her if they knew of her status and abilities.
The most common help sought from Moll Anthony was in regard to the theft of goods and loss of profit. An eighty-four-year-old man called William Byrne from Kilranlagh, Killegan, County Wicklow, talked a lot about the stories that he heard as a child about Moll Anthony. He describes in the National Folklore Collection how people used to go to her to get their sick animals cured and their profits back. He talked about a boy who was unable to make butter after a strange old woman came begging on a May morning and must have put some hex upon the buttermilk. Another story describes how a farmer with six or eight cows could not produce butter, while a neighbour with only one cow had an abundant supply of the stuff and finally another farmer suspected that his butter was being stolen. All three went to Moll Anthony to put an end to their troubles. The advice she gave to the three men was identical. She said to them: ‘Next time you are churning, put the chains of the plough around the churn; put the coulter of the plough in the fire, make it red hot and then plunge it into the churn, when the butter should be forming. In all three cases, once the coulter was plunged into the churn, the profit thief came running to the window or door, screaming in agony, and butter was plentiful in their households from that moment onwards.
Many stories and recollections suggest that Moll Anthony passed on her ‘cures’ to members of her family. Through research and piecing together stories about her, it was possible to trace the existence of healers from Moll’s family right up to the 1930s. Fitzgerald mentions in a 1915 article that ‘the cure’ was still in possession of Moll Anthony’s grandson’s (James Leeson) widow, who still resided at the time in a comfortable slated house on the Hill of Grange. There were re
cords in the National Folklore Collection of 1937-8 stating that a Mrs Leeson of the Red Hills, Rathangan ‘has a cure for everything’. Another reference describes a Mrs Leeson who lived on the Hill of Grange and inherited the cure from an ancestor. Another woman around that same time known for her cures was called Mrs Gleeson but known to the locals as ‘Moll Anthony’. As these references were made by children, spelling was not a top priority and similarities in name are not mere coincidence.
There is wonderful little story recorded by Patrick Kennedy in his book Fictions of the Irish Celts (Macmillan & Co., 1866).
The neighbourhood of Borraheen, Baltracy and Rathcoffey was blessed, or the contrary, in times past, by a fortuneteller and charm-concocter, Moll Anthony by name. So unedifying was her life and conversation, that the priest refused to have any religious services performed for her after her death. She left a son, who had acquired some skill in curing cattle by herbs, and did not pretend to any Supernatural gifts.
A farmer, Pat Behan, at whose house he had remained about a fortnight, and who was well pleased with his performances, was passing near the green hills in his jaunting car, accompanied by Jack Anthony, the doctor, when, on the sudden, an old woman in a red cloak appeared to them between the bushes and the road-fence, and cried ‘Jack, it’s time for you to come!’.
‘Sir’, said Jack to his patron, ‘Will you excuse me for a minute, while I go to say a word to this neighbour of mine.’
‘Oh! To be sure Jack,’ replied the farmer. Jack got on the fence and passed through the bushes, but the farmer was surprised at not subsequently hearing the sound of his or her voice. He waited for about the space of a minute, and then bade his servant to climb the fence, and see if Jack was about to return. The servant did as he was told, and the master observed him look along the inner side of the ditch, now to the left, and then to the right, and then straight before him, with a perplexed expression on his face. The master sprung down, joined his servant, and found he had a long range of vision right and left, and up to the sloping side of the Green Hill, and no bushes or rocks to afford concealment. Neither Jack nor the red-cloaked woman, were in view. It was months before the doctor presented himself before his patron, and even then his account of his disappearance was not consistent in all its parts.
Kildare Folk Tales Page 11
