Townparks Church

The church (DU005-031001-) and graveyard (DU005-031002-) of Holmpatrick (Inis Pádraig/Patrick's Island) stands 720m to the S of Skerries and 200m W of the Dublin coast with St. Patrick's Island (DU005-019----) 2.1km to the NE. 19th century C. of I. church of Holmpatrick stands to the N of the graveyard. The 18th-century bell-tower of the earlier parish church stands on the site of the 13th-century Augustinian priory (DU005-031----) of Holmpatrick which was also used as the medieval parish church (Healy 1975, 18, Campion 1969, 41). According to Gwynn and Hadcock (1970, 178) 'in 1540 the jurors reported that the priory church had been parochial from time immemorial, other buildings on the 3-acre site being necessary for the farmer and not valued; the possessions included c. 1,000 acres with many messuages, cottages and unmeasured plots, a water-mill, and the rectory, val[ued]. £69 8s. 6d; in 1548 the farmers, the executors of Robert Cowley, deceased, and John Parker, were over £119 in arrears. The property was granted to Thomas Fitz Wiliams in 1578'. The 1654-56 Civil Survey of Dublin recorded that the in the 'parish of Holme-Patricke' on the lands of the 'Lord of Thomond of Bunratty' there stood 'The walles of the parish church' (Simington 1945, 54). The early 18th-century church of Holmpatrick was built by the Hamilton family of Hackettown two years after they acquired the Holmpatrick estate from the Earls of Thomond in 1720 (Campion 1969, 38). Possible remnants of the 18th-century church fabric have been incorporated into the upper graveyard wall.