Andrew
Jennings was a Commissioner for Newry.
1828. Act for
lighting, watching and cleansing...Newry Commissioners.
Andrew Jennings
ironmonger
Charles O'Hagan
woollendraper[1]
In 1832
Andrew was selling soap and candles.
NEW
SOAP AND CANDLE
MANUFACTURY.
ANDREW JENNINGS begs leave to
announce to his Friends and the Public, that he has commenced the above
Business, at his Establishment at NORTH-STREET,
where henceforward he will be
regularly supplied with an
EXTENSIVE STOCK OF SOAP AND CANDLES,
which from the arrangements he
has made, he can safely assure those who may favour him with their patronage
will be found to be at least equal in quality to any manufactured at present in
Newry,
and will be Sold on Terms which cannot be surpassed by any
similar Establishment in the Trade.
A.J. takes this opportunity of
assuring his Friends and the Public, that he is supplied, as usual, with an
Extensive Assortment of
Bar, Rod and Hoop Iron; Cast Metal Spades and Shovels;
There is
no doubt these were troubled times in Newry. Life was not easy.
1833 Riot in Newry.
The Newry Papers contain long accounts of a serious riot in
that town, on Monday night. They are somewhat contradictory, and as usual with
all the like affairs in the North, related with strong tincture of party
feeling. […] The Orangemen first commenced groaning opposite the houses of
persons obnoxious to them, but very soon proceeded to open acts of violence;
they commenced by breaking a few windows, firing shots into some, and battering
others with heavy stones. In several instances the entire fronts of the houses
were destroyed, and the hall-doors perforated with bullets and slugs. All
Market-parts of North-street, Castle-street, High-street and Mill-street were
visited with the same unsparing ferocity […]. The wrecking continued
systematically down North-street, when some panes had been broken in Andrew
Jennings’s windows, at past two in the morning, the heavy and measured tread of
the military warned the perpetrators of this atrocity to make their retreat
which they did in double-quick time, leaving nothing to the magistrates and
soldiers to witness but solitude and desolation. […][3]
Andrew appears to recognise the
power of advertising!
SPADE AND SHOVEL
Manufactory
The subscriber begs to intimate to the Trade, that he has
fitted up, in a superior manner, a MILL, at MOUNTCAULFIELD, for the Manufacture of the above articles. He has now on
hands
300 Dozen of Spades,
suitable to the following towns:-
Newry, Armagh, Monaghan, Aughnacloy, Dungannon, Dundalk and
Drogheda.
He is now ready to receive and execute, with the utmost
despatch, other patterns of Spades and Shovels, which he will dispose of on
Moderate Terms.
ANDREW JENNINGS.
But by 1834 Andrew was facing
bankruptcy.
Irish Bankrupts. Andrew Jennings, of Newry, iron-merchant,
July 21 and 22, and August 21.[5]
By this time he had a wife and a
young family to support.
Bankrupt’s Sale
by Auction, of Corn and Potatoes, on the foot, Excellent Family Horse, outside
Jaunting Car, Harness, &c., &c., by order of the Assignees of Mr.
Andrew Jennings.[6]
In 1835 Andrew Jennings was listed
as a bankrupt in Perry’s Bankrupt Gazette.[7]
BANKRUPTS IN IRELAND
1835. Jennings Andrew (July 4,
1834) of Newry, iron merchant...
In 1836 he had a store and yard at 21 Merchant’s Quay, and
premises at 19 Monaghan Street.[8]
By 1837 he was advertising again.
SPADE and SHOVEL
Manufactory,
No. 11 North-street
Newry
ANDREW JENNINGS Offers
for SALE a Prime Quality of SPADES and SHOVELS, of his own Manufacture, to
answer the following Markets:
Newry, Armagh, Dundalk,
Castlewellan, Castleblany, Keady, &c., &c., &c., which, with a
General assortment of GOODS connected with the IRON TRADE, he will dispose of
on Moderate Terms, for Cash Payments. Newry, 10th October 1837.[9]
He also still had a house, stores, offices and yard at 34 Upper North Street
in 1838. And there was another side to life.
In 1838 Andrew Jennings Esq., won first prize for the best
and largest cabbage, the best pickling cabbage, and the best six turnips. An
extra first prize was awarded to Andrew Jennings Esq., for a stem of potatoes,
from one seed, with 40 large and full grown potatoes attached thereto.
There was likewise presented to the Society from the
gardens of Colonel Close, Drumbanagher, a new seedling dahlia, called the
Drumbanagher Queen Victoria.[10]
North-street may not always have
been a very salubrious place to live. It’s not known if Andrew was still a
Commissioner for Newry at this time, as he had been ten years previously in
1828, but it’s possible, as the reference to his premises is very deliberate.
To the Editor of the Newry Telegraph
Sir,
I beg leave through the medium of your Journal, to call the
attention of the Police Commissioners to the state of the entry in
North-street, immediately opposite the stores of Mr. Andrew Jennings. From the
quantity of filth and dirt, of every description, that is constantly heaped up
in it, it is rendered a most intolerable nuisance; and from the very decayed
state of the tenement, the passers by are in danger of being crushed to death,
by the walls falling. Under these circumstances, I respectfully submit, that it
is the duty of the Commissioners to adopt some means of keeping it clean, or,
what would be much better, to close it up entirely. – your obedient servant,
Julian.[11]
In 1846 he is still listed as an
Iron Merchant on North Street.[12]
His brother Charles is also listed as an Iron Merchant at 30 Merchant’s Quay.
But he appears to have had other
interests.
For Sale the British-built sloop “Mary Hardie,” of
Grangemouth, 65 Tons per register – carries 83 Tons of 9 ½ feet on water, well
found in Sails, Rigging, &c., as she now lies at the New Navigation Office,
Canal, Newry.
For further particulars apply to Mr. Andrew Jennings,
Merchant, North-street; or Mr George Guy, Jun., Ship Agent, 45 Merchant’s-quay,
Newry.[13]
A number of times Andrew appears to have acted as an agent
or a trustee, and has even been referred to as a lawyer. But there is no record
of him having studied law.
In 1825 he was paid £25 for what appears to have been some
form of legal representation in a case involving an attack carried out by an
Orangeman [Weir] on a Catholic [McEvoy].
Andrew Jennings to
carrying on Orange prosecutions at Newry, in the case of McEvoy against Weir,
when the latter was found guilty and sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment,
and also for defending Hacket against an Orange party at Down Sessions or
Assizes. 20.0.0.[14]
[1] EPPI 1843 Vol 50, 632, p. 22
[2] Newry Telegraph 6th November 1832
[3] Source unknown
[4] Newry Telegraph 15 Oct 1833
[5] Globe, 14 July 1834
[6] Newry Examiner and Louth Advertiser 6th August
1834
[7] Perry’s Bankrupt Gazette Sat 14 Mar 1835 p. 6.
[8]
Valuation Office Books
[9] Newry
Telegraph 28th October 1837
[10] Source unknown.
[11] Newry Telegraph, 1838.
[12] Slater’s Directory, 1846.
[13] Newry Telegraph, 25th October 1851
[14] Dublin Morning Register 16
Feb 1825
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