Twink Ivory

While growing up in the village we were blessed to have some of the nicest and gentlest men. At the time we were in

our own worlds and it wasn't till years later that we realised how lucky we were to have known them.

I became friends with one of these men by the name of Twink. He was the local grave digger and story teller. I can

remember sitting at the Shippe bar with Twink and a few townies came into the bar. Twink was well under way. He

told a few local stories to warm them up plus he would get a pint or two bought for him for his trouble. Then he got

into the story of Loftus Hall with the devil playing cards and coming up through the floor....well before you know it the

townies were on their way out the door looking a little flushed, with the story of the devil still bouncing around in their

heads. Twink told his stories with conviction and could make the hair stand up on the back of your neck.

I came home one day for tea and my mother was looking rather upset. My mother used to knit all our winter

sweaters. "How did Twink Ivory get one of your sweaters?", says she. Well, says I, "poor Twink lives up in the old

caravan so I thought he might be cold so I gave it to him”. She could not stay mad for long for she had known Twink

all her life as well and he was a good man.

I remember a story that was told when I was young growing up in the village. Twink and Richie ( Bulgaria ) Walsh got

together to dig a grave at the Protestant church. Well the two boys were missing in action and after a few days a

search party was sent out, in the shape of Sargent Flynn. The story goes that the Sarge found the two boys passed

out in the grave, pissed. They had found a few bottles of whiskey when they were digging the grave, it was common

to find such things, family members would bury things with the dead. The graves were almost on top of each other

and when they were digging, I remember Twink saying that some of the old graves on each side of the new one

would fall in. They would put parts of the old coffin and bones into a burlap bag and re-bury them.

From Peter O'Neill

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