placenamesLeitrim
Liatroim
Jamestown’s institutions and Shannon works offer one view of the wider barony’s history.
The name
A reliable full-name meaning has not been established here. The recorded Irish and English forms are given without an unsupported translation.
Recorded forms
- Liatroim · Irish · main form · non-validated name
- Leitrim · English · main form
Place & story
A chartered town beside the Shannon
Samuel Lewis placed Jamestown in Leitrim barony and described the charter granted by James I in 1621. It incorporated a sovereign, burgesses and free commons and required a new town near the Shannon. The borough returned two members to the Irish parliament until the Union. By Lewis’s 1837 account, its corporation had ceased to function, while a flour mill and Saturday market remained part of local life. [2]
Crossing and controlling the river
Jamestown’s five-arched bridge, dated by the architectural inventory to around 1846, links County Leitrim with County Roscommon. A curving wall leads towards a quay with landing steps and mooring posts, connecting the road crossing with river traffic. Another engineering work followed in 1882: sluice gates were installed to control Shannon water levels, with a pedestrian footbridge above. The bridge, quay and sluice preserve different practical uses of the same river setting. [3] [4]
Geographic information
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Leitrim. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Jamestown, A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland1837 · Samuel Lewis
- Jamestown Bridge,NIAH30814016 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Jamestown Shannon sluice,NIAH30814002 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2025-01-10. How this page was prepared.