placenamesLaragh
Láithreach
Saint Peter’s survives as the most striking reminder of Laragh’s industrial past, now cared for as a community venue.
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
- Láithreach · Irish · main form · validated name
- Laragh · English · main form
Place & story
Spinning mills and a model village
Laragh’s industrial growth drew on flax cultivation and the fast-flowing water below Lough Egish. The Davidsons leased Laragh Mills in 1824 and developed mechanised spinning the following year. Workers’ housing and a post office helped form a planned mill settlement. Under later owner James McKean, relations with the workforce could be difficult: a dispute over pay, conditions and religious holidays led to a strike and lockout in the winter of 1884–85. [2]
Gothic detail in corrugated iron
Saint Peter’s Church dates from 1890 and is built on a cruciform plan, with a small chancel, transepts and a tower carrying a slender spire. Corrugated iron covers both walls and roofs, yet the design includes the pointed windows, timber tracery and decorative ridge cresting associated with more conventional Gothic churches. The spire has embossed metal panels with a fish-scale pattern. Its elaborate treatment makes an industrial material central to one of Laragh’s most distinctive buildings. [3]
From a failing spire to a new use
By the severe winters of 2010–11, the disused church was deteriorating badly. Laragh Heritage Group formed in 2012, and fundraising began with Christmas cards, walks and concerts. Emergency work stabilised the spire, allowing its cockerel weather vane to return in December 2013. The restored building reopened in September 2014. Further work brought electricity in 2015, a rebuilt pulpit in 2017 and a bell in 2019, extending the rescue into a continuing community project. [4]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Monaghan
- Barony
- Cremorne
- Civil parish
- Aghnamullen
- Coordinates
- 54.04191, -6.77866 (approximate)
- Logainm ID
- 1417563 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Laragh. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- Saint Peter’s Church, Laragh, County Monaghan: Building of the Month, September 2017 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Saint Peter’s Church, Aghnamullen: register 41402801 · National Inventory of Architectural Heritage
- Restoration Journey · Laragh Heritage Group
- St Peter's tin church, Laragh, County Monaghan illustration: based on a St Peter’s Church, Laragh, Co.Monaghan by Agsmaoineamh1 (Commons uploader); Julie Corcoran (EXIF photographer). AI-assisted watercolour and ink adaptation; cream paper margins added, incidental clutter omitted and fine details simplified. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2014-11-03. How this page was prepared.