Category : Stories

Sub Category : Horror

A mile from the Toar cottages were I grew up in the 1970s, brought you to the edge of the ancient swamp bog of Bonnykill, or as we called it, Bunnykill bog. It was a vast area of deep and dangerous peat bog that only us locals knew how to cross this dangerous swamp of a bog, either day or night.
In 1936 my late grandfather old Jim Feery, and my father, young Jim Feery, while digging turf in the lowbanks uncovered a Roman road and a stone axe. Back in those day's finds like these were often and the local people had no way of recording or taking pictures of their finds, so they went unnoticed.
The Roman road was directly in the path of the remains of old Toar house, which had been burned down since  1922, but her four walls still remain to this day.
In 1952 a man called Ned Molloy from Tubberdaly was working as a farm laborer for the then owner of the lands of Toar house Estate. One day it was late evening and as dusk began to fall, Ned who had been erecting barbed wire to keep the cattle out of the old court yard to the back of the house.
Suddenly in shock he fell backwards heavily on his back on the ground, in total shock at what he saw in a recess in the wall. Right in front of him he saw first a helmet rise up into the open from behind this recess.
To his horror he then saw the complete figure of a Roman Soldier come out of the recess and walk straight past him. Neds account of what he saw was ridiculed because of the description he gave of this Roman Soldier. He said he had a round shield, on the side of his armour he carried a very short sword, not much bigger than a dagger in it's sheaf. His dress of armour plate was bound with strips of leather like a metal dress he wore, with armour plate to chest and back, tied together with brown leather.
It wasn't long till people realized, that the Roman Soldier carried a square shield, and a long sword, also their armour was not bound with brown leather. For many months Ned was the butt of many jokes, who's puteen were you drinking that evening, maybe you fell asleep on the job and not realized you were only dreaming.
Till a school master from Tullamore on hearing of this story took great interest in it and began a bit of research. His findings were remarkable and no one was to laugh or mock Ned Molloy again.
You see towards the end of the Roman Empire they couldn't find enough soldiers to man their massive borders, so they sent out small bands of soldiers, to live off the land for many months.
They did not fight in big battles and often operated in the woods and swamps of Great Britain and Ireland. The school master's findings were exactly as Ned Molloy saw, these soldiers carried a round shield, a short sword, not much bigger than a dagger, and their armour was bound together with brown straps of leather.
Ned had indeed seen a real Roman Soldier it took an academic a long time to work it out and it was very unlikely an uneducated man like Ned Molloy could have known something like the exacted dress of these late Roman Soldiers.
It gives credence to the long held belief that the Roman Road runs beneath Toar house and all the way down around the edge of Bunnykill bog, and this Roman Soldier still remains along his long lost road.