Qualla: Achillbeg

Achillbeg: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit MikaLaureque, CC BY-SA 4.0. Its Irish name, Acaill Bheag, just means Little Achill - the small island tucked off the southern tip of its much larger sister. Achillbeg looks across a narrow sound to the cliffs of Achill itself, and on a clear day from Granuaile's Tower at Kildavnet you can see right onto its grassy back. But Achillbeg is empty now. The last residents were resettled on Achill and the nearby mainland decades ago, and the only working presence on the island is a lighthouse on the southern tip, built in 1965 to replace the much older light on Clare Island.

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Image: MikaLaureque | CC BY-SA 4.0

Achillbeg: The Last Inhabited Year

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kiran Madhusudhanan, CC BY-SA 4.0. Achillbeg's depopulation followed the slow arc familiar from many small Irish islands - school closures, the impracticality of ferrying supplies and children, the pull of the mainland economy. The inhabitants were eventually resettled on Achill itself or on the mainland nearby. T...

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Image: Kiran Madhusudhanan | CC BY-SA 4.0

Achillbeg: A New Light in 1965

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Oliver Dixon, CC BY-SA 2.0. When the Clare Island Lighthouse was decommissioned on 29 September 1965 after more than a century and a half of service, the Commissioners of Irish Lights needed a replacement to cover the same stretch of approach. They built it on Achillbeg's southern tip and brought it into se...

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Image: Oliver Dixon | CC BY-SA 2.0

Achillbeg: Johnny Kilbane's Plaque

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit No machine-readable author provided. El Comandante assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain. In 2012, a small plaque went up on Achillbeg marking a hundred years since the boxer Johnny Kilbane won his first world featherweight championship. Kilbane was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1889, but his father came from this area, and the family connection has been kept alive in is...

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Image: No machine-readable author provided. El Comandante assumed (based on copyright claims). | Public domain

Achillbeg: Two Books from a Quiet Place

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Andreas F. Borchert, CC BY-SA 4.0. Achillbeg has produced an unusual amount of writing for a depopulated island. In 2005, Jonathan Beaumont published Achillbeg - The Life of an Island, a careful account of the place and its people across the generations. The Irish artist Pete Hogan, who spent time living on the is...

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Image: Andreas F. Borchert | CC BY-SA 4.0

Achillbeg: Looking Across the Sound

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ridiculopathy, CC0. From the lifeboat station at Kildavnet on Achill, Achillbeg is a short hop across calm water and a much longer hop in any kind of weather. The currents through the sound can run hard. Sheep still graze on the island; visitors who come over with the small boats run from Achill Sou...

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Image: Ridiculopathy | CC0