The River Tall is a small
river
A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...
in
County Armagh
County Armagh (, named after its county town, Armagh) is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. Adjoined to the southern shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of and ha ...
,
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
which joins the
River Blackwater just south of
Verner’s Bridge. It is navigable for 4 km by dinghy or canoe.
It rises about 5 km west of Markethill and flows north by Richhill and Ballyhegan, and then turns west.
Originally it flowed into the
River Callan at Fairlawn Bridge, but was diverted into a cut excavated in 1851–4, which intercepts it at a point 2 km above the former confluence and conveys it directly to the Blackwater just above Verner's Bridge. The "Old Course of the Tall", from the interception down to Fairlawn Bridge, is so named on maps of the time, but it is unnamed on more recent OSNI maps, and may have been partially filled in.
A second cut, completed in 1855, partly diverted the Callan, by means of a weir at Clonmain Mill near the junction of the Summerisland Road and the Cloveneden Road, to the Tall at a point 0.3 km above the latter's own diversion, but the bulk of the Callan has continued in its original course. Both cuts are labelled "Callan River (New Course)" on maps of the time, but are unnamed on more recent OSNI maps.
In common usage, the name "Tall River" is now extended to include the first cut, all the way from the interception down to the Blackwater, but OSNI maps attach the name only to the part upstream from the interception. The first cut is also known locally as "the canal".
For a map of the drainage, see here.
See also
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List of rivers of Northern Ireland
This is an alphabetical list of the main rivers on the island of Ireland. It includes rivers that flow through the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Rivers that flow through Northern Ireland are marked with an asterisk (*). There are over ...
Bibliography
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References
Rivers of County Armagh
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