Ram’s Island is the largest island in

Lough Neagh Lough Neagh ( ) is a freshwater lake in Northern Ireland and is the largest lake in the island of Ireland, the United Kingdom and the British Isles. It has a surface area of and supplies 40% of Northern Ireland's water. Its main inflows come ...

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 ...

. It lies near the eastern shore of the lake and is about long by wide. Thickly wooded, it is a wildlife haven and includes the ruins of a medieval

Irish round tower Irish round towers ( ga, Cloigtheach (singular), (plural); literally 'bell house') are early mediaeval stone towers of a type found mainly in Ireland, with two in Scotland and one on the Isle of Man. As their name indicates, they were origin ...

History

The island's original Irish name was ''Inis Dar Cairgrenn'', which could mean "island of Cairgriu's daughter", and later became ''Inis Dairgreann''.Ram's Island
Place Names NI. This name was anglicized as "Enish Garden" and also survives in the name of an area on the mainland called "Darachrean".Ram's Island

Placenames Database of Ireland The Placenames Database of Ireland ( ga, Bunachar Logainmneacha na hÉireann), also known as , is a database and archive of place names in Ireland. It was created by Fiontar, Dublin City University in collaboration with the Placenames Branch of t ...

. The English name "Ram's Island" could have come from the Irish ending ''–reann'' or from the island's "resemblance in form to a ram's horn". In the Middle Ages, an Irish monastery and

round tower A fortified tower (also defensive tower or castle tower or, in context, just tower) is one of the defensive structures used in fortifications, such as castles, along with curtain walls. Castle towers can have a variety of different shapes and ful ...

were built on the island. Irish outlaw

Redmond O'Hanlon Redmond O'Hanlon, FRGS, FRSL (born 5 June 1947) is an English writer and scholar. Life O'Hanlon was born in 1947 in Dorset, England. He was educated at Marlborough College and then Oxford University. After taking his M.Phil. in nineteenth-ce ...

is said to have taken refuge on the island in 1679. Several of the founders of the

United Irishmen The Society of United Irishmen was a sworn association in the Kingdom of Ireland formed in the wake of the French Revolution to secure "an equal representation of all the people" in a national government. Despairing of constitutional reform, ...

, including

Wolfe Tone Theobald Wolfe Tone, posthumously known as Wolfe Tone ( ga, Bhulbh Teón; 20 June 176319 November 1798), was a leading Irish revolutionary figure and one of the founding members in Belfast and Dublin of the United Irishmen, a republican socie ...

, visited the island in 1795.Rams Island Timeline
Ram's Island Heritage Project. Retrieved 1 December 2021. Ram's Island grew in size from approximately after Lough Neagh was lowered in the 19th century. In the early 19th century, the island was bought by the

Baron O'Neill Baron O'Neill, of Shane's Castle in the County of Antrim, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1868 for the musical composer The Reverend William O'Neill. Born William Chichester, he succeeded to the estates of his ...

, who built two houses there. The island's last permanent inhabitants were the Cardwells, previously caretakers for the O'Neills, in the 1920s. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, there was a

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

flying boat A flying boat is a type of fixed-winged seaplane with a hull, allowing it to land on water. It differs from a floatplane in that a flying boat's fuselage is purpose-designed for floatation and contains a hull, while floatplanes rely on fusela ...

base at nearby Sandy Bay (RAF Sandy Bay). In 2005, the River Bann and Lough Neagh Association signed a thirty-year lease for Ram's Island. It received funding from the Lough Neagh Partnership, which was supported by the

Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) is a government department in the Northern Ireland Executive, the devolved administration for Northern Ireland. The minister with overall responsibility for the department i ...

. In 2006 a ferry named ''The Island Warrior'' began regular boat trips to the island for tourists.

References

{{authority control Uninhabited islands of Northern Ireland Lough Neagh Lake islands of Northern Ireland