Thomas Gilroy b. 2 October 1852, Dundee, Scotland
Thomas Gilroy was born in Dundee, Scotland and had taken up golf from a young age being taught by George Morris (a brother of Old Tom Morris) and Jack Butchart while playing his golf at Carnoustie as a member of The Dalhousie Golf Club. Fortunately the aforementioned Jack Butchart, a clubmaker, was on hand to extricate him from the Barry Burn when he lost his footing and went in to the mud head first. Later as a student at St. Andrews he would often play golf with young Tom Morris and David Strath before they were famous. Gilroy became even more proficient at the game as Old Tom Morris and Jamie Anderson added the finishing touches to hone his skills.
The Gilroy family were in the Jute industry when Robert and later his brothers Alexander and George started the firm of Gilroy Brothers & Co. as mill spinners in the 1840’s and by 1872 dealt also exclusively in Jute, which they imported from India, and branched into manufacturing and ship owners. Thomas was one of ten children of Robert, the founding member of the firm and he died in 1872. The Company was considered one of the most successful manufacturing businesses in Dundee. Many of the Gilroy family were members of Dalhousie or Panmure and competed in the Amateur Championship. Thomas was also an active member of the Panmure Golf Club who played their golf over the Monifieth Links (until the end of the nineteenth century) and he would win a number of their prestigious events including the MacLachlan Medal (1885), Silver Cross (1879,1880,1881,1882), Gold Medal (1875,1883), Gourlay Cup (1885) and Brand Cup (1883).
Gilroy would often partner with Jamie Anderson in foursomes matches at Monifieth against celebrated local amateurs David Brimer and David Hutchinson. Gilroy was also a member of Panmure, Westward Ho.! and Monifieth, where he was captain in 1872 and would have won medals at Aberdeen, Montrose, Forfar and Oxford. Before going to Ireland he, together with his friend Colonel Warren Swettenham, lived in Cheltenham for two years in the forlorn (as it turned out) hope of as of establishing a club but he would play in Malvern where a club had been established and from where he entered the 1885 Amateur Championship.
Thomas Gilroy moved, with his family, to Ireland living in Mornington House (Coney Hall) in 1885, three miles from Drogheda. John Lumsden, a fellow Scot, had emigrated to Ireland in 1867 where he worked for the Provincial Bank in Kilkenny before transferring to Drogheda and subsequently to Dublin as manager of the Provincial Bank College Street branch. In 1884 Lumsden was caught with the golfing bug following a trip to Wimbledon just outside London. It unclear why Gilroy decided to relocate to Ireland but the employees of Gilroy Brothers & Co. in Dundee were on strike following a 5% pay cut handed down by management but may equally have been disillusioned by his efforts at Cheltenham. The daughters of Isabel and Thomas Gilroy were under five years of age and Randall was eight and Norman a year older when they moved to Coney Hall. On 7 January 1880, the master of the house was Captain James Henry Brabazon a County Meath magistrate, a gruesome murder took place where Margaret Skein, a former servant and mistress of the owner had murdered Emily Boucher with iron bars and dumped her body in the well. The sentence handed down was penal servitude for life for manslaughter and Skein would die a year later in prison.
Coney Hall was considered one of the finest Queen Anne style residences built on a large three acre walled-estate in County Meath and previously occupied by the Earl of Mornington and rumoured, however unlikely, to have been the birthplace of the Duke of Wellington. Gilroy built a fourteen-hole (it was originally eleven-holes) partially on the site of the Laytown & Bettystown Golf Club up as far as the Maiden Tower. There is little evidence of what the course layout looked like back in 1886 except a newspaper report of an inter-club match (probably the second to take place in the country) between Royal Dublin and Royal Belfast which states: “This links is without doubt the nearest approach to that of St. Andrews, the premier of Scottish greens…it abounds with legitimate hazards, the bunker, the rabbit scrape, the water and the furze. Here is not only an opportunity for the long driver and stealthy putter but as too many of the Belfast team found, for the successful player of the sand iron and niblick.” The water being referred to was probably the Mornington River, known locally at the time as the Gut or, its Irish name, Owenwarra. The Gut is a tidal river of the Boyne but would have meandered its way through the Burrows, as the dunes were referred to, not unlike the Barry Burn. It wouldn’t be a stretch to think that some great amateur golfers of the time made their way to play a social round of golf and enjoy the hospitality of their host who no doubt would play the violin and have his son Randall sing for their entertainment.
It is suggested in the County Louth centenary that he encountered opposition from locals to the game and this together with the ‘Squire Pentland’ (George Henry Pentland) identifying suitable terrain on the other side of the Boyne convinced him to stay. Gilroy had initially intended to leave the area in 1891 when in October of that year R.B. Daly placed a notice for the sale of stock, chattels, horses etc at Mornington House were up for auction noting Gilroy’s intention to leave. However a similar notice appeared in October 1895 which suggests the land at Baltray convinced him to stay.
Gilroy was one of the key personalities in bringing golf to Ireland and was himself considered to be the best golfer in Ireland at the time, he is attributed with laying out the Phoenix Park golf course in 1885 (the original home of the Royal Dublin GC), the aforementioned fourteen-hole course in Mornington in 1886, in 1891 the North West Golf Club and in 1892 the first nine-hole course at Baltray. Thomas Gilroy was present at the formation of the Royal County Down G.C. (1889), Leopardstown G.C. (1891) and Ormeau G.C (1893).
Although Scottish by birth, Thomas Gilroy was the first to represent an Irish Club (Royal Dublin Golf Club) at the Open Championship in 1891 and at the Amateur Championship from 1886-1890. Gilroy was also a vice-president of the Ladies Golf Union (LGU) at its inception in 1893. Gilroy entered the Amateur Championship in 1891 as a member of the County Golf Club, Portrush where he had a house and spent much of his summer months. It was Thomas Gilroy who secured Sandy Herd a position at Royal Portrush for the summer when he contacted Captain David Lamb, his brother-in-law and Lamb recommended Sandy who he had regularly played with. In 1895, the final of the first professional championship played in Ireland between Harry Vardon and Sandy Herd would be refereed by Gilroy and Herd was the victor when he returned to his old stomping ground.
In ‘The Golfing Annual 1888-89’ edited by John Bauchope, the second such edition, E. A. Collingwood, the honorary secretary of the County Golf Club in Portrush which was formed in 1888 recalled Gilroy’s status amongst the caddies: To them the greatest man in Ireland is Mr. T. Gilroy for did he not once do the nine holes (later extended to 18 holes) in 37!
Gilroy’s name from the outset was synonymous with the Dublin (Dollymount) Golf Club since his arrival in Ireland in the mid-eighteen eighties during which his handicap would vary between scratch and plus four. He was to win some of the earliest prizes like the Black Watch Medal and the Henderson Cup, which James Henderson presented in 1888 with a view to promoting golf in Ireland. Gilroy won the Henderson Cup when it was played over the Dollymount course on the 10 June 1889 when, as captain of the club, which at the time was reportedly the only eighteen-hole golf course in Ireland, he scored a gross 80 playing off scratch.
It was recorded that Thomas Gilroy broke the record at the County Golf Club (i.e. Royal Portrush as it would later be named – 1895) when he shot a round of 71 in a gale; the recorded scores were 5,4,2,3,4,5,3,6,4 – 36 4,5,3,4,3,3,4,4,5 – 35 = 71.
Gilroy was a semi-finalist in the first Irish Amateur Championship played at the County Golf Club, Portrush and on the 13 September 1893 the second Irish Open Amateur Championship being played at Newcastle he was beaten by W. Taylor another scratch player out of Edinburgh by 3 and 1 in the first round. Gilroy was playing off scratch while the eventual winner, the legendary John Ball jnr. played off plus 5.
Gilroy’s participation in the Amateur Championship began in 1885 when he was beaten in the third round by the eventual winner, Allen F. Macfie, by a margin of 2 and 1. During the championship he beat Charles Hutchings, the 1902 champion, by 3 and 2. The following year at St. Andrews he was beaten on the 19th in a first round match against Major Gregor MacGregor of the Royal Burgess Golfing Society, one of their finest players at the time and a person who made all his own clubs. In 1887 the championship returned to Hoylake where he was beaten in the third round by 4 and 3 by the aforementioned John Ball jnr at his home club. In 1888 at Prestwick, Percy Wilson exacted revenge for his defeat at the hands of Gilroy in a second round match. In 1889 at St. Andrews Gilroy exited in the third round at the hands of J P Henderson by 2 holes. In 1890, at Hoylake, he lost to D Anderson from Dalhousie by 2 holes after beating H.S. Everard by a similar margin in a first round encounter.
In 1891 at St. Andrews he reached the semi-finals:
1st Rnd vs A G Tait Edinburgh University (won 2 and 1) 2nd Rnd vs Garden S Smith - Royal Musselburgh (won 3 and 2) 3rd Rnd vs R T Boothby - Royal & Ancient (won 3 and 2) 4th Rnd vs W Doleman - Glasgow (won 7 and 6) Semi-final vs John Ernest Laidlay - Honourable Company, Muirfield (lost 5 and 4)
Laidlay, the 1889 champion, went on to narrowly win the title and was considered, at the time, with Ball and Hutchinson to be the greatest exponents of the game. Laidlay is attributed, despite its name, with the discovery of the “Vardon Grip”, which together with the interlocking grip are the most popular golfing grips. Now nearing forty this appears to have been Gilroy’s last Amateur Championship but secured the bronze medal for his troubles, no doubt this was his finest hour on the golf links as a player.
Thomas Gilroy was married to Isabel and together had four children; two sons Randall .R. Gilroy (H/cap – 2) and N. Gilroy (H/cap – 12), the daughters Winifred and Eunice were also to prove useful golfers. Randall showed the most promise at the game and was already playing off a handicap of 2 while in Ireland and would later play to plus 3 while at Newhaven GC. By 1895 Randall Gilroy, playing out of County Louth, was a serious contender for the Amateur Championship and had beaten John Ball jnr. in the second round by 2 and 1. Thomas was beaten by J.S. Reade in the second round match in the same championship. Taylor again (as in 1893) took a Gilroy scalp when in the semi-final he beat Randall by 2 and 1, he would go on to win the event and take a further two titles in 1896 and 1898.
In June 1894 upon the visit of Old Tom Morris’ to Dollymount he teamed up with Gilroy to play Anthony Brown, the local professional, and Mr J. Petrie but the honours were shared as the St. Andrews legend’s approaches to the green in the back nine helped the Morris/Gilroy partnership get back on level terms. Less than two years later Gilroy took up a position, as secretary, of the Seaford Golf Club in East Sussex for £100 per annum and quickly made his mark on the course with a record 72 on 8 June 1896.
Gilroy’s daughter Winifred played off a handicap of two upon her arrival at Seaford (age c. 16 years) but would, within a couple of years, lower that to scratch, managing also to set a course record for Seaford Golf Club, amongst others, not long after her arrival. Winifred would win the English Ladies’ Championship in 1913 when it was hosted by Nottingham in only its second year and was a bronze medallist at Cromer in the Ladies’ Amateur Championship in 1905, both under her married name of Mrs F. W. Brown. At Royal Wimbledon Golf Club there is, according to the Seaford centenary book, a photograph with the caption: “Winifred Brown, 1902-1927. Vice President and captain. Ever remembered for her devotion to the Club and her kindness as a friend.” The younger (by two years) daughter Eunice would make her name at both county and international level as an administrator of the game who played no small part in the organising the first post-war Ladies’ Championship at Newcastle, County Down. By 1900 Thomas Gilroy had left Seaford Golf Club to take up a position at Chislehurst but by the 1901 census, his profession was given as “Living on own means”.
Thomas Gilroy was undoubtedly one of the early pioneers and evangelists of golf in Ireland and Mornington has a legitimate claim to being the cradle of links golf in Ireland.
Bibliography:
Margaret Downey: From the Nanny to the Boyne – A Local History
Seaford Golf Club – A History
William H. Gibson – Early Irish Golf
Golf – A Weekly Record of the Royal and Ancient Game ( 17 February 1893)