An Irish pastime

Have you ever played or seen the game called ‘long bullets’ or Irish road bowling? Road bowling is an Irish sport in which competitors attempt to take the fewest throws to propel a metal ball along a predetermined course of country roads. The sport originated in Ireland and is mainly played in counties Armagh and Cork.

THERE was a time, still within living memory, when a Sunday afternoon out road bowling could lead to a day in court on the charge of causing "imminent danger to life and limb of Her Majesty's subjects" through playing a game of bowls along the public road.

Some sources suggest that the decline of road bowling in Ireland was due in large measure to prosecution by the R.I.C. Writing on the topic in "Ireland's Own" in July 1924, Chris M. O'Sullivan describes one officer who took a particular interest in the sport though not for very "sporting" reasons.

"The 'bete noire' of the boys was one Sergeant M ---. Convictions for bowling and for making poteen were the milestones on the road to promotion for M---, and after a few more of them he expected to be able to sit down on the last and take a long-earned rest. These things don’t work out too badly for the "boys", according to M. O'Donovan who wrote in "The Irish Packet" in February 1905.

He relates an Incident which Involved a number of men who appeared before the Petty Sessions Court in Bandon in 1904 charged with bowling and aiding and abetting bowlers. Lord Bandon, the presiding magistrate, declared that in his opinion bowling was a fine, manly game, and that if scores were there on bye-roads not much used by through traffic, he thought the obstruction next to nothing. The offenders were left off lightly. V

While road bowling was banned in Ireland because it was considered dangerous for pedestrians and cattle passing along the country, roads, Henry VIII had banned bowling in, England, at an earlier stage in history because of the gambling that was attached to it.

There is no written evidence as to how and when bowling was introduced to Ireland but people have advanced a few theories on the subject.

Fr. Raymond Murray, who edited a book called "The Armagh Bullet Thrower," suggests that the sport could have come with the Dutch soldiers when William of Orange came to Ireland in 1689. He also suggests it could have been brought over by Yorkshire linen workers.

The pastime of bowling, whether practised upon the greens or* in bowling alleys or on the roads, was probably an invention of the Middle Ages writes Sean Riordan in September 1936, in "Ireland's Own."

Today, road bowling continues in Ireland and largely played in counties Cork and Armagh.

For more information search the pages of the Irish Newspaper Archive (www.irishnewsarchive.com )