The Quoile (; ) is a river in

County Down County Down () is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. It covers an area of and has a population of 552,261. It borders County Antrim to the ...

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...

Course

The river begins its life as the Ballynahinch River which flows from west of the town of Ballynahinch to Annacloy where it is known as the Annacloy River. This then becomes the Quoile proper, which flows through

Downpatrick Downpatrick () is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is on the Lecale peninsula, about south of Belfast. In the Middle Ages, it was the capital of the Dál Fiatach, the main ruling dynasty of Ulaid. Down Cathedral, Its cathedral is sai ...

and the Quoile Pondage before finally emptying into Strangford Lough.

History

The river was effectively created when Edward Southwell (1705–1755) landlord of Downpatrick built a tidal barrier at the Quoile and began draining the land, creating 500 acres of land from what was previously the western branch of Strangford Lough. The name comes from the narrowest point of the estuary at Finnebrogue, where a ford and ferry existed before the construction of the bridge. Harris, in 1744, mistakenly writes that the name of the bridge should be Coyne (after the branch of Loch Cuan up stream) not Coyle because he overlooked the origin.

Inch Abbey

On the north bank of the river, 0.75 miles (1.2 km) north-west of Downpatrick, the Inch Abbey site was originally on an island () in the Quoile Marshes. The pre- Norman

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

monastic settlement here, known as ''Inis Cumhscraigh'' (or ''Inis Cuscraidh''), was in existence by the year 800. In 1002 it was plundered by the

Viking Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

s led by Sitric, King of the Danes, who came up the Quoile with a fleet from the sea. The Vikings plundered the settlement again in 1149.

Quoile Castle

Quoile Castle is situated 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from Downpatrick, just off the main road from Downpatrick to

Strangford Strangford (from Old Norse ''Strangr fjörðr'', meaning "strong sea-inlet") is a small village at the mouth of Strangford Lough, on the Lecale peninsula in County Down, Northern Ireland. It had a population of 475 at the 2001 census. On th ...

, on the east bank of the river. It is a 16th-century

Tower house A tower house is a particular type of stone structure, built for defensive purposes as well as habitation. Tower houses began to appear in the Middle Ages, especially in mountainous or limited access areas, to command and defend strategic points ...

which was inhabited into the 18th century.

Steam-Boat Quay

In September 1837, the County Down and Liverpool Steam-Boat Company commenced regular sailings of their steam packet ''Victoria'' between a quay on the Quoile and

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

. However, the tides of Strangford Lough made time-keeping difficult and there was insufficient low-volume, high-value trade suitable for a steam-boat route. The company folded in 1839 and their ship was sold off. The iron steamship ''Robert Burns'', 120 gross tons, built in 1857 on the Clyde, provided a regular cargo service from the Quoile to northern English ports for 17 years from 1866. The main export was agricultural produce and coal the main import.

Quoile Pondage Nature Reserve

Following the building of the tidal barrier in 1957, the Quoile Pondage evolved into a freshwater marsh. A footpath runs along the bank from the old floodgates to the remains of the stream-boat quay.

References

{{authority control Quoile Downpatrick