History of Garvagh

The village of Garvagh in Country Londonderry, is unique, in that unlike other villages in the country it was not developed by the Irish Society, nor is it an ancient settlement. It is in fact a private plantation that is, a town set up over a period of nearly 300 years and developed by the local Lords of the Manor, the Canning family. George Canning was elevated to the peerage in 1818 with the title, Lord Garvagh. The family association with the Garvagh area began in 1615 when George Canning of Foxcote in Warwickshire was appointed the Agent for the Ironmongers Company of London, a company actively involved in King James the Firsts plantation of Ulster. To begin with, the townland of Garvagh was not part of the Ulster Plantation, as it had been granted to Manus O'Cahan the local Irish chief, as a native freehold. After the Great Irish Rebellion of 1641 the situation changed, when O'Cahan joined forces with Sir Phelim Roe O'Neill in the insurrection and as a result he lost the freehold.

We know that Canning had started to found a village on Ironmongers land on the east side of the Agivey river just south of the present village, in the townland of Ballinameen, where William Canning, George Cannings oldest son was killed.

Eight years later in 1649 another of George Cannings sons, Paul Canning, acquired the townland of Garvagh and began to develop it, by first building St Pauls Parish Church, which initially was intended as a private chapel for himself and his family.

The Canning Family took an active part in the Siege of Derry 1688-89 and after the siege returned to Garvagh and re-built the village. In 1720 the village had 55 houses, a market and a mill. The Presbyterians worshipped in the open air in a meadow on the west side of the Agivey River which flows past the village on its east side. They had been moved there in the previous century because they sang the psalms so lustily that they disturbed Canning in the Parish Church close by.

The Canning family continued to play an active part in the development of Garvagh until 1920 when they sold the estate and moved to England, exactly 300 years after they had set up the first village.

Of that early development Canning wrote to the Ironmongers Company in London after the first six houses had been built, It shall be a great town by the standard of this country. His prediction has proved to be a very accurate one indeed. The town has been the centre of a fertile rural area serving a farming community on the edge of the Bann Valley. The town is noted for its wide main street. Its most prominent building is the War Memorial erected in the form of a clock tower, in memory of those from the town and district who served in the First World War. It includes the names of seven nurses and thirty two officers and men who made the supreme sacrifice; also recorded are the names of all who served and survived that war, in all one hundred and seventy eight men and women, a great effort by a small community. Those who served in the Second World War are also recorded on separate tablets.