COUNTY     LOUTH

In 1824

The county of Louth is bounded by Eastmeath, on the South and South West, by Monaghan and Cavan on the West, on the North by the counties of Armagh and Down and by the Irish Channel on the East. Its greatest extent from North to South is about 21 Irish miles, and from east to west about 16 Irish miles. Its superfice comprises 126,960 acres, Irish plantation measure, including bogs, mountains and waste.

It contains four baronies, Ferrard, Atherdee, Louth and Dundalk, which are divided into 61 parishes.

The soil is uneven, and thickly interspersed with high hills, which add not a little to the beauty of the scenery. This, like many other counties in Ireland, is extremely fecund. The fragments of its ancient monuments are numerous, on which can be traced evident marks of magnificence, as it constituted the centre of the English pale originally extending from Wicklow on the South to Dunluce in the North. Its principle rivers are the Boyne which separates the counties of Eastmeath, for a short distance, and Louth, the Dee, the Fane, the Lagan, the Dundalk, and the Jenisborough, which traverse this county from west to east, and discharge their waters into the Irish Channel. Ochres and fuller’s earth are the principal mineral productions of this county.

(Source: Pigot & Co’s, City of Dublin and Hibernian Provincial Directory, London 1824, p.6.)