These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
Ceann Chlochair· Irish · main form · validated name
Clogherhead· English · main form
Place & story
From the road junction to Port Oriel
Clogherhead developed around the junction of the Drogheda–Dunleer road, with Harbour Road and Strand Street extending towards the sea. Louth County Council's town-centre study compares nineteenth- and early twentieth-century maps: the 1835 settlement included a school, police station, ruined church and waterguard station, while later mapping shows long, narrow plots behind houses. The study dates the construction of Port Oriel to 1885. Fishing and maritime trade therefore help explain both the harbour infrastructure and the village's surviving pattern of curved streets and elongated properties.[2]
A lifeboat arrives in 1899
The RNLI established Clogherhead's station in 1899, supplying the Charles Whitton and a corrugated-iron boathouse on a concrete base with a short slipway. A motor lifeboat followed in 1931. A contemporary magazine account records its naming ceremony on 22 September, attended by General Richard Mulcahy and his wife, who named the boat. The report describes villagers and visitors gathering for the occasion. These successive boats and shore buildings show how rescue work changed from the equipment of the original station to a motor-powered service.[3][4]
People & connections
Maire Hoy’s role at the station
Maire Hoy began running the Clogherhead lifeboat station in 1961. In its history of women in operational leadership, the RNLI places her alongside Jane Hay of St Abbs and Minnie Sutherland of Longhope. A 1979 interview found Hoy matter-of-fact about taking on the honorary secretary's responsibilities, despite contemporary unease in some quarters about women occupying such roles. Her example adds an important shore-based perspective to the station's history: organising a rescue service depended on leadership ashore as well as the crews who went to sea.[5]
Both counts use the 2016 settlement boundary, allowing like-for-like comparison. CSO supplies the 2022 count on this older boundary for comparison only. The official 2022 Built Up Area has different boundaries.
View population figures
Clogherhead — Census 2016 settlement footprint — census population
These are the historical areas published in the 2006 census report. Boundaries may differ between censuses and from modern settlements. Legal towns, environs and suburbs are shown separately; none has been combined into a modern settlement total.
View population figures
Clogherhead, Louth — Census town, CSO 2006 report — census population
These are the historical areas published in the 1996 census report. Boundaries may differ between censuses and from modern settlements. Legal towns, environs and suburbs are shown separately; none has been combined into a modern settlement total.
View population figures
Clogherhead, Louth — Census town, CSO 1996 report — census population
Figures cover the historical town area printed in the 1986 report. Boundaries may have changed between censuses. Legal town, environs and suburb totals remain separate and differ from modern settlement boundaries.
View population figures
Clogherhead, Louth — Census town, CSO 1986 report — census population
These figures use different area definitions. Read the boundary note before comparing them.
Clogherhead, Louth
Published census settlement populations
2,145people · 2016
Settlement boundaries changed during this period. Differences may reflect boundary changes as well as population change. Where a 2011 legal-town-and-environs count is shown, it has not been recalculated onto the 2016 settlement boundary.
placenames