Mothers would be out with their daughters and fathers with their sons. It still pains me today when I remember mothers standing on the footpath with two or three daughters, and farmers, roughly dressed, peaked caps over their ears and ash plants in their hands, looking at these girls as if they were cattle – in other words trying to make up their minds if they were capable of doing the work they wanted them to do. But mothers were really more concerned, not with the wages they would get – which was six pounds for six months – but that they would have a clean bed, reasonable food and that they could get off for Sunday morning worship. Many of them were farmers’ sons and daughters from the mountain farms between Fivemiletown and Roslea. It was thickly populated and families on the whole were large. There was always plenty of work, for example when they were making turf, and I remember farmers bringing in their loads of turf to Roslea on the eighth of the month. They got five shillings for a large load and half-a-crown for a donkey’s one.
      One eighth of May, following a band practice three of us went up to this little confectionery store at about nine thirty in the evening and we sat down on a bench at the back of the shop. There came in two young boys who had just been hired for their first six months and one of them ordered a large bottle of lemonade – ‘Kirkers’ it was those days. Mrs Cummins who owned the shop brought them two glasses to drink the lemonade. They each bought four half-penny Paris buns, consumed the buns and drank the lemonade in complete silence. When they had finished one boy looked over at the other and said, ‘Pat, we’ll meet here on the eighth of November and we’ll have another big brust [feast].’ That was a real banquet for them. The three of us had gone in to buy sweets. I was probably about seventeen. I was farming at the time but my friends were still at school.
      There used to be a character called Devine who came from Omagh. He had a terrific repertoire of stories. There was this tiny man, I’ve forgotten his name, but he was known as Oweny Bottley. He wasn’t the most handsome of men. He had a prominent Roman nose and wore a very long overcoat which certainly wasn’t tailored for him. It was probably given to him by some of the cattle dealers. But this man Devine suddenly spotted Oweny in the crowd and he broke off and said, ‘God created man in his own image but in whose image did he create Oweny Bottley!’ There were people too selling all sorts of remedies that would cure everything from corns to a sore back.
      The Parish priest played his part too. On the Sunday before hiring day he preached a special sermon aimed directly at the boys and girls about to hire. The main thrust of his address was to advise those going into service to make sure they would be free to attend Mass and the Sacraments and at the same time he warned them that whilst being obedient to their masters they should guard against praying with heretics. He also spoke regularly against dancing, hunting on Sunday, wakes and their abominations, runaway marriages and courting in the mountain areas.

Extracted from the Appletree Press title Hiring Fairs and Market Places by May Blair.
Previous extracts regarding County Fermanagh:
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7