‘Stoney Stone’ serves new purpose
Borrisokane bench honours Alan Turing’s local link
One of the features in ‘My Hometown Borrisokane’ is a bench in the town park that honours the local link with WWII codebreaker Alan Turing.
Borrisokane is home to the forebears of many famous sons, among them the actor Martin Sheen, while silent filmmaker Rex Ingram spent a number of formative years in the town while his father was rector there.
Perhaps less well-known is the connection with Alan Turing, the pioneering computer scientist credited with cracking the German ‘Enigma’ code in the Second World War, and widely considered to be the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence. His life was dramatised in the award-winning, star-cast film ‘The Imitation Game’ (2014).
Turing's mother was Ethel Sara Stoney (1881-1976) of the once prominent Stoney family that resided just outside the town at Tombrickane, Kyle Park. The Stoneys were for centuries the biggest landlords, not just in Borrisokane but in all of north Tipperary, where they arrived in the 1600s.
The family is gone now but their legacy remains in the old Kyle Park Agricultural School, built by Thomas George Stoney in 1843. One of his eight children was Edward Waller Stoney, who went on to become a brilliant rail engineer in India and a Companion of the British Empire.
Ethel Sara was one of he and his wife Sarah Crawford's four children. She was born in Madras but spent her childhood in the Borrisokane area, as well as in Co Clare. She married Julius Turing in Dublin before moving to London, where Alan was born.
Alan Turing (1912-1954) achieved a phenomenal amount of scientific breakthroughs in his relatively short life and he is acknowledged for laying the groundwork for much of modern computer science. It is believed that his codebreaking success during the Second World War may have shortened the war in Europe by as many as two years, saving millions of lives.
PRESERVING THE LEGACY
The stone bench in Borrisokane Town Park is in fact the top step to the entranceway of the now demolished Arran Hill House, once residence of the Stoney family. It was brought from there to the park in 2020 in a project driven by Borrisokane man Seán Egan, who wanted to honour the local connection with Turing.
Seán also saw to it that a plaque was erected beside the bench - which has to some extent become affectionately known as the ‘Stoney Stone’ or ‘Stoney Step’ - explaining its symbolism.
Local historian Eamon Slevin adds that there is further historic significance behind the step. It was on this stone that the local rebels reportedly laid their weapons after a call to disarm by the Stoney magistrate. This would have been around the time of the 1798 Rebellion. A large cache of pikes, firearms and other weapons was left overnight on the steps outside the magistrate's house and, legend has it, were subsequently buried in a field.
Now widely used by locals to sit on for a chat after a walk in the park, the bench continues to serve as an important link with Borrisokane's past. Seán took the opportunity to thank local councillor Michael O'Meara and Tipperary Co Council for the funding provided towards the Stoney bench project.