Pettigo

road connects Pettigo with Lough Derg]] In June 1922, at the tail end of the Irish War of Independence, Pettigo in what became the new Irish Free State, and Belleek, which was now in Northern Ireland were occupied by a 100-strong Irish Republican Army unit who had arrived there from Donegal. They were attacked first by a party of 100 Ulster Special Constabulary, who crossed Lough Erne, but they were beaten off, losing one killed. Two companies of British Army troops, along with 6 field guns, along with the USC, were then sent to take the villages. In the ensuing fighting, in which the British bombarded the village and then stormed it, the IRA lost three men killed, six wounded and four…

Pettigo Mill was built by the Leslie family, who owned the Pettigo estate. The Leslie family were originally from Monaghan town. Pettigo Mill was first on the map of Pettigo dated 1767 but is probably much older. The Mill got its power from the Termon river. It was described as a cloth mill, i.e. woolen cloth, but probably also ground oats and other grains. During the famine, maize or Indian meal, as it was called, was ground in the Pettigo Mill. This was then sent to the poor through the port of Ballyshannon in the year 1845–1846. After the arrival of the railway in Pettigo, which opened in 1860, Pettigo Mill was a saw mill as well as a grain mill. Timber for all the usual purposes was…