This may be an old thread, but it may be useful to make some additions.
The Catholic/Protestant dichotomy with regard to old graveyards does not represent reality. I really wish genealogical guides would not use this classification as it can be very misleading.
The reality is that almost all pre-reformation graveyards in Ireland are mixed. They were so for two reasons:
- First, they were consecrated as Catholic burial grounds, and so continue to this day, whatever the legal ownership of the land. That being so, Catholics could continue to be buried there.
- Second, there were no other burial options in the period from the 1530s to the 1790s, when the Catholic church was an illegal organization.
As for Whitechurch, it is a a very old pre-reformation graveyard, on the site of the medieval parish church. Whitechurch received its name from the unusual white stones used to construct its walls. The graveyard was very congested and for a long time was closed to all but interments in existing family plots, but has more recently (1990s?) been extended, and is now once again "open for business" and accepting new long-term residents.
I found this old tread because I believe today is the historic pattern day for Whitechurch, when family graves were dressed. I went on those patterns in the 1960s as one of my Brennan families is buried there.
The graveyard took on a progressively Catholic aspect in the 20th century when some adjoining land was used to construct (at different times) a Calvary, surrounded by some of the white stones from the walls of the original church, a pulpit, and a Lourdes grotto. In any case, the residents are overwhelmingly, if not entirely, Catholic.
Whitechurch graveyard is located in Wilkinstown townland, in the Catholic parish of Glynn. It is close to the border with the Catholic parish of Taghmon, and had many "clients" from that area also.
