Coole (Irish: An Chúil, meaning 'the corner')[1] is a village in County Westmeath, Ireland, on the R395 regional road. It is situated on a plateau that overlooks the part of the Bog of Allen, cultivated for peat for fuel consumption purposes by Bórd na Móna, the government-owned peat production industry and for garden plant soil compost products by Harte Peat Ltd., a private enterprise, and Bórd na Móna.
The village is stretched over a series of junctions and cross-roads. These regional and communal roads connect to Castlepollard to the east, Coolure, near Lough Derravaragh to the south, and Abbeylara to the north-west in neighbouring County Longford. Another communal road accesses and crosses the low-lying bog-land, permitting machinery access to the area.
The village consists of a pub, a post office, a shop, a church, and a medical centre. There is also a primary school and a parish community hall.[citation needed]
Coole is the birthplace of Lt. Maurice James Dease VC, the first posthumous recipient of the Victoria Cross in the Great War at the Battle of Mons.[2]
References
- ^ "An Chúil/Coole". Placenames Database of Ireland (logainm.ie). Retrieved 18 October 2021.
- ^ John Patrick Kierans (8 November 2018). "The untold stories of the 49,000 Irishmen who died fighting in World War One". Irish Mirror. Retrieved 28 January 2020.
