The Miley O'Neill Story

Published in the 'Westmeath Independent' in December 2008.  Sadly Miley (RIP) passed away on January 9th, 2013.   ;Ar dheis de go raibh a anam dilis


He is a man who has lived in transport mode all of his life.   He spent his childhood driving a donkey and cart and travelling all sides of the railway line from his home in Athlone, and for over twenty years following his retirement from the army, he ran a one-man taxi business.
Miley O’Neill was born into a railway family, because his Dublin born father James ‘Joy’ O’Neill worked in Broadstone, Dublin for British rail, pre-1914.  With Redmond’s volunteers, James joined the army to fight in the First World War, and suffered gas poisoning in Flanders.
“When he came back after the war, he went back to the railway and later worked for CIE and was transferred to Athlone, but because of the gassing he was given a light job,” says Miley.  “He was put looking after the railwaymen’s accommodation in Gallows Hill, and he had two children at the time, and lived in a house in Bogganfin.”
James ‘Joy’, and his Dublin born wife, Sarah, went on to have seven more sons and one daughter, and Miley proudly says today – “the nine boys were reared, with three beds in one big room in the house when we moved to Cloghanboy, and it was a case of first up, best dressed,”
It was the house at Cloghanboy that serves as part of Miley’s first memory, and although his mother was born and bred in working-class Gloucester Street, (now Sean McDermott Street), Dublin, she got into the country ways very quickly when she moved to Athlone to raise her family.  She had an orchard of apples and plums at the side of her house, and because she had some empty sheds at the back, she decided to put pigs in there.
“She started rearing pigs, and then she got a donkey and cart and every day after school, I’d have to drive the cart through a laneway at the back of Garden Vale to collect waste,” said Miley. “People used to leave stuff out for me so we could feed the pigs at home.  So I’d carry the waste on the cart and at home put all the slop into a big barrel and put coriander on top of it, and my mother would stir it with a stick, and feed the three pigs, and the hens and chickens.”
Miley was born in 1924, so throughout his childhood in Cloghanboy, he experienced only countryside, because houses were scarce around the area, and the nearest shop was in town.
His mother Sarah was known for bringing Miley and his brothers into town, walking them two by two in front of her, in suits of clothes that she made for them, for 10 am mass in St. Mary’s Church, while his mother and his sister Sadie walked behind.   Miley and his brothers, Dan and Willie served mass in the church.
Miley’s father had a free family travel pass for the railway, and Miley remembers being brought many times on the Athlone to Dublin railway line, via Mullingar, to visit both sets of his grandparents.  Miley is one of the very few people alive today that can say they attended the Eucharistic Congress in 1932.
“The family travelled on the railway line to the Eucharistic Congress in the Phoenix Park,” said Miley.  “I heard John Count McCormack singing, and there was nothing like it.  It was a very warm day there, and my mother was very proud to have us all there in the park, because of being a Dublin woman.”
Miley used to drive the donkey and cart regularly, and from he was about 14 years old he brought his father, James ‘Joy’ from Cloghanboy to his work at Gallows Hill.  When he arrived at Gallows Hill, Miley used to load up the cart with cinders left over from the steam train.  He used to bring the cinders home for the fire.
After leaving school at the Marist, Miley went working for Foys shop in Church Street, Athlone, where he repaired bicycle punctures and changed tyres.  Later on Foys got petrol pumps on the street, and Miley operated them.
“Jack and Ernest Foy were lovely people to work for,” he said.
Miley’s childhood sweetheart was Kathleen Connolly from Sarsfield Square, and the young couple first met when they were 12 years old, on the railway line near the White Gates, while Miley was looking after a goat on the side of the line.  Each day he would feed and milk the goat, which kept him around the area, and where he and Kathleen fell in love.  The couple married and had seven children, Maura, Jimmy, Ann, John, Breda, Kevin, and Kathleen, and lived happily in Athlone until his wife, Kathleen’s death in 1995.
Miley joined the army after leaving Foys, and in the 1940’s, was part of the fit cyclist squadron, who travelled in all weathers, all over Ireland, representing the army.
Miley retired from the Defence Forces in 1977 and set up his own one-man taxi business, which was very successful in the midlands for over 20 years.  In that time, he took hospital out-patients to Galway, Mullingar, Tullamore, Ballinasloe and Dublin, which helped build his idea of campaigning both for the upgrade of Athlone hospital, and the return of the Mullingar rail route.
He would go to Galway twice daily bringing kidney dialysis patients, and many times he had to work with a garda escort, to bring transplant patients from Galway to Dublin, if a kidney was there waiting for them.
“The patient would stay in the back seat and there would be a relative with them, and we had to be in Dublin on time, but the gardai were great with the escort,” said Miley.  “It made me aware of how badly things were in Athlone, because there was nowhere to rest here for people with kidney problems.”
Miley started a letter writing campaign on re-opening the Athlone/Mullingar railway line, and the upgrading of St. Vincent’s Hospital.  In 2000 he set up the Athlone Hospital Action Group, and organized many public meetings and marches, and with the publicity the group got, it shone a light nationally on the local issues. 
“We once had a maternity unit in Athlone hospital, and it’s a pity that we don’t have a general hospital with a full casualty unit and surgical place here now,” he said.  “The opening of the railway line would be great for elderly patients who have appointments in Mullingar Hospital, and for students who use the college here.”
Miley also said that the railway line serviced the people of the Athlone area for generations, and if it was brought back it would alleviate the pressure on the road between the two towns.
Even at the age of 84 years, Miley tirelessly continues the campaign for upgrading the railway line and local hospital, and is in regular contact with the media and local politicians on the issues.
He is currently lobbying for a new road, to by-pass Sarsfield Square, which would encompass the old Mullingar railway line, and go through the Curragh lane, and through the railway bridge.
“If Athlone is not to receive a hospital, well for the children’s sake, let us have our primary care unit, now and not ten years down the road,” said Miley.  “Wouldn't it be a lovely Christmas present to hear that the primary care unit will start after the Christmas break?”