Dictionary of Irish Architects 1720 - 1940

County surveyor for Cos. Cavan, 1853-1864, and Donegal, 1864-1891. Frederick Gahan, who was born circa 1822, was the youngest son of Beresford Gahan, a Brigade-Major of Yeomanry,(1) of Bishop's Hall, Co. Kilkenny, and a brother of FREDERICK GAHAN FREDERICK GAHAN . He had been acting for a year as deputy to THOMAS TURNER THOMAS TURNER , the county surveyor for Co. Cavan, when Turner resigned in order to devote himself to his private practice. On Turner's recommendation, Gahan was appointed to the surveyorship in March 1853.(2) The following July he appealed to the Grand Jury for the number of his assistants to be increased from two to three, apparently in vain.(3) A request to be transferred to a southern county was also turned down; instead, in July 1864, he was moved to the southern division of Co. Donegal, in succession to JOHN FRASER JOHN FRASER . He spent the rest of his career in Co. Donegal. In July 1891 he submitted his resignation on account of his advancing age - approaching sixty-nine - and infirmity; he was by then receiving a salary of £450 per annum and was granted a pension of £240.(4) He remained in the post until the arrival of his successor, JAMES RANDALL ALEXANDER& JAMES RANDALL ALEXANDER& #160; FERGUSON FERGUSON , in January 1892. He had taken up residence in Kenilworth Square, Dublin by 1894.(5)

Gahan died at home on 6 July 1904, at the age of eighty-two,(6) and was buried in Mount Jerome Cemetery.
He had been married twice: firstly in 1853 to Henrietta Byrne, from Carlow, who died suddenly in 1856;(7) secondly to Katharine Jane (née Townsend) (d. 1920). By his second marriage he was the father of Frederick George Townsend Gahan (1866-1955),(8) a civil engineer who worked for the Congested Districts Board, the Land Commission and the Electricity Supply Board.

ICEI: elected member, 1856;(9) no longer on list of members for 1870.
Royal Geographical Society: fellow by 1882.

Addresses: Erskine Terrace, Cavan, 1862;(10) 6 Kenilworth Square, Rathgar, Dublin, <=1894 until death.

See WORKS.



References

All information in this entry not otherwise attributed is from Brendan O'Donoghue, The Irish County Surveyors 1834-1944 (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2007), 179-180, which gives the fullest account of Gahan's career.

(1) Inscription on tombstone in Mount Jerome Cemetery, Dublin (B.O'D).
(2) Anglo-Celt, 3 Mar 1853.
(3) Anglo-Celt, 14 Jul 1853.
(4) Londonderry Sentinel, 11 Jul 1891 (B.O'D.).
(5) He first appears in the Dublin section of Thom's Directory in 1894.
(6) See note 1, above.
(7) Anglo-Celt, 7 Aug 1856.
(8) www.familysearch.org; he had earlier had a another son named Frederick, born in 1861, who died in Cavan at the age of fifteen months on 5 Dec 1862 (Anglo-Celt, 6 Dec 1862).
(9) ICEI admissions applications, I, 20.
(10) Anglo-Celt, 6 Dec 1862.


1 work entries listed in chronological order for GAHAN, FREDERICK


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Building: CO. DONEGAL, DONEGAL, COURT HOUSE
Date: 1891
Nature: Enlargement & repairs. Tender of S. Hepburn, Strabane (£700) accepted.
Refs: IB 33, 15 Jan 1891, 21; Londonderry Sentinel, 11 Jul 1891 (B.O'D.))