Nestling in the rolling hills of Slieve Felim, the twin villages of Upperchurch and Drombane are unique and quaint, full of natural rural charm and surrounded by breath-taking scenery. Ride like Ned O'the Hills through rolling fields and see five counties from the peak of the Black Hill. See hurleys being hewn from ash grown locally and being lovingly worked by handcraft experts.

As the name denotes the church building is central to Upperchurch. However, an earlier church, built circa 1800 by the then parish priest James Clancy (1792-1812), was south of the village. The cemetery evolved around that church which was completely demolished in 1928 following the building of the present Romanesque church.

The village predates the Anglesey road (the road from Thurles to Newport) which was built in 1828 under the direction of the celebrated engineer Richard Griffith whose better known memorial is his Primary Valuation of Lands and Tenements (1851).

Clan Name

Upper Church is part of the ancestral home of the O'Dwyer and O'Ryan and forms a stage of the Beara-Breifne Greenway which is based on the historic march of O'Sullivan Beara in 1603.

Greenways Festival 2003

Upperchurch is talking part in the Greenways Festival in summer 2003 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the legendary 1603 march of O’Sullivan Beara from the Beara Peninsula to the Breifne area. Click here for info on the events