The Green Lady

'The Green Lady' is a common name for local ghosts, you find Green Ladies all over the place in various countries! The house where Bellina Prior lived in Armagh was occupied in both 1901 and 1911 according to the census of each year, so I wonder when the house acquired its reputation for being 'haunted'.

I've been doing a little bit of detective work on Bellina, for a radio play I'm writing, and I have found the house where she and her mother were living in Dublin, together with the spot where they are buried (unfortunately no headstone or anything there). They were at 2 Charleville Road in Rathmines, and their bodies were discovered by police - alerted by neighbours hearing their dogs barking for some time - on 24th November 1909, both poisoned with carbolic acid, the mother leaving a suicide note saying she had administered the poison to her daughter before taking it herself. They are buried in Mount Jerome cemetery in Harold's Cross.
It appears they were living in Rathmines for several years, an eccentric couple of ladies, with Bellina calling herself 'Mrs Beresford' to shopkeepers, and known locally as 'The Pink Lady' for dressing usually in that colour.

What I haven't been able to find out is where the family went after the court case in Armagh in 1888. No sign of them in the census of 1901 that I can find anyway. I gather two of Bellina's siblings (the 2 brothers probably) were living in South Africa and Australia by 1909, where Adele was, Bellina's only sister, I have no idea. Bellina was put into Dundrum asylum in 1888, possibly released from there around 10-12 years later, perhaps into her mother's care, although I can't find them in the 1901 census.

Did the mother and Adele (21) and Harvey (14) leave Armagh after the trial? Go abroad? Is the father, Lieutenant-Colonel Prior, buried in Armagh (he died in 1876)? He was of the 12th Lancers, any more information on him? Presumably he and his wife were English, and one person in the papers said Nina (his wife) was from a military family, her mother possibly Greek.

I grew up in Abbey Street in Armagh, just down the street from Vicars Hill (No. 6 was the Prior House I believe), hence my interest. I am an actor and writer based in Dublin.

I have managed to get a good bit of info on what happened Bellina post-1888. She spent 4 years in Dundrum Asylum in Dublin, was released into her mother's care in 1892 (on condition they not return to Armagh), and lived for a while in London, sometimes travelling abroad with her mother or sister Adele (India and New York at least). She and her mother subsequently settled in Warrenpoint, Co Down, around 1894-99, with occasional stays in London and elsewhere. They moved to Dublin after that, various locations, then around 1904/5 into what would be their final abode in Rathmines, where they were found dead in November 1909.
The older brother John Felix probably went to Australia (rarely kept in touch, I think), Adele probably ended up staying in the States, and Harvey spent his life (between fighting in the Boer War and WW1) in what is now Zimbabwe.
I've visited the graves of the father (C of I Armagh), Annie Slavin (old RC graveyard, Armagh), and indeed Bellina and her mother in Dublin (unmarked, in Mt Jerome cemetery).