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This book was prepared and edited by John MacPhilpin of Tuam and published in Dublin by M. H. Gill & Son in 1880. It reprints Tuam News reports on the apparition of the Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph and St. John the Evangelist, which about twenty people saw on the south gable of Knock chapel, County Mayo, on 21 August 1879. It also gives the witnesses' official depositions, which a commission of priests appointed by the Archbishop of Tuam judged trustworthy. It lists cures recorded in Archdeacon Cavanagh's diary.
“O'Brien”1 page
59 presence should come from the simple faithful and not through the priests. Though I have not witnessed the di vine manifestation I have seen the light, and once, when standing at some distance from the chapel, in company with others, a most brilliant star flashed along the gable, leaving a train of radiance." Miraculous Cures. Questioned as to miracles, the archdeacon said : " I will show you along list of cures effected by the divine interposi tion, and can tell you of one in which I was an agent. Some little while ago I received a ' sick-call ' late at night to a man who was said to be vomiting blood, and in extreme danger. Hastening to the house, attended by a boy with a lantern, I met the father of the patient coming to hurry me, in distress lest I should be too late. On reaching the cottage, I found the young man covered, so to speak, with blood, and appa rently very near death, but conscious. After ministering to him, I called for a glass of water, sprinkled on it a few particles of the mortar from the gable wall of the chapel, and bade him drink. He did so ; at once he began to recover, and is now well. I can speak of other cases, but especially of a man who came from Cork afflicted with a polypus, which extended into his windpipe, and so, said the surgeons, re quired a dangerous operation. He was here performing his devotions for several days, and then, to his astonishment and joy, expelled the abnormal growth—I saw it—and he returned cured." The archdeacon next showed me his list of " miracles," from which I quote a few special cases : Bridget Nearney of Strokestown, blind for seventeen years, can see ; Maria Conolly, a cripple for thirteen years, is now able to walk ; John O'Brien, who was born blind, has the use of his eyes; Belinda Mash of Ballina, dumb for six
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