The Dearg Due: The Forgotten Vampire of Ireland
The Dearg Due. Beauty and Doom.
The County of Waterford, in the south-east of Ireland, shares its name with the city, one of the oldest and most populous settlements in southern Ireland. Originally a small Viking town, it grew over the centuries in both size and importance, with defensive walls and fortifications raised during the medieval period. But it is not the city’s history that concerns us here. It is the grim thing said to lurk beyond its walls - an undead being that once terrorised the region and was believed to dwell beneath an old oak called Strongbow’s Tree.
It is likely this troubled tree took its name from Richard de Clare, the Norman lord who captured Waterford in 1170. Worryingly, the exact location of the tree has long since been lost to folk memory. Whether it still stands somewhere forgotten, or was cut down long ago and the thing beneath it put to the flame, I cannot say.
But what was this creature? What was it that caused the good people of County Waterford to quiver in fear as darkness fell over their city and the lands beyond? Prepare yourself, dear reader, and I shall tell the tale of the Dearg Due.
Long ago, when the air was fresher, the waters cleaner, and the summer breeze gentler upon the skin, there lived a young woman as beautiful as a flower blooming beneath the midsummer sun. She was deeply in love with a handsome young farmhand, and he with her. Together they had made plans to marry. Sadly, they lived in a time when arranged marriages were common, and love often bowed before wealth.
The girl’s father was a cruel and greedy man who cared far more for gold than for his daughter’s happiness. He forced her into marriage with a wealthy clan chieftain, trading her future for land and coin.
Her new husband was no kinder. Jealous and possessive, he kept her locked away in a tower and took cruel delight in hurting her, merely to see blood upon her pale skin. As the years passed, she withered, fading like a rose left too long in winter.
When at last she died, she was buried beneath Strongbow’s Tree, but the villagers neglected an important custom: to place stones upon the grave, a ritual meant to keep restless spirits from rising and poisoning the land.
It was a foolish mistake. For rise she did.
Her beauty remained, even in death, but all kindness had rotted away, poisoned by grief, cruelty, and the agony of unfulfilled love. She returned to the world of the living as one of the undead, seeking vengeance upon those who had ruined her life.
First, she returned to her childhood home. There, as her father slept, she stole the very breath from his body, leaving him cold and lifeless before dawn.
Then she sought out her husband. She found him staggering drunkenly home from the tavern. As her lips met his, she drew not only the air from his lungs, but the blood from his veins.
But her vengeance did not end there. It is said the Dearg Due lingered on, haunting the roads and lanes of Waterford, luring young men with her beauty before feasting upon their blood. Desperate to end her reign of terror and spare others from her hunger, the villagers gathered by have grave, placing heavy stones upon it trapping her spirit, imprisoning it beneath the earth.
“But the Dearg Due is gone now,” I hear you say with confidence.
Yet cities in Ireland, like cities throughout the world, still have their disappearances. People vanish in the night, leaving behind no trace, no explanation, no farewell. Are there rational answers for such tragedies? Perhaps.
But perhaps - just perhaps - a handful of them may be laid at the feet of something ancient and wicked, something that has found its way into our modern world, something that still walks the nocturnal streets, thirsting for vengeance. Thirsting for blood.
Thank you for taking the time to read my blog, dear friend. If you enjoy a frightening tale, why not try my horror trilogy, The Wendlelow Mysteries? The final, thrilling conclusion, A Crow’s Scream, is set to be unleashed upon the world in the coming months. It will be available on Amazon and Audible - links below.
Stay spooky
