Not every corner of Edwardian Portrush was postcards and promenades — for a few summers, the north end of Main Street ran its own unofficial casino.
A familiar, unlicensed fixture
Unlicensed gambling tables — roulette wheels, card games — were a common summer sight around the north end of Main Street and Ramore Hill in the early 1910s. On the busiest day of 1912, the Dock Head entrance to Ramore Hill was reportedly a full impromptu showground: roulette tables, shooting galleries, peg tumbling, dart throwing, photography stalls, fortune tellers and hawkers, prompting a Council debate — never actually resolved — about designating a proper trading area for it all.
A lost bet, and a “Donnybrook in miniature”
Things came to a head one Friday evening in July 1913. An excursionist from Desertmartin lost at roulette, and the resulting argument turned physical when the table operator reportedly struck him in the face with a stick. A full “free fight” broke out between the excursion party and the operator’s supporters — tables were overturned, and the fleeing roulette proprietor took shelter in a nearby house, whose windows, and the neighbouring house’s, were smashed by the pursuing crowd before he escaped out the back. One eyewitness called it “a Donnybrook in miniature.”
Police made four arrests and drew batons against the hostile crowd, though didn’t need to use them — locals stepped in to calm things down. The men were bailed to appear before magistrate Captain Watt at the Petty Sessions, and the excursion train home was delayed by roughly an hour.
A petition, and a problem that didn’t really go away
Weeks later, local merchants petitioned the Urban Council to clear Main Street’s north end of roulette tables entirely; the Council voted unanimously to direct police to act. Whether it actually worked is another matter — period reports suggest the gambling trade likely carried on regardless, a quieter, less official thread running underneath Portrush’s polished seaside image.