Mary Barnwell (nee Appleby) is a former Irish hockey captain with a career total of 47 caps, the first of which came at the World Cup in 1986. She has enjoyed two hockey triple crown victories. She was also former Irish record holder for the 400 metres hurdles and represented the country internationally on many occasions.
The club was founded in 1926 and up until 10 years ago was only open to former Loreto schoolgirls. It has moved from various locations, but now is firmly settled at the astro-turf facility that the club built last year at Loreto High School in Beaufort. Membership: There would be about 100 playing at the moment and of course many non-playing members also. We field about seven teams in all including the schoolgirls, which probably makes us the biggest ladies' club in Leinster.
Status: The main competitions would be the Leinster Senior League, playing in Division One, as well as the All-Ireland Cup. The club has consistently been among the top three teams in Leinster and the future looks very strong also.
Honours: In recent years we've had three League and one Leinster Cup title along with All-Ireland junior titles. There's also been at least five or six international caps from the club. The season before last we were pipped by one point for the league against Muckross so that could have been another great moment.
Finest hour: For me that would be the first time we won the Leinster Cup which happened shortly after I joined and obviously brought great excitement, especially since it had gone to a third replay.
Worst moment: I've been with the club a long time and there's nothing but good memories, although I suppose losing the league by just one point was very disappointing.
Club hero: Well like any club there are a lot of people who do great work behind the scenes, and here we have Ann Murray, a former cap and now international umpire, and Sally Ann Fanagan, who is current president and a superb worker. Then there is Rionach Donnellan who did so much fund raising for our new pitch.
Greatest rivals: That would traditionally be Muckross who we won our first cup against and are leading rivals in the league. We also met them in the cup final last year and more recently Hermes, who have become very strong of late.
