The following was recorded from his father by the late Billy Dollard - a great friend of Crosspatrick school - for the Schools' Folklore Collection on the 1930s:

Years ago there was an old hawthorn bush growing in the centre of the village of Crosspatrick supposed to be a monument over some persons that were killed or executed there. About fifty years ago a pump was sunk by the side of this tree and in the sinking of the pump they came on the bones of a man which they placed back again in the same place just under the stone flag of the pump. Old people say that there were three hawthorn bushes in it at one time many years ago, and that there was a man buried under each tree. These men were either killed or executed there. There is no sign of any bush there now as the last bush was blown away by a storm about twenty or thirty years ago. There was an old custom years ago that every funeral that would pass the way would stop at the monument and prayers for the dead would be said there, and then the people would go on there way again, but that is not done now.

Billy Dollard from William Dollard senior.