Cobh (pop. 14,148) is a port and holiday resort in County Cork in the Republic of Ireland. It lies on the southern shore of Great Island in Cork Harbour. The town forms a half-circle facing the harbor. The land rises steeply from the harbor, and the town has developed both along the beach and on the hill.
The natural harbor known as the Cove of Cork was first used extensively in the 1700’s. The port town grew up because ships could load and unload easily there without sailing to Cork.
When Queen Victoria landed at the port in 1849, the British renamed it Queenstown in her honor. The Irish went back to the original name Cobh, the Gaelic spelling of cove, in 1922. Many victims of the torpedoed passenger liner Lusitania are buried at Cobh.
