A Saint Patrick’s Day ‘virtual tour’ of a dozen churches and cathedrals dedicated to Saint Patrick

A statue of Saint Patrick in Saint Patrick’s Church, Soho Square, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

Today is Saint Patrick’s Day [17 March], and this afternoon I am allowing my mind’s eye to travel on a ‘virtual tour’, revisiting a dozen cathedrals and churches dedicated to Saint Patrick.

To mark Saint Patrick’s Day two years ago, I offered a similar ‘virtual tour’ to a dozen cathedrals and churches in Ireland dedicated to Saint Patrick: Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin; the two Saint Patrick’s Cathedrals in Armagh; the Saint Patrick’s Cathedrals in Trim, Co Meath, and in Cavan; the two Saint Patrick’s Churches in Donabate, Co Dublin; and Saint Patrick’s Church in Dalkey, Co Dublin, Wicklow Town, Ballysteen, Co Limerick, and Waterford City; and the ruins of Saint Patrick’s Church, at the end of High Street, where I once lived in Wexford.

In today’s ‘virtual tour’ with Saint Patrick, I am returning to two cathedrals or pro-cathedrals in Ireland, the college chapel where I graduated, the two churches where my both sets of grandparents were married, two churches in Co Limerick, where I lived for five years, a church in Skerries where I did ‘Sunday duty’ during a vacancy many years ago, a church in Co Kilkenny where another Canon Comerford was once parish priest, and three churches named after Saint Patrick that I have visited within the last six months or in Belfast, London and Sarawak.

1, Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, Skibbereen, Co Cork:

Saint Patrick’s on North Street, Skibbereen, Co Cork … is it a cathedral, or is it a parish church? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Patrick’s Cathedral on North Street, Skibbereen, West Cork, is the 200-year-old Roman Catholic parish church in Skibbereen. It is often referred to as the cathedral of the Diocese of Ross, although Cork and Ross is now a united diocese.

The foundation stone was laid in 1825, and the church was designed as a plain Greek Revival T-plan church by the Revd Michael Augustine Riordan, a priest-architect from Doneraile, Co Cork.

A plaque on the west gable is inscribed: Deo Opt Max et Beato Patritio Parochus Populusque extruere AD 1825 Venite adoremus et procidamus ante Deum (‘To the great glory of Almighty God and the Blessed Patrick, the parish priest and people built this church in AD 1825. Come let us adore and fall down before God’).

George Coppinger Ashlin gave the cathedral the splendour it retains to this day (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The most significant improvement to Saint Patrick’s was carried out in the early 1880s, when Bishop William Fitzgerald commissioned AWN Pugin’s son-in-law, the Cork-born architect George Coppinger Ashlin (1837-1921), to design a radical modernisation of the church. Ashlin was also the architect of Saint Colman’s Cathedral, Cobh, for the Diocese of Cloyne.

Ashlin gave the cathedral the splendour it displays to this day, and reconfigured the church in the shape of a Latin cross. The east wall behind the original High Altar was opened; a semi-circular apse was added; the apse was embellished by three stained-glass windows; the High Altar, dedicated to the memory of Bishop Michael O’Hea (1858-1876), and the Marian Altar, supplied by Pearse and Sharpe of Dublin, were erected.

The arcade of three arches above the sanctuary and two dividing the transepts from the nave, the polished pillars of granite, the coffered ceiling which they support, all date from 1882-1883.

The white marble altar rail was the work of Pearse and Sharp of Dublin; James Pearse was the father of the 1916 leader Padraig Pearse. The wrought iron panels, with their floral and leaflet decoration, were the work of Eugene McCarthy of Skibbereen.

The High Altar was consecrated on the first Sunday in May 1883 and the reconstructed church was blessed and re-opened.

2, Saint Patrick’s Pro-Cathedral, Dundalk, Co Louth:

Saint Patrick’s Pro-Cathedral, Dundalk, Co Louth … Thomas Duff modelled the exterior on the Chapel of King’s College, Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Modern Dundalk was first laid out by James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Clanbrassil, in the mid-18th century. Around the same time, Dundalk Grammar School was founded as a Charter School in 1739. The town continued to grow and prosper in the 18th and 19th centuries, thanks to the patronage of the Jocelyn family, Earls of Roden, the industrial revolution and the arrival of the railway.

The growing Roman Catholic population was becoming more prosperity, and the architecture of their new churches reflects their growing confidence. The principal Roman Catholic church is Saint Patrick’s, known locally as the Pro-Cathedral. It was designed by the Newry architect Thomas Duff (1792-1848), who modelled the interior on Exeter Cathedral, where Richard FitzRalph of Dundalk was consecrated bishop, and the exterior on King’s College Chapel in Cambridge – it is curious to note that the Vicar of Dundalk at the time, the Revd Elias Thackeray, was a former Fellow of King’s College.

Thomas Turner’s entry curtain at Saint Patrick’s in Perpendicular Gothic (1850) was inspired by the curtain at King’s College, Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Building work on Saint Patrick’s began in 1834. The travel writer and Church of Ireland clergyman, the Revd Caesar Otway, met Duff in Cambridge the following year making drawings of King’s College Chapel for his new designs. At the same time, Duff also designed the Methodist Church in Jocelyn Street (1834) in the Greek revival or classical style, and the Presbyterian Church across the street (1839) in the Tudor Gothic style.

Duff died in 1848 following a stroke after his daughter’s death. Thomas Turner’s entry curtain in Perpendicular Gothic, inspired by the curtain at King’s College, Cambridge, was erected two years later. But the Famine disrupted work at Saint Patrick’s, and did not resume until 1860. The church was completed by JJ McCarthy, the ‘Irish Pugin,’ who designed the high altar, the reredos and the Gothic sedilia in Caen stone. Pugin’s son-in-law, George Coppinger Ashlin, designed the Italian mosaics in the chancel by Oppenheimer and the pulpit. The stained glass is by Mayer and Earley, who had worked on many of Pugin’s churches in Dublin. Ashlin’s later tower was modelled on Gloucester Cathedral, although it interrupts the grand Cambridge-like main façade.

3, Saint Patrick’s College Chapel, Maynooth, Co Kildare:

The chapel at Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth, Co Kildare (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

I received my BD in theology from the Pontifical University in the chapel in Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth, Co Kildare, in 1987. Later, I was a post-graduate student in history at Maynooth, and I spent a day on a retreat in the chapel before my ordination as priest in 2001. Since then, I have been a visiting lecturer in Maynooth, co-chaired conferences, contributed chapters, papers and book reviews to books and journals edited in Maynooth, and I was involved in organising a retreat for students from the Church of Ireland Theological Institute (CITI) in Maynooth in 2016.

Those books include a recent history of Maynooth, We Remember Maynooth: A College across Four Centuries, edited by Salvador Ryan and John-Paul Sheridan (Dublin: Messenger Publishing, 2020).

Inside the chapel at Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth, Co Kildare … I received my BD in the chapel in 1987 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The chapel, built by public subscription, was designed by the architect JJ McCarthy, the foundation stone was laid in 1875, and the chapel opened on 24 June 1891.

It is in French 14th-century Gothic style, and is more ornate than AWN Pugin’s college buildings in Maynooth. The interior was designed by the architect William Hague, the stained glass windows are by Mayer of Munich, Lavers and Westlake of London and Cox Buckley of London and Youghal, and NHC Westlake designed the Pre-Raphaelite style Stations of the Cross and the ceiling panels.

The carved oak choir-stalls that fill the whole church were produced by Connollys of Dominick Street, Dublin. Many of the mosaics are in Italian glass by the Earley Studios of Camden Street, Dublin.

4, Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, Co Dublin:

Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate … George Luke O’Connor was inspired by Pugin’s cathedral in Birmingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

My paternal grandparents, Stephen Comerford (1867-1921) of Rathmines and Bridget Lynders (1875-1948) of Portrane, were married in Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, on 7 February 1905. The witnesses at their wedding were her cousin Lawrence McMahon and her younger sister Mary Anne Lynders (1879-1956), who later married John Sheehan.

Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, was designed by the Dublin architect George Luke O’Connor, for the Very Revd W Magill, PP, and was consecrated by Archbishop Walsh of Dublin on 9 August 1903.

O’Connor designed many churches, schools and cinemas, and it always strikes me that his church in Donabate is strongly influenced by Pugin’s designs for Birmingham Cathedral.

Inside Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

This is a Gothic, gable-fronted cruciform church with an apse and tower. The family tradition is that much of the work in the church interior is my grandfather’s work. The high altar, erected in 1906, is the work of Patrick Tomlin & Sons of Grantham Place. The canted apse has a painted ceiling.

This red brick church is built in English garden wall bond. The features include decorative buttressing, limestone dressing and string courses, terracotta details in the eaves, pointed arched doors with limestone surrounds, the exposed timber truss, barrel vaulted ceiling, tongue and grooved timber doors with elaborate cast-iron hinges, cast-iron pillars, marble columns, encaustic tiles, the ornate rose west window, lancet windows and the Harry Clarke stained glass.

5, Saint Patrick’s Church, Millstreet, Co Cork:

Saint Patrick’s Church, Millstreet, was designed by the priest-architect Michael Augustine Riordan (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Patrick’s Church is an imposing feature on the streets of Millstreet, and its fine façade marks out the church as the most accomplished historic building in the town. The church, built in 1833-1835, was designed by the Revd Michael Augustine Riordan (1783-1848), a priest-architect from Doneraile who founded the South Presentation Monastery (1828) in Cork, and whose best-known work is probably Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, Skibbereen.

My maternal grandparents, Thomas Michael ‘Corduroy’ Murphy (1882-1949), later of Mackay, Queensland, Australia, and Maria Crowley (1882-1953) of Millstreet, were married in Saint Patrick’s 110 years ago, on 3 March 1915.

The west front porch has a timber panelled double-leaf door, stepped-profile carved limestone surround with plinths and Celtic interlace decoration in relief. Above the door, the carved limestone pediment has a cross finial, and a render, relief panel has a crucifixion scene between an image of the Good Shepherd and a scene of Saint Patrick baptising Saint Aonghus at Cashel.

The east front porch has a moulded archivolt with scroll keystone, all set into a carved limestone doorcase with carved limestone panelled pilasters, decorative capitals and a carved limestone open-bed pediment with cross finial. Above the timber panelled double-leaf doors, the tympanum has a render scene depicting an outdoor Mass, perhaps at a penal rock.

The carving above the west porch door (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Patrick’s Church has a window attributed to Harry Clarke and two windows by Clement Watson & Co of Youghal and erected by the Crowley in memory of my maternal great-grandparents Denis and Margaret Crowley, who are buried in the churchyard outside.

Saint Oliver Plunket is depicted in a window with the inscription: ‘Erected to the memory of Denis and Margaret Crowley of Millstreet by their son Cornelius. 1944.’ Facing it, a a second window depicts the Apparition at Lourdes and has the same wording.

Denis Crowley died on 8 March 1912 at Drishane Rectory, Liscahane, Millstreet, the home of his son Con Crowley, later of Finnstown House, Lucan, Co Dublin – so, you could say, I was the third generation in four in my family to live in a rectory. Margaret Crowley died at the home of her daughter, my grandmother Maria Murphy, on Main Street, Millstreet, on 9 March 1923.

6, Saint Patrick’s Church, Clare Street, Limerick:

Saint Patrick’s graveyard, Limerick … the site of a mediaeval church dedicated to Saint Patrick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

There were five parishes in the mediaeval city of Limerick: Saint John’s, Saint Mary’s, Saint Michael’s, Saint Munchin’s and Saint Patrick’s. As one of these five original mediaeval parishes, Saint Patrick’s once included the old parishes of Ballysimon, Derrygalvin and Kilmurry (now Monaleen).

Saint Patrick’s Well in Singland was once in a small field but is now surrounded by housing estates. It is half-way along Saint Patrick’s Road, on the west side, at the bottom of the hill on which Saint Brigid’s Church stands.

Local lore claims that this well is where Saint Patrick baptised Cairtheann, the son of Blatt and the Chief of the Dál gCais, in the year 440 CE. According to the legend, when Saint Patrick was building his church, he could not find any water to help in the project. He prayed for water and the well sprang up.

It is claimed that the print of his feet can be seen on one of the rocks at the well, and there was supposed to be a rocky bed where Saint Patrick slept. It is claimed that the water cures sore eyes, although looking into the well this week the water looks more likely to cause infections than to cure anything.

Saint Patrick’s Well at Singland in Limerick … the statue was erected in 1904 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

A statue of Saint Patrick was erected at the well in 1904 by the priests and parishioners, and a plaque behind the statue lists their names. But over a century later, while the grass and the paths around the well are well maintained, the water in the well is filthy and Saint Patrick’s mitre has been broken, not standing the test of time over more than a century.

On the top of the hill, Saint Patrick’s Church may have stood on the site of Saint Patrick’s Graveyard, next to Saint Brigid’s Church, which dates from the 1970s.

Saint Patrick’s civil parish was situated on both banks of the River Shannon and was distributed over three baronies in Co Limerick and Co Clare: Bunratty Lower, Clanwilliam and the barony of the City of Limerick.

There was a church on the site in Singland from at the mediaeval period. But it was in ruins by the 17th century. The Down Survey Map of 1683 shows a round tower on the site, but this had fallen by the early 19th century.

By 1711, Saint Nicholas’s Parish in the Roman Catholic Church had been joined with Saint Patrick’s. The Harold family built a church in Pennywell in 1750 to serve the needs of Roman Catholics in this area.

Meanwhile, the old Saint Patrick’s graveyard continued in use. The oldest identified headstone was erected by John Sexton for his parents who died in 1770 and 1771. The tombs include the crumbling and part-shattered tomb of John Young (1746-1813), Bishop of Limerick (1796-1813).

7, Saint Patrick’s Church, Clare Street, Limerick:

Inside Saint Patrick’s Church on Clare Street, Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint Patrick’s Church on Clare Street, Limerick, was built over 200 years ago in 1816, and replaced a Penal Chapel on the Rhebogue Road. The church was built while Father Patrick McGrath was Parish Priest. Bishop Charles Tuohy of Limerick, dedicated it to Saint Patrick on 25 August 1816.

It is a simple, but well-built example of a pre-Emancipation church and it claims to be the oldest purpose-built Catholic church in Limerick City that is still in use. It is a simple nave and transept or T-plan, gable-fronted stone church with a bell-cote and a wooden ceiling. The ceiling is high and large wooden beams hold up the ceiling of the church. The church was renovated in 1835.

With its good masonry and fine roof, it is an important part of the streetscape in this area of Limerick. The central window at the front gable has stone moulding. Below is an ogee-headed front entrance with a clustered, carved limestone bull-nose moulding surmounted by pinnacles with replacement stone finials. Inside the church, there is an elaborate timber roof with a groin vault.

The statue of Saint Patrick in Saint Patrick’s Church, Limerick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Inside the church, there is a stained-glass window of Saint Patrick over the main entrance to the church, and stained-glass windows depicting the Sacred Heart, Saint Joseph, the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Saint Brigid and Saint Ita.

There is a large crucifix on the stone wall above the high altar, and the reredos, donated by the Presentation Sisters has six statues, three male saints and three female saints: Saint Columba, Saint Munchin, Saint Patrick, Saint Bridget, Saint Ita and Saint Lelia. The front of the altar is carved with a Judgment scene and a mosaic on the floor in front of the altar depicts the Lamb of God with a flag. To the right of the altar there is a large, colourful statue of Saint Patrick.

To meet the needs of the growing population in the area, Bishop Henry Murphy created the new parish of Monaleen in 1971 from the area in the west of Saint Patrick’s parish. Saint Brigid’s Church, on the hill off the N7, was dedicated by Bishop Jeremiah Newman in 1975.

The old graveyard at Saint Patrick’s, on the hill beside Saint Brigid’s, is now closed to burials. Saint Patrick’s Church celebrated its bicentenary in 2016.

8, Holmpatrick Church, Skerries, Co Dublin:

Holmpatrick Church and the wetlands at Kybe Pond in Skerries, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

When I was living in Co Dublin, Skerries was one of my favourite choices for a beach walk. I have known Skerries since my teens, and around 2010-2011, during a vacancy, I was privileged to do ‘Sunday duty’ in Holmpatrick Church, and to speak at Lenten talks. I also organised a number of Ash Wednesday retreats in Skerries for CITI staff and students.

Holmpatrick Parish Church is a Gothic Revival, pre-disestablishment church, built in 1867. It has an ornate interior, with neo-mediaeval decoration, and interesting stained glass windows, especially those on the balcony.

The Church was designed by the architect and artist James Edward Rogers (1838-1896) was consecrated on 2 September 1868. The limestone came from the Milverton quarries, near Skerries, and Walter Doolin was the contractor. Other churches by Rogers include Saint Mary’s Church, Howth; Kenure Church and the nearby Rectory in Rush, Co Dublin, built for Sir Roger Palmer (1832-1910) of Kenure Park; Kilfergus Church, Glin, Co Limerick; Saint Patrick’s Church, Kilcock, Co Kildare; Kilkeedy Church, Clarina, Co Limerick; Saint Columba's Church, Omagh, Co Tyrone; as well as the former Saint Bartholomew’s Vicarage and the parochial hall in Ballsbridge.

Looking across to the towers and spires of Holmpatrick from Skerries Mills (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Holmpatrick Church has some memorial tablets from an older church that stood nearby. One describes James Hamilton of Holmpatrick as a ‘gentleman who during a long and most active life displayed that zealous energy and ingenious integrity that forms a useful and virtuous man … He died the 20th of October 1800, in the 73rd year of his age … Of the uncommonly numerous offspring of thirty six children he was survived by eight sons and eight daughters.’

I think he gave new meaning to ‘zealous energy’! Hamilton’s descendants include Richard Branson, but with his ‘uncommonly numerous’ 36 children born 2½ centuries ago, Hamilton must be the ancestor of thousands upon thousands of people living in Ireland today.

Behind the church stand the ruins of an earlier church built in 1722 by the Hamilton family after they acquired Holmpatrick from the Earls of Thomond in 1720. When the church was demolished in the 1860s, the square tower was left standing – supposedly as a landmark for ships, although it is also a reminder of the mediaeval monastic past of this site.

Local lore says that when Saint Patrick was expelled from Wicklow he moved to Saint Patrick’s Island off Skerries in 432 CE. Legend says that one day, while Saint Patrick was on shore buying groceries, the people of Skerries rowed over to his island where he kept a goat for milk, stole the goat, took her back to the mainland and ate her. When Saint Patrick returned he was angry, and with one great step he bounded from his island to Red Island. There he questioned the local people, and when they denied their theft he took away their powers of speech. They could only bleat like goats, until they eventually admitted their crime.

It is said that on Red Island there is still a mark on the rock that is nothing less than Saint Patrick’s footprint. In all my visits to Skerries, I have failed to see the saint’s footprint on Red Island.

9, Saint Patrick’s Church, Ballyraggett, Co Kilkenny:

Saint Patrick’s Church, Ballyragget, Co Kilkenny, stands on the site of an earlier, Penal-era chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Both Saint Patrick’s Church, the Roman Catholic parish church in Ballyragget, Co Kilkenny, and Ballyragget Castle are difficult to find, with the church at the end of a side street between the Square and Castle Street, and the castle at the end of a lane behind locked gates. The obscure location of the church is explained because it stands on the site of an earlier chapel that may have been built first during the Penal days in the 18th century.

Saint Patrick’s is an imposing large-scale church built in 1842 under the direction of William Kinsella, Bishop of Ossory (1793-1845), for Father John Foran, Parish Priest of Ballyragget, who died in 1843, to designs by William Deane Butler (ca 1794-1857).

Butler, who was also the architect of Saint Kieran’s College, Kilkenny, designed the church in the Gothic Revival style. It is similar in many details to other contemporary parish churches in the area, including Castlecomer and Freshford, representing a form of house style developed by Butler while he was the resident architect for the Diocese of Ossory.

The grave of Canon James Comerford, who died in 1948 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Gothic-style reredos in Caen stone was designed in 1869 by Pugin’s son-in-law, George Coppinger Ashlin and depicts the Sacrifice of Abraham, the Crucifixion and the Sacrifice of Melchizedek. The front of the altar depicts the worship of the Lamb on the Throne (see Revelation 4). The mosaic work in the sanctuary is by Ludwig Oppenheimer Ltd (1915).

The church was renovated in 1924 and again in 1983-1985, and some new windows were added after 2000.

Because the church saw few interior alterations after the Second Vatican Council (1963-1965), it retains its rich interior scheme, with high quality carpentry, decorative plasterwork, and stained-glass windows.

The churchyard on the north side of the church has many cut-limestone Celtic High Cross-style gravestones dating back to 1842, including the grave of Canon James Comerford, Parish Priest of Ballyragget, who died on 12 June 1948 at the age of 69.

10, Saint Patrick’s Church, Donegall Street, Belfast:

Saint Patrick’s Church on Donegall Road, Belfast, was built in the 1870s, replacing a church built in 1815 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Saint Patrick’s Church on Donegall Street, Belfast, is a Victorian gem and an oasis of peace in the heart of the city and it is part of community life in the city centre. The church serves a large local resident community and a thriving population in the Cathedral Quarter, the city’s cultural and social heartland, and the students and staff in the neighbouring Belfast campus of Ulster University, along with a busy hospital, a large primary school, and residential and care homes.

The first church on the site was built in 1815, the year of the Battle of Waterloo, and it was the second Catholic church built in Belfast since the Reformation. The present Saint Patrick’s Church, the second on the site, was designed in the Gothic Revival style by Timothy Hevey (1846-1878) and Mortimer Thomspon. It is said the church was built ‘by the pennies of the poor’.

Two of the six windows in the south transept illustrating the life and mission of Saint Patrick (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

The original windows in the right transept were destroyed by an explosion during the ‘Troubles’, but six newly-installed windows illustrate the life and mission of Saint Patrick.

The church has a triptych by Sir John Lavery, who was baptised in the older, smaller church. He painted ‘The Madonna Of The Lakes’ (1919), with his second wife, Hazel Trudeau, as the model for the Virgin Mary and his daughter Eileen and step-daughter Helen as models for Saint Patrick and Saint Brigid.

The triptych originally stood on an altar designed by Edwin Lutyens, a friend of Lavery, and was illuminated by two candlesticks by Lutyens. Both the altar and the candlesticks were lost during reordering works out in the 1960s and 1970s, and the frame around the triptych, decorated with Celtic knotwork, remains the only Lutyens-designed artefact in Northern Ireland.

11, Saint Patrick’s Church, Soho:

Saint Patrick’s Church on Soho Square is one of the oldest post-Reformation Catholic parish churches in London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Patrick’s on Soho Square is one of the oldest post-Reformation Catholic parishes in London, and the original church on the site was the first Catholic place of worship to open in London after the Roman Catholic Relief Acts were passed in 1778 and 1791 and the first post-Reformation church in England dedicated to Saint Patrick.

The first church on the site was in a building behind Carlisle House and was consecrated in 1792. The present church, built in 1891-1893, is a Grade II* listed building designed by the Leeds architect John Kelly.

Father Arthur O’Leary (1729-1802), a celebrated Irish Capuchin preacher from Fanlobbus, Dunmanway, Co Cork, is the founding figure of this church.

Inside Saint Patrick’s Church, Soho Square, designed by the Leeds architect John Kelly and built in 1891-1893 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The present church on Soho Square was designed by John Kelly of Leeds and was built in 1891-1893. The church was built in the Italian Renaissance style. The main entrance has a Roman-style porch with Corinthian columns. Above the entrance is the inscription: Ut Christiani ita et Romani sitis (‘Be ye Christians as those of the Roman Church’), a quotation from the writings of Saint Patrick.

Many alterations have been made to Kelly’s church since it was built, and Saint Patrick’s Church was renovated and refurbished at a cost of £4 million in 2010-2011. Today, only a handful of resident Catholics remains in the parish. Hundreds of people continue to attend Saint Patrick’s Church, but they are mostly visitors, tourists and people working in the area. The church also attracts immigrants and migrant workers from across London, and Mass is regularly celebrated in both Spanish and Portuguese.

12, Saint Patrick’s Church, Semadang, Sarawak:

Saint Patrick’s Chapel (left), in orange and white, and Saint Patrick’s School (right), in green and white, beneath the mountain in Semadang, south of Kuching (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Saint Patrick’s Chapel, a mission chapel in Semadang, dates back to the 1930s, and neighbouring Saint Patrick’s School dates from 1953. They are among the churches, chapels and schools in the Diocese of Kuching that I visited Father Jeffry Renos Nawie during a recent visit to Sarawak.

Semadang is about a 1½-hour drive south from Kuching, half-way between Kuching and the border with Indonesia, and just a few miles north of the Equator. The Sarawak River in this area is known as the River Semadang (Sungai Semadang).

Two villages in the area, Kampung Semadang and Kampung Danu, are home to the Bidayuh community.

Saint Patrick’s Chapel, Semadang, was first built in the 1930s and was rebuilt and dedicated in 2009 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Saint Patrick’s Church is in striking, bright orange and white colours, and the school beside it is in bright, striking green and white colours, so that the whole site looked to this Irish visitor like a bright eye-catching display of green, white and orange.

Perhaps the colour scheme is nothing more than coincidence, and I imagine few other visitors notice the vivid and colourful combination or make a mental association with the Irish flag.

Saint Patrick’s Chapel dates from the 1930s, and was probably given its name by missionaries from the Anglican mission agency SPG (now USPG, United Society Partners in the Gospel). The present church building was consecrated on 3 May 2009 by Bishop Bolly Lapok of Kuching. Bishop Bolly also became the Archbishop of the Church of the Province of South East Asia in 2012 and was installed in Saint Thomas’s Cathedral, Kuching. He retired in 2017.

The present priest-in-charge of Saint Patrick’s is the Revd Kamor Diah. Parishioners told me how Saint Patrick’s has a congregation of about 200 on Sundays, but these numbers can reach 800 at major festivals and celebrations.

Visiting Saint Patrick’s School in Semadang, beside Saint Patrick’s Chapel (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2024)

Daily prayer in Lent with early English saints: 33, 17 March 2024, Saint Osmund of Salisbury

Saint Patrick depicted in a window by Burlison and Grylls in the Church of Saint John the Baptist, Spon Street, Coventry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

Lent began over a month ago on Ash Wednesday (14 February 2024), and Passiontide – the last two weeks of Lent – begins today. This is the Fifth Sunday in Lent (Lent V), also known as Passion Sunday. But today is also Saint Patrick’s Day (17 March 2024), and I hope to say more about Saint Patrick later today.

Later this morning, I hope to be at the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford, and I hope to celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day and my name day appropriately later in the day.

Throughout Lent this year, I am taking time each morning to reflect on the lives of early, pre-Reformation English saints commemorated in the Calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship.

Before this day begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, A reflection on an early, pre-Reformation English saint;

2, today’s Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

A statue of Saint Osmund in Salisbury Cathedral (Photograph: James Bradley/ Wikipedia/ CC BY 2.0)

Early English pre-Reformation saints: 33, Saint Osmund of Salisbury

Saint Osmund (1099), Bishop of Salisbury, is remembered in Common Worship on 16 July.

Osmund was born the son of a Norman count and came to England in the wake of William the Conqueror, his mother’s half-brother. He was quickly promoted to Chancellor in 1072. Six years later he became Bishop of Salisbury and completed the building of the new cathedral at Old Sarum.

He was a scholar and a good administrator but was best loved for his lack of avarice and ambition, traits apparently not common in the new hierarchy of Church and State. He took part in collecting the information for the Domesday Book and was present at Sarum when it was presented to the king in 1086. He is said to have compiled the Sarum Use.

Saint Osmund died on 4 December 1099 and his remains were translated to the new cathedral in Salisbury on 16 July 1457.

Saint Patrick depicted on cladding during recent restoration work at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

John 12: 20-33 (NRSVA):

20 Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. 21 They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’ 22 Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. 23 Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24 Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25 Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.

27 ‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – “Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. 28 Father, glorify your name.’ Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’ 29 The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to him.’ 30 Jesus answered, ‘This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. 31 Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. 32 And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ 33 He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

Saint Patrick receiving his mission to Ireland from Saint Celestine … a stained-glass window in a church in Dundalk, Co Louth (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 17 March 2024, Lent V, Passion Sunday, Saint Patrick’s Day):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Lent Reflection: True repentance is the key to Christian Freedom.’ This theme is introduced today by the Revd Dr Simon Ro, Dean of Graduate School of Theology at Sungkonghoe (Anglican) University, Seoul, Korea:

Read Luke 13: 1-9

‘Freedom is an idea that permeates most of the major religions in our world. This idea is essential to any spiritual journey, and for many the journey focuses on how to become liberated from a love for self, a state of self-righteousness and complacency.

‘What is Christianity’s approach towards freedom? The Gospel of Luke (13: 1-9) gives insight to answers this question, but a key idea is that of repentance. Jesus Christ stresses the universal need for repentance and shows us that unless we repent and respond to the challenges of our world, we will suffer such “disasters” as hopelessness, loneliness, frustration, anger and fear. Jesus does not want just devotion but rather a deep sincere change in heart and attitude which results in a change of behaviour – both spiritual and physical.

‘For true freedom to happen, true repentance must occur. We are challenged to recognise the need for true repentance and pursue a change in our thinking, attitude, and behaviour. This is definitely a message for consideration and change during this Lent season.’

This is a sample taken from the 2024 USPG Lent Course which can be downloaded and ordered from the USPG website www.uspg.org.uk

The USPG Prayer Diary today (17 March 2024, Lent V, Passion Sunday, Saint Patrick’s Day) invites us to pray reflecting on these words:

Praise to you, O Christ, King of eternal glory.
Christ humbled himself and became obedient unto death,
even death on a cross.
Therefore God has highly exalted him
and given him the name that is above every name.

The Collect:

Most merciful God,
who by the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ
delivered and saved the world:
grant that by faith in him who suffered on the cross
we may triumph in the power of his victory;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

Lord Jesus Christ,
you have taught us
that what we do for the least of our brothers and sisters
we do also for you:
give us the will to be the servant of others
as you were the servant of all,
and gave up your life and died for us,
but are alive and reign, now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

Gracious Father,
you gave up your Son
out of love for the world:
lead us to ponder the mysteries of his passion,
that we may know eternal peace
through the shedding of our Saviour’s blood,
Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday: Saint Wulfstan of Worcester

Tomorrow: Saint Anselm of Canterbury

Saint Patrick depicted in a window in Saint Patrick’s Church, Waterford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Friars Entry and Gloucester Green are reminders of monastic life in mediaeval Oxford

Friars’ Entry … the only direct route from Gloucester Green into the centre of Oxford until Beaumont Street was laid out in 1822 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

As I make my way regularly from Gloucester Green bus station along Friars’ Entry to the centre of Oxford, the name of Friars’ Entry and the area around Gloucester Green and Gloucester Street remind me each time of the mediaeval Carmelite Friary in Oxford and of mediaeval Gloucester College, founded by the Benedictine monks of Gloucester Abbey.

The first building of significance in this part of Oxford was Beaumont Palace, at the end of Beaumont Street. It was built as a royal residence ca 1130 for Henry I to use as a stopping point on his visits to the royal hunting-grounds at Woodstock.

Beaumont Palace was the birthplace of two kings: Richard the Lion-Heart and King John. The palace was a royal residence until 1275, but nothing remains of the building, although some of its stones are said to have been used to build Saint John’s College.

People were living near Beaumont Palace in the 12th and 13th centuries, and George Street was first recorded as Irishman’s Street in 1251. But it was abandoned after the Black Death killed about a quarter of Oxford’s population in 1348, and fell into a derelict state.

Nicholas de Meules or de Molis, formerly custodian of Oxford Castle, granted the Carmelite friars a place near the hospital in Stockwell Street, in the parish of Saint George, in 1256. The provincial prior sent a friar John of Rochester to take possession of the site and make arrangements for the new friary. Nicholas de Stockwell, sometime mayor of Oxford, gave the Carmelites an adjacent plot towards the highway.

The Bishop of Lincoln and the Abbot of Osney permitted the Carmelites to build an oratory. In return, the friars agreed not to admit the parishioners of the abbey and to any sacraments without his consent. However, the Carmelites did not refrain from hearing confessions, and paid no attention to Archbishop Peckham when he prohibited them from doing this in 1280.

The Carmelites continued to expand their property holdings in the area, and built their church and houses with gifts of oaks from Henry III and Edward I.

At the junction of Gloucester Green, Gloucester Street and Friars Entry, looking towards Beaumont Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Benedictine monks of Saint Peter’s Abbey, Gloucester (now Gloucester Cathedral), founded Gloucester College in Oxford in 1283 on land claimed by the Carmelites. That year, the Carmelite friary was attacked, its doors were broken down and the friars, beaten were wounded and ill-treated crimes. The two events may have been connected.

The Chapter of the Carmelite Province in England met in Oxford in 1264 and 1289. Although the early history of the Carmelite school in Oxford is obscure, Peter de Swaynton is said to have been the first Carmelite to receive the doctor’s degree at Oxford, and perhaps John Chelmeston, William of Littlington and William de Paul or Pagham studied there too before the end of the 13th century.

A meeting of the general chapter of the order in London in 1312 passed many statutes referring to the stadium at Oxford. At the king’s request, the canons of Osney, as patrons of the Church of Saint Mary Magdalen, gave the Carmelites permission to celebrate divine service and the right of free burial in 1312.

When Edward II was put to flight at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, he invoked the Virgin Mary and vowed to found a monastery for the poor Carmelites if he escaped in safety. In fulfilment of his vow, he granted Beaumont Palace to the Carmelites of Oxford. The gift was confirmed by Pope John XXII and by Parliament in 1318. The king also gave a further grant a land at Stockwell Street.

Edward III confirmed the friars in their possession of the royal palace in 1327. However, the neighbourhood was not suitable for a religious house. The mayor and bailiffs of Oxford and other officials were commanded in 1328 to remove harlots and other women of bad character from the neighbourhood of the house of the Carmelite Friars, and to prevent houses being let to such women. It was said the friars were hindered in performing divine service by the clamour, night and day, caused by the men visiting the prostitutes and brothels.

The students of Robert of Walsingham, master of the Whitefriars, included John Baconthorpe, ‘the resolute doctor’ and ‘prince of the Averroists,’ who became the doctor of the Carmelite order as Thomas Aquinas was the doctor of the Dominicans and Duns Scotus of the Franciscans.

Baconthorpe studied in Paris and returned to Oxford, where he influenced Richard FitzRalph (1300-1360) of Dundalk, later Vice-Chancellor of Oxford (1333-1336), Dean of Lichfield (1335-1346) and Archbishop of Armagh (1346-1360). Baconthorpe was the Carmelite provincial prior in 1329-1333, and died in 1346.

The name of Friars’ Entry keeps alive the memory of the presence of the Carmelites in mediaeval Oxford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

It was decreed in 1336 that no friar of the English province should be sent to Oxford or Cambridge unless six brethren, some of whom must be priors, testified from personal knowledge to his good character. In the late 14th century the province was divided into four ‘distinctions’ or sections, based at London, York, Norwich, and Oxford. To avoid local rivalries, it was arranged a friar should be chosen from each of these sections in turn to proceed to the degrees of bachelor and master in theology.

John de Norton, a Carmelite, was summoned before the chancellor’s court in 1360 for breaches of the peace, and when he refused to appear he was punished. With the support of his order, he appealed to the Pope. Edward III then came to the help of the university and ordered the provincial prior to stop all appeals against the chancellor’s jurisdiction.

The mendicant friars were accused of stirring up the Peasant Revolt in 1381, and the prior of the Oxford Carmelites joined with the heads of the other mendicant convents in Oxford in an appeal for protection to John of Gaunt.

The Carmelites in Oxford had a prominent part in opposing John Wycliffe and his followers. Peter Stokes was commissioned to publish the condemnation of Wycliffe’s doctrine at Oxford in 1382. Stephen Patrington, who became provincial prior in 1399, was a commissary at Oxford against the Lollards in 1414. Thomas Netter of Walden, who was engaged in controversies with the Lollards, was confessor to both Henry V and Henry VI, and succeeded as provincial prior in 1417.

Walter Hunt is said to have been one of the chief exponents of the Latin view in the negotiations with the Greek Church at the Council of Florence in 1439. He returned to Oxford and there he spent the remaining 40 years of his life.

Henry VI would stay in the Carmelite house at Oxford ‘as in his own palace.’ The future Cardinal Reginald Pole, a member of the royal family, lodged at the White Friars when he was a student at Oxford.

On the eve of the dissolution of the monastic houses, however, the moral, intellectual and material condition of the White Friars came under public scrutiny. A Carmelite friar was jailed for ‘incontinence’ in 1502. A girl of 13 disguised as a boy was found at the White Friars in 1533 ‘in the cubicle of one Browne scholar,’ perhaps a secular student having rooms in the friary. The long-standing hostility between the White Friars and the Benedictine monks of Gloucester College broke out 1534-1535, and both were bound over to keep the peace.

The 24 Carmelite friars whose names are in the university register from 1505 to 1538 include three who were DDs of Cambridge and who requested incorporation at Oxford. The friar who last who proceeded to a degree was John Hurlyston, BD, of Cologne, who applied for the degree of DD in 1534. After that, no Carmelite appears in the university register.

When John London visited the Oxford friaries in 1538, he reported that the Carmelite and Augustinian friars were living in such poverty that ‘if they do not forsake their houses, their houses will forsake them.’

The White Friars’ house was in ruins, they were selling off property and sources of income, the elms that grew about their house, almost all the jewels and plate, and copes and vestments. They petitioned Thomas Cromwell for permission to change their habits and to surrender their house ‘in consideration of their poverty, which compels them to sell their jewels, plate, and wood; and will, if they continue, compel them to sell the stones and slates of their house.’ The plate sent to London included three chalices, a silver ship, two silver cruets, a silver-gilt pax, and a silver-gilt censer. There was little or no lead.

Worcester College was built on the site of Gloucester College and Gloucester Hall (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Edmund Powell of Sandford, Oxfordshire, was granted the site of the White Friars in 1541. It included the house itself, tenements and gardens, a stable, a timber yard, 3½ acres of land called Gloucester College Close, and a passageway called the Entry that led from Saint Mary Magdalen Church to the friary.

The greater part of the buildings was pulled down by Powell and his children, and much of the stone was carried to Saint Frideswide’s in 1546. The refectory remained standing until 1596, and was used as a poor-house for the parish of Saint Mary Magdalen. It was then demolished and the materials were used to enlarge the library of Saint John’s College.

As for Gloucester College, the Benedictine house in Oxford, after the dissolution it became Gloucester Hall, an academic hall and annexe of St John’s College. It was re-founded as Worcester College by Sir Thomas Cookes in 1714. Gloucester Green, which was opposite the old college, and the Gloucester House building within Worcester College preserve the name of Gloucester College.

Because Friars’ Entry was once the most direct route to Worcester College, it contributed to the idea that the college was ‘out of Oxford.’ Until modern times, the footway was lined with houses, and solemn processions ran the risk of ‘stumbling over buckets, knocking over children, catching the rinsings of basins, and ducking under linen-lines.’

the White Rabbit on the corner of Friars’ Entry and Gloucester Street … a reminder of the White Rabbit in the stories of Alice and of the White Friars (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The name of Friars’ Entry has survived through the centuries and keeps alive the memory of the presence of the Carmelites in mediaeval Oxford. Perhaps the name of the White Rabbit on the corner of Friars’ Entry and Gloucester Street is a play not only on the White Rabbit in Lewis Carroll’s stories of Alice but also on the name of the White Friars.

Gloucester Green was laid out as a bowling green in 1631, and later became a public square. A plaque on a modern building facing onto Gloucester Green is ‘to the memory of Private Biggs and Private Piggen, executed like their Leveller colleagues at Burford by forces loyal to Cromwell. They were shot near this place for their part in the second mutiny of the Oxford garrison on 18th September 1649.’

Gloucester Green became the site of the City Gaol in 1786. Although Friars’ Entry was still a mere footway, it remained the only direct route from Gloucester Green into the city centre until Beaumont Street was laid out in 1822. Beaumont Street provided a grander approach to Worcester College and a new site for the Ashmolean Museum, the oldest public museum in Britain, which was founded in Broad Street in 1683.

Gloucester Green was the location for Oxford’s cattle market from 1835 until 1932 before the area was converted into a bus station. More recently, there were proposals to build a multi-storey car park there. But, with public support, the council chose instead to create today’s exuberant market place, opened in 1990. I have enjoyed the food market there on Wednesdays and the antiques market on Thursdays.

Gloucester Green now has colourful food and antiques markets (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The eccentric sculptor who donated his statues of Boswell and Johnson to Lichfield and London

The writer and sculptor Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald (1830-1925) was in his late 70s when he donated his statue of James Boswell to Lichfiield in 1908 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald (1830-1925) was an Irish-born lawyer, author and critic who became a painter and sculptor later in life, and when he was in his late 70s made public donations of two major works with Lichfield connections: his statue of James Boswell in Lichfiield (1908), and his statue of Dr Samuel Johnson in the Strand, London (1910).

But who was the sculptor who completed these public works at a late stage in life?

And what inspired him to work on them?

Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald was born on 26 April 1830 at Fane Valley near Dundalk, Co Louth. His father Thomas FitzGerald, was an Irish politician and slave trader, who became wealthy in the West Indies as the owner of the slave plantation at Richmond Hill in Demerera, British Guiana (now Guyana).

Thomas Fitzgerald was a son of Christopher Fitzgerald and Anne Esmonde. He was the co-owner of Richmond Hill with his brother Laurence Fitzgerald and Thomas Fitzgerald and his business associate of Thomas Naghten were slave-factors in Demerara in the early 1800s.

When Fitzgerald returned to Ireland with a fortune from slavery and sugar, he bought Fane Valley in Co Louth in August 1823. He was elected MP for Co Louth for Daniel O’Connell’s Repeal Association in the 1832 general election. He was still in office when he died in 1834.

FitzGerald was the father of two sons: Thomas Christopher Fitzgerald (1820-1871), and Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald (1830-1925).

Percy Fitzgerald’s statue of James Boswell with the statue of Samuel Johnson and the Samuel Johnson Museum in the background (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald was educated by the Jesuits, first at Belvedere College in Dublin and then at Stonyhurst College in Lancashire, before studying at Trinity College Dublin. He was called to the Irish Bar and for a time crown he was a prosecutor on the north-east circuit and briefly served as high sheriff for Co Louth.

In 1853, and perhaps on other occasions, he made a pretentious claim to the title of ‘Knight of Kerry’, one of three unique hereditary knighthoods in the FitzGerald/FitzMaurice dynasty in Ireland, the others being the Knight of Glin and the White Knight. However, the true Knight of Kerry was Sir Peter George FitzGerald (1808-1880) of Valentia Island.

Percy Fitzgerald stood back from his legal career, and moved to London in the hope of becoming a journalist and writer. He introduced himself to the literary critic and biographer of Charles Dickens, John Forster, who had recently completed a biography of Oliver Goldsmith and was working on another of Jonathan Swift. Forster encouraged Fitzgerald to write and introduced him to Dickens in 1856.

Fitzgerald became a regular contributor to Dickens’s magazine Household Words, founded in 1850, and All the Year Round. Other contributors included William Henry Wills, Edmund Yates, Douglas Jerrold, Blanchard Jerrold, Wilkie Collins, Eliza Lynn Linton and George Augustus Sala.

Claire Tomalin, in Dickens: A Life (2011), describes Fitzgerald as an Irish lawyer with a fluent pen and one of the clever young men Dickens surrounded himself with, ‘aspiring writers who were eager to learn from him and ready to flatter.’ She describes how ‘Dickens gave them work, corrected and improved their copy, was a good friend to them and dined them well.’

Fitzgerald contributed to a variety of journals and papers, including the Temple Bar Magazine, London Society, the Art Journal, the Daily News, the Gentleman’s Magazine, Cassell’s Magazine, and the Illustrated London News.

Fitzgerald was also a drama critic for the Observer and the Whitehall Review, and wrote a series of biographies and histories of the theatre.

One of the three bronze reliefs shows Boswell and Johnson together in the Hebrides (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

He edited the works of Samuel Johnson (1898), wrote biographies of Charles Dickens (1905, 1913), James Boswell (1891, 1911, 1912), David Garrick (1868), Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1886), Laurence Sterne (1864), Charles Lamb (1866), Henry Irving (1893), George IV (1881) and William IV (1884). He produced several histories of theatres and theatre companies, including the Savoy Theatre, the Lyceum and the works of Gilbert and Sullivan.

His output was prolific: at any one time he claimed to be at work on two serials and he is credited with more than 200 publications on a variety of topics including fiction, drama, history, biography, religion, and dramatic criticism. He wrote several volumes of memoirs, in which he included detailed personal recollections of Dickens and his circle.

Most of these books were published by Chapman and Hall. Although his fiction is no longer read, at the time he experienced considerable success with novels such as Bella Donna (1864), published under the pseudonym ‘Gilbert Dyce’, and its sequels, Jenny Bell (1866) and Seventy-five Brooke Street (1867).

His shorter pieces included the Foreword to Dickens’s Dream Children (1895) by Mary Angela Dickens and others.

Fitzgerald married the Hon Dorcas Olivia Skeffington, eldest daughter of John Skeffington, 10th Viscount Massereene and Ferrard, on 8 July 1869. Already, there were interesting Lichfield connections through this marriage.

The Skeffington family were descendants of the Skeffingtons of Fisherwick Hall. Dorcas was a niece of Amelia Spread Deane O’Grady, who eloped to Gretna Green as a young teenager in 1821 to marry Lord Edward Chichester (1799-1889), who became the Dean of Raphoe in 1831. Dorcas’s parents were married in the Deanery in Raphoe, Co Donegal, in 1835. Lord Edward eventually succeeded as 4th Marquess of Donegall in 1883, but he never inherited the vast estates once owned by the family that gave its name to Donegal House on Bore Street in Lichfield.

Dorcas brought her husband a fortune of £12,000. He recalled that they quickly ran through this money, but only briefly experienced financial difficulties before he inherited his father’s fortune when his elder brother died in 1871. Dorcas died on 27 September 1876.

Percy Fitzgerald boasts on his Lichfield statue of his published works on Johnson and Boswell (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

In later life, Fitzgerald turned his hand to being an artist, illustrator, and sculptor. He completed a bust of Dickens in 1900 for the Pump Room in Bath, another in the courtyard of the Prudential Assurance building, Holborn, London, and a bust of Charles Reade, the plaster cast of which is in the National Portrait Gallery.

Most noticeably, Fitzgerald was responsible for the eccentric statues of James Boswell in Lichfield (1908), and of Samuel Johnson behind Saint Clement Danes Church on the Strand, London (1910).

In the inscription on the Boswell statue in Lichfield, Fitzgerald describes himself as the ‘Biographer of Boswell and editor of Boswell’s Johnson.’

The more than life-size bronze figure shows a jaunty, fashionably dressed Boswell, sword at his side, with a comical crown-like hat and a turned-up nose. He stands on a black marble base with a Portland stone plinth.

A decorative medallion with a portrait of Mrs Thrale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Three bronze reliefs show Boswell with Johnson in different scenes: travelling together in the Hebrides; Boswell being introduced by Johnson to the Literary Club in London; and Boswell and Johnson dining at the Three Crowns Inn in Lichfield.

Boswell’s name and dates (1740-1795) are on the front bronze panel on the north side, with his heraldic crest at the base. There are additonal decorative medallions with portraits of James Boswell, David Garrick, Edmund Burke, Joshua Reynolds and Mrs Hester Thrale, friend and patron of Johnson and Boswell.

The inscription on the south side reads: ‘The Work of Percy Fitzgerlad MA FSA, Biographer of Boswell, also Editor of Boswell’s Johnson, presented by him to the City of Lichfield.’ Smaller lettering at the base names ‘WR Coleridge-Roberts Mayor, Herbert Russell Town Clerk, 1908.’

Percy Fitzgerald’s bronze statue of Samuel Johnson at the east end of Saint Clement Danes Church in the Strand, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Fitzgerald also made the bronze statue of Johnson behind the east end of Saint Clement Danes Church in the Strand, London. The statue, which has been dismissed by critics as ‘grotesque’ and ‘quirky’ and as ‘modelled in a very rough style.’

Johnson used to worship in the church and Fitzgerald depicts him looking past the Law Courts down Fleet Street.

Fitzgerald is said to have copied Johnson’s face from a portrait by Reynolds and a bust by Nollekens. He looks stout and crumpled, as he did in life, and is commenting animatedly on a book he is reading, with two more books and an inkpot at his feet.

Percy Fitzgerald’s statue of Johnson in London has been dismissed by critics as ‘grotesque’ and ‘quirky’ and ‘modelled in a very rough style’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The main part of the inscription reads: ‘Samuel Johnson L.L.D. Critic. Essayist. Philologist. Wit. Poet. Moralist. Dramatist. Political Writer. Talker.’ On either side of the Boswell medallion are Johnson’s dates (Born 1709 Died 1784).

Below that is information about the sculptor and the erection of the monument: ‘The gift and handiwork of Percy Fitzgerald FSA and erected by the Revd S. Pennington MA, Rector of St Clement Danes 1910.’

The London relief showing Johnson and Boswell in the Highlands is similar to the one on Fitzgerald’s statue of Boswell in Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The relief showing Johnson and Boswell in the Highlands is similar to the one on Fitzgerald’s statue of Boswell in Lichfield. A whimsical relief showing Johnson and Mrs Thrale misspells her name as ‘Mrs Thrall’.

The original plan was to have a royal unveiling by Princess Louise. But this was postponed when Edward VII died that very day. Then Septimus Pennington, the Rector at Saint Clements, died just as the statue was ready.

At Fitzgerald’s suggestion, he eventually unveiled his own work as Pennington’s body was brought into the church for lying in rest before his funeral.

The relief showing Johnson and Mrs Thrale misspells her name as ‘Mrs Thrall’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Fitzgerald took his sculptures and ‘handiwork’ much more seriously than his writing, and more seriously than his critics: in An output (1912), he mentions up to 50 works.

Nevertheless, he continued to write, and he produced new editions of his biography of Boswell in 1911 and 1912.

However, it must be asked whether Fitzgerald’s sculptures were inspired by his books? Or whether his sculptures were merely an enthusiastic but amateurish and awkward effort to promote his books and their sale?

Percy Fitzgerald was 80 when he unveiled his own statue of Samuel Johnson in London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

He remained loyal throughout his life to Dickens. He was in his mid-80s when he published Memories of Charles Dickens in 1914. He was the first president of the Dickens Fellowship, and he presented much of his collection of Dickens memorabilia to the Eastgate Museum in Rochester.

He was 95 when he died on 23 November 1925 at his Bloomsbury home at 37 St George Square, London. His body was brought back to Ireland and he was buried at Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin.

Samuel Johnson used to worship in Saint Clement Danes Church and Percy Fitzgerald depicts him looking past the Law Courts down Fleet Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)