Mowbray Stephen O’Rorke, the bishop with the ‘tallest mitre in Christendom’ and his family roots in Ballinasloe

A walk on the beach at Robin Hood’s Bay and searching for smugglers

A walk in May along the beach at Robin Hood’s Bay in North Yorkshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

Living in Stony Stratford means I am perhaps as far from the coast as one can be in England. The nearest beach is at Southend-on-Sea in Essex, a two-hour drive away by car, and even longer by public transport.

Although I was back in Dublin a few weeks ago, the last time I had a walk on a beach until last week was in Courtown, Morriscastle and Kilmuckridge more than a year ago during a day in Co Wexford (6 March 2022), and before that in Skerries and Loughshinny in north Co Dublin the day before (5 March 2022).

Since my early childhood, I have always been invigorated by walks on the seashore and on the beach, and I miss the sound of the sea, the smell of the sea air, and the sea breeze blowing on my face.

I was missing all of these until last week. Charlotte and I were spending a few days in York, and one day we caught the bus to the North Yorkshire coast. We spent a few hours in Whitby, where we visited Whitby Abbey and Saint Mary’s Church on the East Cliff, walked around the town, paused for lunch, and caught a glimpse of the beach at the harbour.

Then, later in the afternoon, Charlotte brought me to Robin Hood’s Bay, a pretty village with a long beach, set in a sheltered bay beneath towering cliffs on the Yorkshire coast. Robin Hood’s Bay is a place where Charlotte spent many of her childhood holidays, and it is one of Yorkshire’s true jewels.

Robin Hood’s Bay is known to local people as Bay Town. It is a small fishing village and bay in the North York Moors National Park, 10 km (6 miles) south of Whitby and 24 km (15 miles) north of Scarborough.

Brooding cliffs tower above the beach at Robin Hood’s Bay (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Brooding cliffs tower above the beach this small fishing village with its quaint charming cottages that spill down to the edge of the sea. From the cliff top, we made our way down through the twisting village, with little cobbled alleyways and picturesque dwellings.

Smugglers would slip through the same narrow winding streets of this fishing village in the 18th century with their illicit trade, following the network of passageways with tea, silk and tobacco.

Over coffee in the café at the Old Coastguard Station and Visitor Centre, where Charlotte often stayed as a child, we learned how Robin Hood’s Bay is one of the best spots for fossil hunting in Britain, with some incredible discoveries across the years across the golden sands. We read too about the incredible fossil finds and a little about the geology of Robin Hood’s Bay.

There too we heard how smuggling was rife all along the Yorkshire coast in the late 18th century. Vessels from the continent brought contraband that was distributed by contacts on land and the operations were financed by syndicates who made profits without the risks taken by the seafarers and the villagers. The contraband smuggled into Yorkshire from the Netherlands and France to avoid the duty included tea, gin, rum, brandy and tobacco.

Two excise cutters, the Mermaid and the Eagle, were outgunned in 1773 and chased out of the bay by three smuggling vessels, a schooner and two shallops. A pitched battle between smugglers and excise officials took place in the dock over 200 casks of brandy and geneva (gin) and 15 bags of tea in 1779.

I suppose gives an extra resonance or new significance to Yorkshire tea.

Many houses in the village were built between 1650 and 1750 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Many of the houses in the village were built between 1650 and 1750 and whole families were involved in the fishing industry. Fishing reached its peak in the mid-19th century, but started to decline in the late 19th century.

These days, instead of fishing and smuggling, the economy of Robin Hood’s Bay is vibrant thanks to the cafés, pubs, restaurants, galleries and craft shops and the income generated by tourism.

Essential repair work to the sea wall is being carried out, which means the sea wall path and the picnic area are closed until Autumn. But all the cottages remain accessible, all shops and businesses are open as usual, and we were able to spend some time at low tide in the late afternoon strolling along the sandy beach and in and out through the rocks and the rockpools.

Robin Hood’s Bay is built in a fissure between two steep cliffs. The headlands at each end of the beach are known as Ness Point or North Cheek (north) and Old Peak or South Cheek (south).

From the beach and the tiny harbour, we wandered back up through the maze of tiny, narrow and twisting cobbled streets and alleyways, imagining which houses had been the homes of sailors and fishermen, smugglers and press gangs, and wondering whether we might stumble across some of the tunnels or secret underground passages leading to hidden warehouses or linking the houses.

Wandering through the maze of tiny, narrow and twisting cobbled streets and alleyways in Robin Hood’s Bay (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Bram Stoker set some of his scenes in Dracula (1897) in Robin Hood’s Bay. The writer visited the area recreating the steep steps and the sightings of the red eyes, the ship that ran aground with the immense dog, the dog being none other than Dracula.

We all know, of course, that Dracula never visited either Robin Hood’s Bay or Whitby, and that he is not buried in the churchyard at Saint Mary’s beside Whitby Abbey. But did Robin Hood ever visit Robin Hood’s Bay?

‘Robin Hoode Baye’ is mentioned by John Leland in 1536, when he describes it as ‘a fischer tounlet of 20 bootes with Dok or Bosom of a mile yn length.’ There is a reference too to ‘Robyn Hoodis Baye’ in 1544. The place is also named in an old North Sea chart published by Waghenaer in 1586 and now in the Maritime Museum in Rotterdam.

The ballad ‘The Noble Fisherman’ tells of Robin Hood visiting Scarborough, taking a job as a fisherman, and using his skills in archery to defeat French pirates who were pillaging the fishermen’s boats along the coast. The pirates surrendered and Robin Hood used half the loot to build homes for poor people in the village now called Robin Hood’s Bay.

Or, so the story goes.

But this ballad is first referred to only in the 17th century at the earliest, three or four centuries after Robin Hood is said to have lived in Sherwood Forest.

Perhaps Robin Hood, Maid Marian, Friar Tuck, Little John, Will Scarlett and all the other merry band needed more than I can imagine to get away from the Sheriff of Nottingham and the Midlands for a day by the sea and a walk on the beach.

The economy of Robin Hood’s Bay is vibrant these days thanks to tourism (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Sad to hear of the plans to close Saint John’s College, Nottingham

Saint John’s College, Nottingham … due to close next summer (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

It was sad to read in the Church Times at the weekend that Saint John’s College, Nottingham, is to close after 156 years.

While I was on the staff of the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, I worked closely with Saint John’s and the college staff. The principal, Canon Christina Baxter, was an external examiner at CITI and a regular visitor, and I also worked closely with other staff members, including the Revd Dr Tim Hull, tutor in theology.

With other members of academic staff at CITI, I lectured on the three-year course for NSM ordinands leading to Certificate in Christian Studies awarded by Saint John’s in association with the Open University and the University of Chester. I also supervised post-graduate research leading to the MA in theology and art from Saint John’s College and the University of Nottingham.

I regularly visited theological colleges in England, to compare notes and network with academics who were teaching in the same fields as I was teaching in, including Church History, Liturgy and Patristics, and I was welcomed to Saint John’s in 2013.

A statement last week said the college council agreed last month [11 November 2019] ‘that the operation of the current configuration of St John’s is no longer financially viable in the long term,’ and that the process of closure would begin.

It now looks as though most of the 28 people working at Saint John’s, including tutors, are to transfer to new posts in institutions that continue the college’s distance-learning and youth-ministry work. But, inevitably, there will be job losses and redundancies by next summer.

Students have been reassured that their courses will continue until they have completed them.

The Principal of the Eastern Region Ministry Course, the Revd Dr Alex Jensen, a former lecturer at the Church of Ireland Theological College, suggested there is ‘great fear’ in the Theological Education Institutions (TEI) sector that other closures could follow. ‘Hardly any college or course is financially sustainable,’ he told the Church Times last week, wondering when ‘the next college or course falls by the wayside.’

The broader context for theological education was illustrated by figures seen by the Church Times, suggesting a target in the Church of England of a 50 per cent increase in ordained vocations is unlikely to be met by 2020.

The Church Times said there have been ‘signs of trouble’ at Saint John’s ‘for some time.’ The college had 60 students last year, compared with 108 in 2016-2017, and 223 in June 2016.

Saint John’s decided in 2014 to stop recruiting students, including ordinands, to study on campus. Plans were announced for ‘remodelling the college to meet the future training needs of the Church.’ It was renamed Saint John’s School of Mission in 2015, although it later returned to calling itself Saint John’s College.

Plans were made to place students with a church and to study for two days a fortnight at the campus. All recruitment was suspended for the academic year 2016-2017, and the last ordinands finished training in June 2017.

Healthier finances were secured in 2017 when land was sold for a new housing development. The college reported a surplus of £1.3 million in 2018, compared with a deficit of £612,853 the previous year. The Revd Dr David Hilborn, who welcomed me to Saint John’s six years ago, resigned as principal at the end of last year, and is now Principal of Moorlands College, Christchurch, an evangelical college in Dorset.

As far back as 1997, the college was facing financial pressures and falling student recruitment. But a ‘mixed-mode’ delivery of ordination training was introduced, and two years later the Midlands Institute for Children Youth and Mission (MCYM) was opened on site, in partnership with Youth for Christ, offering two undergraduate degrees. This became the college’s main source of income.

However, the MCYM announced in October it was moving to Leicester to merge with the Institute for Children Youth and Mission. That move includes moving a collection of 10,000 books, while discussions are taking place way with the Diocese of Southwell and Nottingham, and Saint Mellitus College, East Midlands, to ensure the Saint John’s library has ‘a new home in Nottingham.’

The last remaining building owned by Saint John’s will be sold, and the three parts of the legacy – MCYM, distance-learning, and the library – will be given funds to help to secure their future in new homes.

The Queen’s Foundation, Birmingham, is to take over the Extension Studies department, offering distance-learning courses and degrees validated by the University of Durham. The majority of staff, including tutors, are expected to transfer to Leicester or Birmingham.

In the gardens at Saint John’s College, Nottingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saint John’s was originally founded as the London School of Divinity, an evangelical college, in 1863. Former principals include Donald Coggan, later Archbishop of Canterbury, and the evangelist and theologian Michael Green. Another Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, trained at Saint John’s, as did Bishop Christopher Cocksworth of Coventry, Bishop Vivienne Faull of Bristol, Archbishop Janani Luwum of Uganda, and the recently retired Bishop Harold Miller of Down and Dromore.

The college was founded by the Revd Alfred Peache and his sister, Kezia, after they inherited their father’s fortune. The college was established to provide an evangelical theological education to ordinands who could not go to university. Canon Thomas Boultbee was the first principal and Lord Shaftesbury became the first president of the college council.

The first premises near Kilburn High Road Station were known as Saint John’s Hall, and Saint John’s became an informal name for the college, perhaps because Boultbee was a graduate of Saint John’s College, Cambridge.

The college moved to Highbury in 1866 and remained there for almost 80 years, with close links to Arsenal FC and their grounds at Highbury. During World War II, the faculty, staff and students were evacuated to Wadhurst School in Sussex in 1942 when the Highbury buildings were damaged by air-raids.

The future Archbishop of Canterbury, Donald Coggan, became principal in 1944, and for the 10 years he was principal, the college was based at Harrow School and then at Ford Manor in Lingfield, Surrey.

Under Dr Coggan’s successor, Canon Hugh Jordan, discussions began on moving away from London. Canon Jordan believed the future of the college was outside London but near a university. A site was available in Nottingham, where the university’s theological department was growing in reputation. His successor as principal, Canon Michael Green, oversaw the move from London to Bramcote in Nottingham in 1970.

With the move from London, the London College of Divinity changed its name to Saint John’s. As Saint John’s, the college pioneered distance learning programmes in theology in the late 1970s, and made new theological thinking and research accessible to a wide audience through its A5-sized Grove Booklet series.

Later principals included Colin Buchanan, who became Bishop of Aston, Professor John Goldingay, Canon Christina Baxter, the first lay principal, Dr David Hilborn and Dr Sally Nash.

Former staff members include Dr George Bebabwi, an Egyptian scholar who was one of my lecturers at the summer school on ‘The Ascent to Holiness,’ organised by the Institute for Orthodox Studies at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, in 2008. I still recall how he barely managed to stick to his script as he delivered his paper on ‘Discernment’ with great style, compassion and humour.

Dr Bebabwi warned against what he described as ‘learning wisdom.’ He quoted from the Egyptian Desert Father, Abba Poemen, who said: ‘A man who teaches without doing what he teaches is like a spring which cleanses and gives drinks to everyone, but is not able to purify itself.’

In the chapel at Saint John’s College, Nottingham (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

‘Sir Thomas Southwell (1665-1720), 1st Baron Southwell of Castle Mattress, in Co Limerick: the first protector of the Palatines and his family’

Sir Thomas Southwell (1665-1720), 1st Baron Southwell and the first protector of the Palatines

Patrick Comerford

Irish Palatine Weekend, in affiliation with Heritage Week

Hosted by the Irish Palatine Association

26 August 2017 (10 a.m.).

‘Sir Thomas Southwell (1665-1720), 1st Baron Southwell of Castle Mattress, in
Co. Limerick: the first protector of the Palatines and his family’

1, Introduction:

Throughout my academic career, I chided and joked with my students that if they cited Wikipedia in their footnotes or as sources in their coursework or dissertations, they would lose 10 per cent marks for each citation.

If you were to look at the entry for Thomas Southwell on Wikipedia – well, at least during this past week, for Wikipedia entries change constantly – you would find a mere nine lines of text, no more than 254 words, and no references to his role in bringing the Palatines to Rathkeale as religious refugees.

You would be forgiven for thinking that all that was important about his life were the titles he held, his brief time in prison during the reign of James, and some genealogical details that tell us nothing about his life and character, and tell us nothing about his family and legacy.

In the title of this presentation, I have referred to Southwell and his family, because this morning I want to put him within the context of Rathkeale local history and identity, and to ask some interesting implications of the legacy he has left, not only through the descendants of the Palatines he welcomed onto his estate, but also in his descendants and their religious activities.

So, this morning, I want to say something first of all about his family background; then to sketch a more rounded biographical report of this man; then look at what happened to later generations of his family; and finally look at the significance of the family that once gave sanctuary to Palatine refugees becoming Roman Catholics.

2, Family background:

Southwell Minister… the nave (Photograph © David Iliff)

One of the failings and shortcomings of popular approaches to genealogy in the past has been a concentration on primogeniture, tracing ancestry back through a direct male line.

When it came to compiling their genealogy for the peerages, the Southwell or Sewell developed a family tree that fits neatly into the genres of the time. Although the family had middle-class merchant and political origins in Essex, the family tried to claim its origins could be traced to Southwell, now a cathedral town in Nottinghamshire.

The town is known for its cathedral, as the place where the Bramley apple was first seeded, and as the place where Lord Byron spent his holidays with his mother while he was at Harrow and Cambridge.

It is about 25 km north-east of Nottingham, but there is no more evidence to suggest that this particular Southwell is the ancestral home of this Southwell family than it is the ancestral home of Robin Hood or Maid Marion.

To boost their genealogical egos, the Southwell family also threw in an heroic mediaeval ancestor who owned a castle in Bordeaux, who rescued the king’s cousin, and later genealogists added embellishments that are found in similar family trees in the Tudor era for families that felt a need to enhance their lineage and find antique origins.

There is no verifiable, impartial evidence to connect the family that was spread throughout East Anglia in the reign of Henry VI with the small town in Nottinghamshire, and even when the claims are pushed, there are so many gaps between generations in the peerages of the 18th and 19th centuries, that they are impossible to verify or trust.

The earliest known ancestor of the family may be John South Southwell of Felix Hall, Essex, MP for Lewes in 1450, although even here I am uncertain about the direct line of ancestry and descent.

Saint Robert Southwell … Jesuit poet and Elizabethan martyr

We can be sure that this family profited considerably from the dissolution of the monasteries during the reign of Henry VIII, buying large estates and becoming minor gentry. It is ironic, then, that one of the better-known members of this family is Saint Robert Southwell (1561-1595), the poet and Jesuit martyr who was hung, drawn and quartered on Tyburn Hill at the age of 33.

But even here, the peerages are confused. The Southwells of Rathkeale claimed that this Robert Southwell was a brother of Edmund Southwell who first came to live at Castle Mattress in the early 17th century. But there are conflicting genealogies, and they distract us from the how rooted Thomas Southwell was in this area and in this region.

If we pursue genealogy only through lines of male primogeniture we often end up with myths and fables, and lose context and relevance.

Castle Matrix was built as a fortress during the early 1400s by FitzGerald, 7th Earl of Desmond. In the early 1600s the castle was granted to the Southwell family who converted it to a manor house.

But this alone does not account for how deeply rooted Thomas Southwell was in this part of Ireland. His father, Richard Southwell, MP for Askeaton (1661-1666), died in 1680 during the lifetime of his own father and while Thomas was in his teens; and his grandfather, Sir Thomas Southwell, a former Cromwellian who became a baronet after the restoration, died a year later in 1681.

Murrough ‘the Burner’ O'Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin and grandfather of Thomas Southwell

Young Thomas was still in his teens when he inherited his grandfather’s title of baronet and became Sir Thomas Southwell. He was made a ward of his cousin, Sir Robert Southwell, and was sent to Christ Church Oxford at the end of that year.

But the key family member and single most influential figure in in his life may have been his mother, Lady Elizabeth O’Brien, a daughter of Murrough O'Brien, 1st Earl of Inchiquin, one of the enigmatic figures in 17th century Irish history.

Thomas Southwell’s maternal grandfather, Murrough MacDermod O’Brien (1614-1674), 6th Baron Inchiquin and 1st Earl of Inchiquin, is known as Murchadh na dTóiteán, or ‘Murrough the Burner’, after his troops burned the cathedral on the Rock of Cashel. His family owned vast estates throughout Co Limerick and Co Clare.

During the Irish Civil Wars in the 1640s, he was loyal to Charles I and fought against the Irish Confederates. He became President of Munster, and gradually became the political and military master of the south of Ireland, and declared for Charles I in 1648.

Following the execution of Charles I in 1649 and Cromwell’s subsequent arrival in Ireland, Murrough retreated to the west of the Shannon and then left Ireland for France in 1650, where he became one of close advisers of the exiled and future Charles II, who in 1654 made him Earl of Inchiquin. In 1656, he became a Roman Catholic. His sudden conversion caused an irreconcilable split with his devoutly Protestant wife, Elizabeth St Leger, and alienated him from the Duke of Ormond and his friends at court.

He was taken prisoner by North African pirates in 1660, but he was ransomed, and returned to this part of Ireland, where his estates totalled 60,000 acres (240 sq km), including 39,961 acres in Clare, 1,138 in Limerick, 312 in Tipperary, and 15,565 in Cork. He lived quietly after 1663 and when he died on 9 September 1674 he was buried in Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick. His grandson Thomas Southwell was then a nine-year-old.

As a young woman in the exiled Caroline court in Paris, Lady Elizabeth O’Brien seems to have witnessed the persecution of Huguenots. Although her father had become a Roman Catholic, her mother remained an Anglican, and the future Lady Elizabeth Southwell could not have been but sensitive religious divisions, diversity and persecution.

When she was widowed, Lady Elizabeth married John McNamara, and lived at Cratloe, Co Clare. She died in September 1688.

This is social diversity and domestic ecumenism on a scale that shaped the young Thomas Southwell, grandson of ‘Murrough the Burner’ and stepson of John McNamara of Cratloe, near Limerick.

3, The life and career of Thomas Southwell:

Christ Church Oxford … Thomas Southwell was sent there at the age of 16, but there is no record of any degree (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Sir Thomas Southwell had succeeded his paternal grandfather as Sir Thomas Southwell, 2nd Baronet, in 1681, at the age of 16. He was made a ward of his cousin, Sir Robert Southwell, and was sent to Christ Church Oxford at the end of 1681.

Buy there is no evidence that he ever graduated or took a degree, and he probably returned to Ireland shortly after. He was 23 when his mother died in 1688. Following the Williamite revolution that year, he raised 100 horse in support of William III, William of Orange.

During the war in Ireland between the rival supporters of James II and William III, Thomas fought on the side of William, but he was forced to surrender to a Jacobite force at Loughrea, Co Galway, in March 1689.

He was sentenced to death for high treason, imprisoned in Galway, and attainted by the Jacobite Parliament. However, he was pardoned by James II in April 1690, and was allowed to sail for Scotland. Remember that this was still before the Battle of the Boyne, and Thomas was only 24 or 25.

As a political prisoner, he seems to have provided financial support for his fellow prisoners. After the wars were over, he was awarded £500 in compensation. Three years later, he was appointed to a commission inspecting crown lands in April 1663, and his political career began in earnest when he was elected MP for Co Limerick in 1695.

But, despite this run of events, Thomas was no Whig at this stage in his political carfeer, contrary to what may have been the expectations of many. As an MP, he was identified with the Tory interest, and was a key figure in defeating the attempted impeachment of the Tory Lord Chancellor, Sir Charles Porter.

Thomas Coningsby, 1st Earl Coningsby and Vice-Treasurer of Ireland, and father-in-law of Thomas Southwell

In April 1696, he married Lady Meliora Coningsby (1675-1735), eldest daughter of Thomas Coningsby, 1st Earl Coningsby and Vice-Treasurer of Ireland. But, while he tried to gain public office by using his family connections through his father-in-law, and through his cousin, Robert Southwell, who was Secretary of State for Ireland, Thomas found his Tory sympathies made him suspect and worked against him.

Eventually, when he was appointed, Thomas was an active and conscientious revenue commissioner, challenging corruption and idleness among politicians of the day.

He was re-elected an MP for Limerick in 1703, and actively resisted efforts by more powerful politicians to extend Whig interests in Co Limerick. But in 1707, he deserted the interests of the former Tory Lord Chancellor of Ireland, Sir Richard Cox, and switched his allegiance to the Whigs.

But his greatest achievement and contribution to political, social and economic life was his instrumental role in bringing French-speaking and German-speaking Protestant refugees, Huguenots and Palatines, to settle in Ireland.

This role is linked to his part in promoting the linen industry in Ireland. The Irish Parliament appointed him a trustee for the linen industry, and he assisted the French Huguenot Louis Crommelin, to establish the linen industry in Lisburn, Co Antrim.

Southwell championed the Palatines, secured government support for the settlement venture and took care of many of their initial needs at considerable personal expense, being reimbursed only just before his death.

In 1711, only 10 of the original Palatine families who had arrived in 1709 remained on his estate. But by 1714 he had settled about 130 new families on his lands, and to this day the neighbourhood around his demesne in the Rathkeale are has the largest concentration of the descendants of Palatines who moved to Ireland.

Southwell remained a Whig after the Hanoverian succession in 1714, and was re-elected an MP for Co Limerick in 1715.

In 1716, Southwell presented a petition to the Lord Lieutenant requesting the reimbursement of what it cost him to start the colony:

The Humble Petition of Sir Thomas Southwell humbly showeth:

That the said Sir Thomas Southwell, having set down 130 German Protestant families on his estate in County Limerick in or about Michaelmas 1712, and for their encouragement to settle and be a security to the Protestant interest in the country, he (the said Sir Thomas Southwell) set them his lands at almost one half of what it was worth, and gave them timber also to build their houses to a very great value; and for their further encouragement did from time to time supply them with cash and other necessities.

That all these families are since well settled and follow the raising of Hemp and Flax and have a good stock which the said Sir Thomas Southwell (though very unwillingly) must seize upon to reimburse him for his great expense, unless His Majesty will be graciously please to repay Sir Thomas.

On 4 September 1717, 300 years ago, he was made an Irish peer with the title as Baron Southwell, of Castle Mattress, in the County of Limerick.

Southwell died at Dublin on 4 August 1720 and was buried here in Rathkeale, probably in a crypt under the present church.

4, The descendants of Thomas Southwell:

Thomas Southwell and his descendants, Part 1 (Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Thomas Southwell and his wife Lady Meliora Coningsby had six sons and five daughters, of whom five sons and two daughters survived. His six sons were:

1, Thomas Southwell (1698-1766), his eldest surviving son, succeeded to his titles and estate.

2, Henry Southwell (died 1758), his second surviving son, lived at Stoneville, near Rathkeale. He too was an MP (1729-1758), and his wife Dulcinea Royse was the daughter of the Revd Henry Royse of Nantenan.

3, Robert Southwell, his third surviving son, was killed in a duel on 30 May 1724.

4, Edmund Southwell, his fourth surviving son, married Agnes Anne Studdert, daughter of the Revd George Studdert.

5, The Revd Richard Southwell, the fifth surviving son, was the Rector of Dungourney, Co Cork.

6, William Southwell.

The eldest son, Thomas Southwell (1698-1766), 2nd Baron Southwell of Castle Mattress, was MP for Leitrim (1717-1720) until he succeeded his father as the 2nd Lord Southwell of in 1720. He was Governor of Limerick around 1762.

This Thomas Southwell married Mary Coke, and their children included:

1, Meloria Southwell.

2, Thomas George Southwell (1721-1780), 1st Viscount Southwell of Castle Mattress.

He died in London, and he was succeeded in his titles and estates by his only surviving son.

Thomas Southwell and his descendants, Part 2 (Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Thomas George Southwell (1721-1780), 1st Viscount Southwell of Castle Mattress, 3rd Baron Southwell, and 4th baronet, was born on 4 May 1721 and was educated at Christ Church, Oxford, and Lincoln’s Inn, London. He MP for Enniscorthy, Co Wexford (1747-1761), MP for Co Limerick (1761-1766), High Sheriff of Limerick (1759), Constable of Limerick Castle (1750-1780) and Governor of Co Limerick (1762-1780). He succeeded as the 3rd Baron Southwell in 1766, and was given the additional title of Viscount Southwell of Castle Mattress, Co Limerick.

It may have been to mark this occasion that he presented a pair of Communion vessels, a silver chalice and paten, to Holy Trinity Church, the Church of Ireland parish church in Rathkeale in 1769. He died on 29 August 1780 at age of 59.

The Southwell paten and chalice in Holy Trinity Church, Rathkeale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

This Thomas George Southwell married Margaret Hamilton of Castle Hamilton, near Killeshandra, Co Cavan, on 18 June 1741. Their children included two sons and a daughter:

1, Thomas Arthur Southwell (1742-1796), 2nd Viscount Southwell.

2, Lieut-Col Robert Henry Southwell (1745-1817).

3, Meliora Southwell, who married John Brown, of Danesfort and Mount Brown, Rathkeale, a son of the Ven John Brown, Archdeacon and Chancellor of Limerick. Their second son, John Brown, was ancestor of the Southwell Brown family, who effectively took over the administration of the Southwell family estates and interests in the Rathkeale area.

The eldest son, Thomas Arthur Southwell (1742-1796), 2nd Viscount Southwell, was MP for Co Limerick (1767-1768). In 1774, he married Sophia Maria Josepha Walsh (1757-1796), third daughter of François-Jacques Walsh (1704-1782), Comte de Serrant, one of the Irish ‘Wild Geese’ in France, descended from an old Catholic family of Jacobite exiles, originally from Co Kilkenny, who had fled Ireland after the Siege of Limerick in 1690.

Gormanston Castle, Co Meath … the Hon Mary Southwell married Jenico Preston, 12th Viscount Gormanston (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Thomas and Sophia were the parents of four sons and four daughters. The family title and estates passed to their eldest son, Thomas Anthony Southwell (1777-1860), who became 3rd Viscount Southwell in 1796. He married Jane, daughter of John Berkeley of Spetchley, and they became Roman Catholics. His sisters also married members if two prominent Catholic families in Co Meath: Mary married Jenico Preston, 12th Viscount Gormanston, and Paulina married Richard O’Ferrall-Cadel.

They were joint owners of vast estates in England that came to almost 3,000 acres, but Lord Southwell only visited his English estates on a few occasions, and then to shoot pheasants. He spent the rest of the time in Ireland, London and the south of France.

They had two sons and three daughters, but neither of their sons survived to succeed to his titles or the estates.

And so, to continue the family line of succession, we turn to his younger brother, Colonel Arthur Francis Southwell (1789-1849). He too married into a prominent Catholic family when he married Mary Anne Agnes Dillon, daughter of Thomas Dillon of Mount Dillon, in Paris in 1834.

He died in 1849, before his elder brother. His children, who were later given the style and titles of a peer’s children, were:

1, Marcella Maria Agnes Southwell (1835-1901), who never married.

2, Thomas Arthur Joseph Southwell (1836-1878), who succeeded his uncle as 4th Viscount Southwell.

3, Jane Mary Matilda Southwell (1838-1910), married John David Fitzgerald, Attorney-General of Ireland.

4, Charles Francis Xavier Southwell (1839-1875), who never married.

5, Mary Paulina Anne Southwell (1842-1891), married Field-Marshal Sir Henry Evelyn Wood.

6, Margaret Mary Southwell (1844-1916), married Charles Standish Barry.

By the early 1800s, Castle Matrix, the home of Sir Thomas Southwell, was being used to manufacture linen and a flour mill was added.

Samuel Lewis notes in 1837 that that the flour mill at Castle Matrix ‘has been fitted up by the proprietor J. Southwell Brown esq in the most complete manner’ and that the Elizabethan square castle was being repaired. John Southwell Brown held Castle Matrix from Lord Southwell. In the mid-19th century, the buildings including the flour mills were valued at £90.

Thomas Arthur Joseph Southwell (1836-1878) became 4th Viscount Southwell in 1860 on the death of his uncle Thomas Southwell, 3rd Viscount Southwell. He was Lord Lieutenant of Co Leitrim in 1872-1878.

This Lord Southwell married Charlotte Mary Barbara Mostyn, daughter of Sir Pyers Mostyn, a member of a leading Roman Catholic family in North Wales. In the 1870s, Lord Southwell was the owner of 4,032 acres in Co Limerick, 2,252 acres in Co Cork, 329 acres in Co Kerry, 1,147 acres in Co Donegal and 4,017 acres in Co Leitrim in the 1870s.

By the 1930s, the castle was abandoned and became a ruin, with wild plants and trees growing within the old stone walls.

Today, the castle and lands in Rathkeale have long passed from the family, but the titles are held by Pyers Anthony Joseph Southwell, 7th Viscount Southwell (born 1930), who succeeded his uncle in 1960. The heir apparent is his son, the Hon Richard Andrew Pyers Southwell (born 1956).

5, Some conclusions:

Holy Trinity Church, the Church of Ireland parish church in Rathkeale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

The conversion of the Southwell family to the Roman Catholic Church may have caused a stir here and there at the time, but it was eased socially by a number of strategic marriages in the family over the space of a few short generations.

It is interesting because it came in stages, with a number of family marriages indicating the Catholic sympathies of the family long before formal conversion. And these family connections, generation after generation were far more influential than the Oxford Movement and the Tractarians, who had influenced the decisions of many of their social class in this part of Co Limerick.

This shift in Church identity may help to explain why earlier I wanted to emphasise the direct link with and possible lasting influence of Thomas Southwell’s grandfather, Murrough ‘the Burner’ O’Brien, Lord Inchiquin, who had been an ardent Anglican but became a Roman Catholic while he was in exile in Paris with the Caroline court in the 1650s.

That relationship, and that change in Church identity or membership also show how the Southwells were embedded in society in this part of Ireland. Despite their ancestry in the male line from English minor gentry, they were part and parcel of the nexus of old Irish chiefdom families in this area, through their immediate descent from the O’Briens and their kinship with families such as the McNamaras of Cratloe.

In their entries in Burke’s Peerage and similar genealogical tomes, they were now seeking to construct, in a very awkward and ham-fisted way, not just a more ancient lineage that found its origins in rural Nottinghamshire rather than Essex and East Anglia, but also trying to recover a kinship with the young Elizabethan Jesuit poet and martyr Robert Southwell.

Long-tailed Catholic credentials had become more important than rustic English roots in a new elitist understanding of lineage and aristocracy.

Nor can these Catholic conversions be dismissed as being merely superficial or socially convenient at a time of social change and upheaval in Ireland. Their Catholic identity has been passed on to successive generations, so that to this day male members of the family sent to Catholic public schools in England such as Ampleforth.

Nor did these conversions incur any loss of social status for a family like this – indeed, quite the opposite. The family was embedded in the Irish Catholic aristocracy, through marriage, for example with the Prestons of Gormanston Castle in Co Meath. It was an experience that they shared with many in their social group in Co Limerick society – consider, for example, Edward Wyndham-Quin 3rd Earl of Dunraven, the de Vere family of Curraghchase, and William Monsell, 1st Lord Emly.

Nor did they lose their political standing and credibility. They continued to be appointed to positions with prestige, such Lord Lieutenant of Co Leitrim, to be admitted to ranks of the Knights of Saint Patrick, the equivalent of the Knights of the Garter, and their name was invoked by Cardinal Manning as he lobbied the government in Westminster for more Catholic peers in the House of Lords.

The Southwell memorial in Holy Trinity Church, Rathkeale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

There were consequences for this parish, needless to say. There are few Southwell family graves in Rathkeale parish. Only one Southwell monument is in the church, and this was moved from the old church to the new church.

There may have been a Southwell vault, but the church was rebuilt in 1831, and we would probably need to bring a post-graduate archaeology student to work on the church floor to see how many of the Southwells are buried there.

The church looks quite a poor church when you consider that this was once the largest commercial town in West Limerick and when you compare it with other, better-built Church of Ireland parish churches on the estates of landed aristocrats.

Instead, the Southwells put their interests and their capital into helping to pay for a new Roman Catholic Church in Rathkeale. This was a time when the de Vere and Spring-Rice family brought in JJ McCarthy to build a new Gothic revival church in Foynes, when the family of William Smith O’Brien brought the same architect in to remodel Cahermoyle House, and when the Earls of Dunraven were remodelling the parish churches in Adare.

Had the Southwell family remained Anglicans, they might have rebuilt Holy Trinity Church as a proud Gothic revival church in the 1860s that followed the pattern of other ‘estate churches.’

Saint Mary’s Roman Catholic Church, Rathkeale … designed by JJ McCarthy (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Yes, they did build such an ‘estate church’ – but it is Saint Mary’s Roman Catholic Church, built by JJ McCarthy, the most prestigious architect of the Gothic Revival in the Victorian era, who claimed the mantle of AWN Pugin. And they built it proudly, on the hill that makes it the single most noticeable landmark as one arrives into Rathkeale from Limerick.

The Southwell name heads the last of donors found in the porch of Saint Mary’s Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

The decoration and the windows in the apse or east end are nothing less than a retelling of the genealogy of the Southwell in paintings and stained glass, in hagiography and heraldry.

Saints in the reredos in Saint Mary’s Church, Rathkeale (Photographs: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

The saints that are painted in the reredos represent names in the family. Although Robert Southwell would not be canonised until 1970, another Saint Robert was found to take his place, upholding the church in his arms.

The coat of arms of Thomas Arthur Southwell, 4th Viscount Southwell, in the centre of the three-light window above the High Altar in Saint Mary’s Church, Rathkeale (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Thomas Arthur, 4th Viscount Southwell, married Charlotte Mary Barbara Mostyn (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

The Mostyn family were leading Roman Catholics with large estates across North Wales and elsewhere, including commercial, residential and agricultural holdings in Llandudno. Long after these windows were completed, her younger brother, Francis Edward Joseph Mostyn (1860-1939), became the Roman Catholic Bishop of Menevia (1898-1921) in Wales and Archbishop of Cardiff (1921-1939).

Marcella Maria Agnes Southwell was not married (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Marcella Mary Agnes Southwell was born in Paris while her parents were living there. Her individual coat-of-arms is shown in a diamond shape to indicate she never married.

Jane Mary Matilda married John David Fitzgerald, MP for Ennis and Attorney General for Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

John David Fitzgerald (1818-1889), Baron Fitzgerald, was MP for Ennis (1852-1860), Solicitor General, Attorney General for Ireland and a law lord. Jane Mary Matilda Southwell was his second wife. He was the presiding judge at the trial in Dublin in 1880-1881 of Charles Stewart Parnell and 21 other prominent members of the Land League.

Mary Paulina married Sir Evelyn Wood (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Field Marshal Sir Henry Evelyn Wood (1838-1919) was a distinguished army figure, and a recipient of the Victoria Cross (VC). The Southwell family opposed this marriage in 1867 when Wood refused to leave the Church of England and become a Roman Catholic. There may have been further family embarrassment later, for Wood’s sister Katherine is better known as Kitty O’Shea, the lover of Charles Stewart Parnell.

Nevertheless, his coat-of-arms are up there in the chancel of Saint Mary’s Church, alongside the other Southwell sisters, with Mary Paulina and her other sisters.

Margaret Mary married Charles Standish Barry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2017)

Margaret married Charles Standish Barry, a wealthy Co Cork landowner, whose uncle, Garrett Standish Barry, was the first Catholic to be elected a Member of the Parliament after the 1829 Emancipation Act.

Instead of the Church of Ireland parish church in Rathkeale being supported by a rich local landlord living in a castle, Holy Trinity Church was mainly paid for and supported by the descendants of the original Palatines brought to live here by the Southwell, the ordinary parishioners who continue to give their support and to give life to the church, to the school and to this parish

This lecture was prepared for Irish Palatine Association weekend conference in Rathkeale on 26 August 2017. The conference was organised in affiliation with Heritage week. The conference programme included the following biographical note:

(Revd Canon Professor) Patrick Comerford is priest-in-charge, the Rathkeale and Kilnaughtin Group of Parishes and Canon Precentor of Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick. He is a former Adjunct Assistant Professor at Trinity College Dublin, and has lectured on Church History in the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. He worked as a journalist for over 30 years and is a former Foreign Desk Editor of The Irish Times. He has studied at TCD, Maynooth and in Cambridge and has contributed to many books and journals.

A day in Nottingham without meeting Robin Hood and his merry band

Robin Hood and his merry band … forever associated with Nottingham

Patrick Comerford

What does Nottingham mean to you?

What images does the name conjure up for you?

In my childhood, I probably associated Nottingham with Robin Hood, a capricious Sheriff, and that roly-poly merry band in Sherwood Forest, including Friar Tuck, Maid Marian, Little John and Will Scarlett.

At a later stage in my childhood, I probably associated it with its two football clubs, Nottingham Forest and Notts County, or perhaps thought of it as the home of the Raleigh and Triumph bicycles, which seemed to be the only makes of bicycle any of us had as boys.

Still later, as my interests turned to cricket Nottingham was associated inseparably with Trent Bridge and test matches – and still is.

As an adult, I came to realise too that Nottingham was the home of DH Lawrence, author of Lady Chatterley’s Lover and Women in Love, and the poet Lord Byron lived nearby at Mucknell Abbey.

But, while I have passed through Nottingham occasionally on my way between the Midlands and the North, and while I once supervised a thesis for an MA at Nottingham University, I have been visiting Nottingham for the first time today.

I caught an early morning train from Lichfield Trent Valley, changed at Tamworth, and travelled through Burton-on-Trent and Derby before arriving at Nottingham before 9 a.m., for a day’s visit to Saint John’s College, meeting colleagues teaching in similar fields.

In the gardens at Saint John’s College, Nottingham, today (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)

Nottingham is a city without an Anglican cathedral – it is part of the diocese of Southwell, and Southwell Minster is 23 km north-east of Nottingham. On the other hand, the Roman Catholic Cathedral of Saint Barnabas (1844), which I passed on the way from the train station to Bramcote, is a major work in the Gothic revival style by AWN Pugin.

Nottingham has the dubious distinction of being twinned with Harare, the capital of Mugabe’s Zimbabwe.

Nottingham is also a new city – it received its charter as a city as recently as 1897.

Yet Nottingham is the home of well-known brand names such as Boots the chemists.

And Nottingham has not one but two universities – the University of Nottingham and Nottingham Trent University.

Apart from glimpsing Pugin’s cathedral this morning, this full and busy day at Saint John’s meant there was no opportunity to see three sights I must see in Nottingham in the future: Trent Bridge Stadium, Nottingham Castle, and Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem.

‘The Trip,’ as it is known locally, is partially built into a cave system beneath Nottingham Castle, and is one of the claimants to the title of “England’s Oldest Pub,” supposedly dating from 1189. However, this claim is challenged by The Bell Inn on the Old Market Square, and Ye Olde Salutation Inn on Maid Marian Way.

The Trip claims to date from 1189. According to local legend – probably of recent creation – it takes its name from crusades, when local knights who followed Richard the Lionheart to the Holy Land, stopped off here for a drink before beginning their journey to Jerusalem.

The legend, as it is spun in Nottingham, becomes linked with the legends about Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham. But there was no time to explore these further before catching the train this evening back through Derby, Burton-on-Trent and Birmingham to Lichfield.

In the chapel at Saint John’s College, Nottingham, today (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2013)