Inspired by Saint Dymphna: John Meagh, S.J.

On May 31, 1639, Irish Jesuit John Meagh was murdered at Kuttenburg (Kutná Hora), near Prague. This Cork native had left for exile in Europe only to encounter the strife unleashed by the Reformation in a place far from home. The case of Father Meagh provides us with a rare opportunity to read an account of an Irish martyr by John, Canon O'Hanlon (1821-1905), author of the Lives of the Irish Saints whose work provided the original inspiration behind my blog Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae. He researched those medieval Irish saints who were active in Europe but did not explore the cases of the later Irish martyrs. It appears to be the part played by Saint Dymphna in the story of this particular martyr which made him the exception. Father John Meagh's devotion to Saint Dymphna is recorded by Jesuit historian Matthew Tanner (1630-1692) in his 1675 work Societas militans on which O'Hanlon based his own account below:

Article IX.—The Blessed John Meagh, S.J., Martyr, near Prague, Bohemia. *

[Seventeenth Century].

A peculiarly religious interest connected with the Life of a holy servant of Christ, and as serving to illustrate the devotion of an Irish martyr towards St. Dympna, Virgin and Martyr, deserves to be recorded. His career closed, also, with the victorious laurel of martyrdom.

John Meagh, a native of Cork, in Ireland, having voluntarily exiled himself from a country, then suffering from dire calamities, travelled through France, Spain and Italy. While this pious man lived at Naples, he happened to meet a book, which contained an account of the lives and acts of various saints. Touched with a sudden inspiration, he besought the Almighty to guide him, whilst casually opening this book, to the life of some saint, whose example might become the model by which his own future course should be guided. On opening the leaves, he first met with the Life of St. Dympna, the Martyr. Thinking, however, that the biography of this youthful virgin was somewhat inapplicable to the purpose had in view, he was about to try again, if a more suitable subject for reading should be presented. Yet, on considering for a moment, the pious man resolved—still with some degree of reluctance—on studying the lessons to be derived from a perusal of St. Dympna's acts. While passing over the pages, his interest in the subject gradually increased; especially when he found, that this noble virgin, when persecuted by the dreaded and unnatural solicitations of her father, fled as an exile from her friends and country, to avoid idolatry, and as a consequence of her heroic resolutions, she obtained the crown of martyrdom, in reward for her virtues of faith and holy purity. The following train of reflections then took possession of his mind: "How, if God should desire me, flying from the heresy now introduced into Ireland, to resolve on a farther flight from sinful occasions, by embracing a religious state? And, afterwards, when I am ordered to return, might I not obtain a share in St. Dympna's crown of martyrdom?"

We are next informed, that this good Irishman was induced to join the Society of Jesus, in which he was advanced to the sacred order of priesthood. While preparing himself for a return to Ireland, being destined by the Superior-General to labour on that mission, he was sent to Bohemia. In the year 1639, the Jesuit College of Guttenberg, near Prague, having been destroyed by the Swedes, Father John Meagh was obliged with his companions to fly elsewhere for safety, on the 31st of May. They had hardly proceeded one mile from this place, however, when they were suddenly attacked by some Protestant peasants, who issued from a wood. All the fugitives escaped, excepting Meagh, who, while reciting the Litany of Loretto with another companion, fell, having been pierced through the breast with a leaden bullet. At the same time, two Jesuit lay brothers shared this crown of martyrdom, which their Reverend Father had expected to meet in Ireland. They carried many sacred relics with them at the time, intending to remove these precious treasures to a place of greater security. Thus, in another respect, also, the devoted priest resembled his patroness, St, Dympna, who shed her blood for the faith, in a country far distant from the land of her nativity.

[*This narrative taken from a work written by the Jesuit Father Matthias Tanner, entituled : "Societas Jesu usque ad sanguinis et vitae profusionem militans in Europa, Africa, et America, contra Gentiles, Mahometanos, Judaeos, Haereticos, Impios, pro Deo, Fide, Ecclesia, Pietate."—Prague, A.D. 1675.]

Rev. John O'Hanlon, Lives of the Irish Saints, Volume V, ( Dublin, 1875), 622-623.

Father Meagh was one of the martyrs included by Irish Jesuit Denis Murphy, in his 1896 catalogue Our Martyrs.  He drew on the 1657 work the Mortes Illustres by another Jesuit historian, Philip Alegambe (1592-1652).  Alegambe confirms that Saint Dymphna was instrumental in encouraging the vocation of John Meagh even though initially he 'thought the history of a woman unsuited to him for imitation'. He brings in another, decidedly masculine, intercessor in the person of the founder of the Society of Jesus, Saint Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556). Saint Ignatius suffered a severe leg injury in battle on May 20, 1521 and it was during his recovery that he reassessed his life's direction. Father Meagh also suffered a leg injury en route to Rome and this enabled his own decision to enter the Order, having earlier been inspired by the example of Saint Ignatius whilst in prison. It is noteworthy too that Father Alegambe's account concludes by laying out two reasons why Father Meagh and his companions were martyrs, killed out of hatred of the faith. This reminds us that martyrdom is judged according to the principle 'causa non poena' - the reason for the suffering, not the suffering itself. Had these Jesuits simply been the target of robbers or fallen while defending themselves they would certainly be tragic victims of violence but could not be said to have been killed in odium fidei. Thus Alegambe argues that they were singled out for attack because they were Jesuits, the Order's very name inspiring hatred amongst their Protestant assailants:

1639. John Meagh, S.J.

(From Alegambe's Mortes Illustres, p.538)

John Meagh was a native of Cork, in the province of Munster. To remove him from the persecution of the heretics, he was taken by his father first to France, and then to Naples. After his father's death, he entered the service of the Duke of Ossuna, the Viceroy. But disliking the frivolous amusements of the Court, he began to think of leaving it; and he would have done so if the Viceroy had not been recalled just then to Spain. In this way John found the means of going there, and asking for some favours from the King. He was received in so kindly a way that he obtained very soon an annual pension; with this he returned to Naples. 

But mark by what wonderful ways God draws men to Him. They young man prayed to God to make known to him, when he opened a book, the manner of life which he should enter on. He opened it, and found there the Life of St. Dympna, a maiden of royal birth, who fled from Ireland to avoid her father's fury, and was afterwards slain by him. John thought the history of a woman unsuited to him for imitation, and was thinking of looking for some other; but in the mean time he went on reading it; again and again he deliberated about turning over the leaves, and searching for another , and yet he hesitated to turn them. 'What if God wishes me to leave the world' said he, 'and to flee from all occasions of sin, as that royal maiden did when she left her native country'. Wherefore, he determined to  enter the religious state without further delay; and whilst he was yet hesitating somewhat, he was wrongfully accused of a grievous crime, and taken into custody. Seeing in the prison a statue of St. Ignatius, he consoled himself with the thought that he, too, was thrown into prison though free from all guilt. Wherefore, he placed himself under this Saint's protection, and asked his aid. Soon after he was released.

This occurred during the year of the Jubilee. Through devotion he set off for Rome. On the way his leg was hurt somehow, and he was hospitably entertained by our Fathers, and nursed until he recovered. Full of gratitude for their kindness, and remembering that St. Ignatius too had broken his leg, he determined to enter the Society. He was ordained a priest, and sent back to Naples with letters from the General to the Provincial. There he entered the noviciate, and having gone through it in a blameless manner, he was sent to Bohemia for a short time, in order to acquire some experience before he returned to Ireland to be employed in the saving of souls. His zeal and earnestness were specially remarked, his great piety while offering the sacrifice of the Mass, which was often witnessed by those who assisted thereat, and his great eagerness to divert the conversation to divine things. He was about to depart for Ireland, and he had prepared himself for the journey by making the spiritual exercises.  Indeed, he had a sort of presentiment, that he should be called on to offer up his life for the faith.

John Pauer, who after the death of Gustavus Adolphus commanded the Swedish army that harassed Germany so long, made an incursion into Bohemia in 1639 and laid siege to Prague, its capital city. The Fathers who were then in the College of Catternberg, terrified at the approach of such a powerful enemy, looked for some safe place where they might take refuge. The College of Neuhaus seemed better suited to their wants than any other place. Several were told to go there by different roads; these were beset with robbers, whom the hardship of the times or the hope of booty induced to arm themselves, to the ruin of travellers. Moreover, many of the people were still infected with wicked doctrine, and though it had been preached against some years before throughout the whole of Bohemia, yet the consequences of that evil teaching remained deeply fixed in the minds of many, and induced these rude men to assail those who strove to root out such principles by their preaching. Many of these were robbed and forced to fly. Three of them were slain, namely, John Meagh, Martin Ignatius and Wenceslaus Trnoska. There are two reason for asserting that they were put to death through hatred of the Catholic faith. One is the hatred which the heretics have for the very name of Jesuit, because they find them to be among the most active and zealous defenders and teachers of the faith. The second is, that they did no harm whatever to the other persons who were travelling with ours, nay, even thy bade them put away all fear and take courage; this is a certain fact. John received one wound in the breast from a small leaden bullet. Martin was wounded in the breast, and received a deadly blow on the head from an axe. Wenceslaus was shot through the temples. The place where they were murdered is one mile from Guttenberg, on the road to Neuhaus. The date was May 31st, 1639. Their bodies were taken away by the nobleman Bernard De Gerschoff, and buried in the Church of the Holy Trinity, in the village of Litz. On June 3rd following they were transferred to the church of St Barbara, at the Rector's request. F. John Meagh was put to death in his 39th year, thirteen of which he had passed in the Society of Jesus.

Rev. Denis Murphy, S.J., Our Martyrs,  (Dublin, 1896), pp. 268-271.

Although Father Murphy, the then Postulator,  devoted over three pages of his book to the case of Father John Meagh, his name does not appear on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918).  It is of course customary for the cause of a martyr to come under the jurisdiction of the Bishop in whose diocese the martyrdom took place. I have been unable to find out, however, if the cause of John Meagh S.J. and his companions has ever been promoted by the relevant authorities in the Czech Republic or where it currently stands.

Phelim O'Hara and Henry Delahoyde: Two Martyred Franciscans of Moyne

The names of two Franciscans, Phelim O'Hara and Henry Delahoyde (Delahayde, O'Lahaye), of Moyne, County Mayo have been linked in some of the sources as having suffered martyrdom together in the year 1578. In his 1905 book on Irish monasteries, Carmelite historian, Father James Rushe, gives a brief summary of Moyne Friary's history:

The Franciscan monastery of Moyne, county Mayo, was a superb edifice situated on the river Moy, near its entrance to the Bay of Killala, and affording a grand view of the Atlantic. It was the gift of MacWilliam Burke to St. Francis, at the instance of Father Nehemias O'Donoghoe — the first Vicar-Provincial of the Irish Observantines, renowned as a preacher and for his eminent holiness (A.D. 1460). The beautiful church was consecrated in 1462 by Donatus O'Connor, Bishop of Killala, and placed under the invocation of St. Francis. Soon after this solemn ceremony the founder had the claustral limits marked out by a massive stone wall. Beneath the church was a crypt wherein might be seen the tombs of many noble benefactors, not a few of whom had worn the humble habit of St. Francis during life. The library was very valuable, a great number of precious works having been collected there, this house being a college of the Irish Province for more than a hundred and fifty years: the community rarely comprised less than fifty religious — whether priests, students, or lay-brothers. Here, too, the Provincial Chapters were frequently held. When suppressed by command of Queen Elizabeth, the friary of Moyne became the scene of the martyrdom of several heroic sons of Saint Francis. 

Rev. James P. Rushe, O.D.C., A Second Thebaid: Being a Popular Account of the Ancient Monasteries of Ireland, (Dublin. London and New York, 1905), 201.

The martyrdom of Brother Phelim O'Hara was one of the cases featured by Myles O'Reilly in his 1869 compilation of Irish martyrs. He drew on the account left by Father Donatus Mooney, O.F.M., (c.1577-1624). Father Mooney was a survivor of the assault on Donegal friary in 1601 and became Provincial of the Order in 1615.  He undertook an official visitation to all of the Irish Franciscan foundations and wrote a history of them at Louvain in 1617-1618. He begins by telling us that Brother Phelim was martyred as part of an attack on the Franciscans of  Elphin, but all other sources place him within the community at Moyne:

PHELIM O'HARA, FRANCISCAN.

 

"In the year 1578, the English heretics made an expedition to this convent, (that of Elphin, in the city of the same name,) and when the brethren learned their approach they fled across the sea in a boat which was there. The father provincial minister was there at the time, and when he asked who, for the merit of holy obedience, would remain alone in the monastery, Brother Phelim O'Hara, a lay brother, was chosen out of many who offered themselves, partly because he was prudent and far advanced in years, and partly because it was hoped he would be less obnoxious than the others.* Wherefore he received the benediction and remained. But the English, coming, despoiled the monastery and slew this brother, even before the high altar; nor did they dare to remain there long, but departed the same day. The other brethren who had fled, and who remained out at sea waiting, when they returned home found the brother, who had become a martyr through obedience, before the high altar, where it was believed he was praying when, on the approach of the enemies, he gave up his soul a grateful sacrifice to God. He is buried in the chapter house." 

 

* Father Mooney is our authority for this narrative.

 M. O'Reilly, Memorials of those who Suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, (New York 1869), 54-55.

Father Denis Murphy, S.J. in his 1896 compilation Our Martyrs, used Father Mooney as a source too but also used the 1669 account of Irish Franciscan martyrologist Anthony Bruodin. Bruodin upholds the depiction of Brother Phelim as an aged man who meets his death as a result of monastic obedience. However, he departs from the testimony of Mooney that the high altar at the monastery of Moyne was the scene of the martyrdom and instead records that Brother Phelim was captured 'not far from the convent of Killala, where he was begging for the necessities of life for the brothers.' This seems to imply that he was outside the monastic sanctuary altogether. He also links his martyrdom with that of Brother Henry Delahoyde and provides a date of May 1, 1582 for the event. Furthermore, Bruodin claims that both men were not simply run through by soldiers on the spot but were actually hanged and quartered. It puts a different complexion on their martyrdom but Bruodin ends by citing a family link to John O'Hara, the grand-nephew of Brother Phelim, from whom he claimed to have heard the story of the martyr's life and death:

1578. Phelim O'Hara and Henry Delahayde, O.S.F.

(From Bruodin's Propugnaculum, p.444)

The first was the son of that well-known man, John O'Hara, chief of his very extensive family and owner of large possessions in the County of Sligo in the province of Connaught. Burning with love for the life of poverty such as Christ led, he entered the Order of the Friars Minor in the 21st year of his age, and wished to be considered the lowest among the laybrothers in it. During the many years that he lived in religion, he made such progress in virtue that he was reckoned among the most obedient and humble brothers and those most famed for holiness of life of the whole Province of Ireland; and with good reason, for he observed the rule of St. Francis given to him by God so exactly up to the very moment of his death, that he was never seen to transgress it in the slightest way. Adorned with various virtues and praised by all for them, he fell into the hands of the heretics then raging throughout Connaught, not far from the convent of Killala, where he was begging for the necessities of life for the brothers. These tyrants, through hatred of the faith, first hanged and then quartered him. They did the like to his companion Brother Henry Delahyde, who was born of noble parents in Leinster. These two martyrs suffered for the Catholic religion May 1st, 1582.

Formerly I lived on terms of intimacy with the grand-nephew of the martyr Brother Phelim, that famous soldier John O'Hara, the eldest of his family, who was married to Mathilda O'Higgin, the daughter of noble parents, Thaddeus O'Higgin, lord of Culrehil, and Finola Bruodin, who played a very important part in the last war against the heretical Parliamentarians. I often heard this relative of mine describe at length the religious life and glorious death of this athlete of Christ, Phelim the martyr.

Rev. Denis Murphy, S.J., Our Martyrs,  (Dublin, 1896), pp. 97-98.

Brother Phelim O'Hara and Brother Henry Delahoyde are numbers 55 and 56 on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) whose causes were submitted to Rome for official consideration.  Brother Phelim is also number 14 on the list of Richard Creagh and 41 Companion Martyrs of Ireland whose causes are currently being re-submitted for further consideration. As this will require documentation of the martyr's cause perhaps some of the discrepancies around the details of Brother Phelim O'Hara's martyrdom can be resolved.

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'Worn out by Sufferings and the Squalor of Prison': Father John O'Kelly

 

May 15, 1601 saw the death of a Connaught priest, Father John O'Kelly, in prison in Dublin. As the reign of Queen Elizabeth wore on and particularly following her excommunication by Pope Pius V on February 25, 1570, the enforcement of her religious settlement hardened. As a modern scholar has said:

By declaring Elizabeth excommunicated and deposed, the pope lent legitimacy to Catholic resistance in England and Ireland. Deeming Elizabeth unfit to rule gave the rebellions against her credibility in the eyes of the rest of Catholic Europe and might convince more people on the ground in England and Ireland to join the resistance.

Aislinn Muller, The Excommunication of Elizabeth I:  Faith, Politics, and Resistance in Post-Reformation England, 1570-1603 (Brill, 2020), 2.

I have not been able to establish the details of Father O'Kelly's imprisonment.  Both Myles O'Reilly and Father Denis Murphy in their catalogues of Irish martyrs use the short account of Anthony Bruodin (1625-1680). Below is O'Reilly's translation from Bruodin's 1669 work Propugnaculum Catholicae Veritatis:

REV. JOHN O'KELLY, 

 "A priest of Connaught, of an illustrious race, endured many torments for the Catholic religion, and, worn out by sufferings and the squalor of prison, he yielded his soul to God, in prison, in Dublin, 15th May, 1601." — Bruodin, lib. iii. cap. xx. 

M. O'Reilly, Memorials of those who Suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, (New York 1869), 176.

 Father O'Kelly is number 24 on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) whose causes were submitted to Rome for official consideration. No further progress has been made to date.

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'A most peculiar martyrdom': Daniel O'Nielan, O.F.M.

On March 28, 1580 Franciscan priest Daniel O'Neilan (Donal O'Neylan) was put to death in the town of Youghal by its military governor, Sir William Morgan (d. 1584).  The town was caught up in the Second Desmond Rebellion and had been occupied by the rebel leaders on November 15, 1579. W.H. Grattan Flood, drawing on the Calendar of State Papers, describes what happened next: 

During the Christmas of that year the citizens of Youghal were so terror-stricken that in January they fled, and when the Earl of Ormond entered Youghal on February 1st, 1580, the only inhabitant he found there was a Franciscan friar, Father Daniel Nealan, the martyr.

W.H. Grattan Flood, Notes on Strancally Castle, JCHAS, Vol. 25 (1919), p.112.

Father O'Neilan's execution was noted by a number of martyrologists, all of whom record that his was no ordinary hanging. In 1869 Myles O'Reilly used the work of these writers to describe the friar's 'most peculiar' martyrdom:

REV. DANIEL O'NIELAN 

Was a priest of the diocese of Cloyne, and endured a most peculiar martyrdom, on the 28th March, 1580. He was a most apostolic man, full of attention to the wants of the poor and of solicitude for all his flock. He was no sooner arrested and conducted under a military guard to Youghal, than two wicked men, named Norris and Morgan, undertook the task of his execution. They conducted him to the summit of Trinity Tower, and, having fastened a rope around his waist and arms, precipitated him from the battlements. The rope not being sufficiently strong to resist the shock, the holy man fell, mangled and almost lifeless, to the ground. 

The fury of his executioners, however, was not allayed. Observing that life was not yet extinct, they caused him to be dragged to a mill not far distant, when they tied him to the water-wheel. His lacerated body in a few minutes was wholly disfigured, and scarcely retained the semblance of human remains.

Philadelphus adds that John Norris was commander (what he calls prefect) and William Morgan captain of the troop that arrested him. He says he was an Observantine Franciscan. Dr. Moran, on the authority of Bruodin, calls him a secular priest. Wadding also claims him as a Franciscan.

 M. O'Reilly, Memorials of those who Suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, (New York 1869), 67.

I am unsure why O'Reilly introduced the notion that Father O'Neilan may have been a secular priest as all of the other sources affirm that he was a Franciscan. Indeed, despite O'Reilly's attribution of this idea to the martyrologist Anthony Bruodin (himself a Franciscan), the translation of Bruodin's account by Father Denis Murphy records that our martyr entered the Order of Saint Francis in 1560:

1580. Daniel O'Neilan, O.S.F.
(From Bruodin's Propugnaculum, p. 439)

Daniel O'Neilan, born in Thomond of a noble family, consecrated himself to God by vows in the Order of St. Francis in the year 1560, and he lived in it for twenty years, both in Ireland and Spain. During this time he made great progress both in virtue and in learning, so that he was the model of a good religious to all. Urged by zeal for the salvation of souls, he returned to his native country which was then ravaged by the fury of the heretics. 

Immediately on landing at the post of Youghal, he was seized by William Morgan, the Governor of the town, and closely questioned. Daniel openly and fearlessly declared that he was a priest and a member of the Seraphic order. When the cruel tyrant heard this, without any process of law, he directed that Father Daniel's hands should be tied behind his back, and then ordered him to be scourged and salt and vinegar to be put into the wounds made on the skin by the lash. At last the tyrants seeing Neilan's courage, for he prayed without ceasing for himself and his persecutors, and despairing of changing his purpose, since he refused the honours offered to him if he would join with the heretics, ordered this brave champion of Christ to be hanged from the vane of a wind-mill with his head down, like Peter, the prince of the Apostles, and to be shot at till his whole body was pierced through with balls. By such a martyrdom Daniel earned for himself a glorious crown in heaven. He suffered at Youghal, in Munster, March 28th, 1580.

Rev. Denis Murphy, S.J. , Our Martyrs,  (Dublin, 1896), pp. 111-112. 

An earlier seventeenth-century martyrologist also recorded the details of the Petrine-style execution meted out to Father O'Neilan and the denial of a swift end to the suffering inflicted by those taking aim at him:

5. Daniell Oneilan was apprehended at Youghull by Sr. William Morgan and captaine Peers which then kept garrison in that towne. He was hanged with his legges vpwardes, and his head downewards: and then all the souldiors were comaunded to leuell at him with their bulletts; Comaundement was also giuen that none should leuell at his harte, therby to encrease his paine by his lingering death: he was a priest of the order of S. Frauncis: this hapned the 28. of march 1580.

J. Copinger,  The Theatre of Catholique and Protestant Religion (St Omer, 1620), p. 581

 Daniel O'Neilan is number 45 on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) whose names were submitted to Rome for official consideration. No further progress has been made with his cause but he is number 3 on the list of causes currently being re-submitted for further consideration. There he appears as Donal O'Neylan, professed priest, Franciscan Friars Minor.

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Six Franciscan Martyrs

 

In its entry on Irish Confessors and Martyrs, the 1910 Catholic Encyclopedia mentions a group of six Franciscan martyrs, all of whom died in prison in Dublin in the year 1582 and at least one of whom reputedly died on February 13: 

1582: Roger O'Donnellan, Cahill McGoran, Peter McQuillan, Patrick O'Kenna, James Pillan, priests, and Roger O'Hanlon, lay brother O.S.F. — died, 13 February, Dublin Castle, but the date can scarcely be correct for all.

 Perhaps inevitably there is also some degree of confusion around the names with McQuillan appearing as O'Chillian in some places and the possibility that 'Roger O'Hanlon' should be Rory McHenlea, according to the martyrologist John Copinger.

In 1896 Father Denis Murphy translated an account of the six from another seventeenth-century Irish martyrologist, Franciscan Anthony Bruodin (d.1680), who gives the background to their imprisonment. He attributes their arrest to the fact that they were travelling evangelists in the Counter-Reformation cause:

1582. Roger Donnellan, Charles Goran, Peter O'Chillian, Patrick O'Kenna, James Pillan and Roger O'Hanlon, O.S.F.

(From Bruodin's Propugnaculum, p. 445)

These, the first five of whom were priests and the last a lay brother, belonged to the Order of St. Francis. They were pious and most zealous men, who in spite of every kind of danger used to travel through Connaught and Leinster without ceasing, in order to guide the people on the paths of justice and truth by preaching to them often and earnestly the word of God. Wherefore they were seized by the heretics and thrust into the prison in the Castle of Dublin, where, worn out by the tortures by which their constancy was put to the test, and by the filth and squalor of the place, they died in the year 1582.

Rev. Denis Murphy, S.J. , Our Martyrs,  (Dublin, 1896), pp. 125-126.

Our martyrs also appear among a list of men referred to by John Copinger who confirms that:

'al these were catholique & died in the Castle of Dublin through hard usadg and restrainet. '

 J. Copinger,  The Theatre of Catholique and Protestant Religion (St Omer, 1620), p. 582

The six Franciscan martyrs, are numbers 49, 50, 51, 52, 53 and 54 on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) whose names were submitted to Rome.  There they appear as Charles MacGoran, Rory O'Donnellan, Peter O'Quillan, Patrick O'Kenna, James or John Pillanus [Pillin], Rory O'Hanlon [O'Hanly?, MacEnlea?] No further progress has been made to date with their cause.

 

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Three Franciscan Martyrs of Down: Edmund Fitzsimon, Donough O'Rourke and John O'Loughran

 

On January 21, 1575, according to the seventeenth-century writer Anthony Bruodin (1625-1680), three Franciscans in Saint Patrick's own city of Down were hanged within the confines of their friary, a foundation which dated from the 1230s. The deaths of Friars O' Lochran, Fitzsimon(s) and O'Rourke were recorded by several of their Order's martyrologists.  The following account is based on the work of two of them - Bruodin and the famous Louvain scholar, Waterford man Luke Wadding (1588-1657): 

Rev. John O'Lochran, Edmund Simmons, and Donat O'Rorke, Franciscans.

These fathers were members of the Franciscan convent of Down. A military commissioner, named Britton, and his ravaging band, resolved to fix their winter quarters in that ancient town. Their thirst for religious spoils soon impelled them to the convent. But the sacred vessels had been concealed, and none could be found. The three fathers were their only prey. These they first subjected to a variety of tortures, and then, dragging them to the adjoining garden, strangled them from the branches of a large oak that overshadowed the sanctuary.

M. O'Reilly, Memorials of those who Suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, (New York 1869), pp. 55-56.

Father Denis Murphy based his account on that of another seventeenth-century Irish Franciscan scholar of Louvain, Donegal man Hugh Ward (1593-1635):

 1575. John O'Lochran, Edmund Fitzsimon, and Donogh O'Roarke, O.S.F.

(From Ward's Catalogue.)

In 1570 a certain Englishman named John Britton, or Brereton, accompanied by a body of soldiers, seized Brothers John O'Lochran, Edmund Fitzsimon, and Donogh O'Roarke, priests, in the convent of Down, and after putting them to the torture repeatedly, hanged them near the place commonly called St. John's Well, the spot where the angels appeared to St. Patrick. He hanged two more in the garden of the convent from a tree, though he had received a large sum of money from the townsmen to set them free. It is said that the tree, which formerly bore fruit in abundance, soon became withered, and never sent out a leaf. Bruodin gives January 21st, 1575, as the date of their martyrdom. 

Rev. Denis Murphy, S.J. , Our Martyrs,  (Dublin, 1896), p. 94.

Father Ward has provided a hagiographical flourish to his account by adding the detail of the withered tree. He also states that the executions took place in 1570 rather than 1575, something confirmed in another Louvain manuscript attributed to Ward which mentioned the history of Downpatrick Friary:

....The friars were first expelled from this convent by John Brittan, an English Protestant, who, with a number of wicked followers, invaded the place in the year 1569. The friars were apprised of his approach, and saved themselves by flight, but returned again; and in the following year, 1570, he made an attack on the convent, hanged all the friars he caught, and almost totally destroyed the establishment, with the exception of the church which was kept as a court house for the English judges of Assize.... 

Rev. James O'Laverty, An Historical Account of the Diocese of Down and Connor, Ancient and Modern, Vol. I (Dublin, 1878), pp. 260-261.

The website of the Irish Franciscans adds that the names of these Franciscan martyrs are all local to the area, substituting Rooney for O'Rorke:

Driven out of Downpatrick in 1569, [the Franciscans] returned the following year when three friars with local names (Fitzsimons, Rooney and Loughran) were hanged from an Oak tree near Toberglory which is now called St. Dillon’s Well.

Our three martyred friars of Down, Edmund Fitzsimon, Donough O'Rourke and John O'Loughran are numbers 39, 40 and 41 on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) whose names were submitted to Rome. No further progress has been made on their cause.

 

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Father John Wallis and Father John Walsh

One distinct sub-grouping within the Irish martyrs whom I find particularly interesting are those Irishmen who were martyred in England. I have already written about a number of them and links to the various posts can be found here.  In most cases the circumstances in which these Irish victims came to be in Britain have been established, but not in the case of Father John Wallis, who died in prison in Worcester on January 20, 1582.  In his classic work Our Martyrs, Father Denis Murphy translated the 1669 account of Irish Franciscan martyrologist Anthony Bruodin:

1582. John Wallis

(From Bruodin's Propugnaculum, p. 445)

He was a priest, a native of Leinster, noble by birth but still more noble by reason of his reverence for the things of heaven. He was seized by the heretics, and bore with wonderful patience the various kinds of torture inflicted on him. At length he was sent to England, and imprisoned in the gaol at Worcester. There he died of hunger and other hardships, and triumphed gloriously for Christ, January 20th, 1582. 

See also Rothe and Molanus. The latter gives 1600 as the date of his death. Challoner makes no mention of him.

Rev. Denis Murphy, S.J. , Our Martyrs,  (Dublin, 1896), p. 124.

 Initially I wondered, given the date of his death and his Leinster origins, if the noble father might be another victim of the executions following the Baltinglass Rebellion. There were two problems with this idea though, first the 'Martyrs of the Pale' executed in the aftermath of the Rebellion were mostly aristocratic laymen, among whom I have never seen a Father Wallis mentioned. Secondly, I would still be left to wonder what was so special about the case of this priest that he would be sent to England, instead of simply being executed in Ireland. Unfortunately, Bishop Challoner (d. 1781), whose detailed and authoritative account of the English martyrs included many of the Irish among them, does not mention Father Wallis. But then if we examine the 1600 date another possibility arises. Myles O'Reilly, in the other great nineteenth-century catalogue of Irish Martyrs, translates the entry from Bishop Rothe cited by Father Murphy above:

Anno 1600.

Rev. John  Walsh,

A priest and Vicar-General of the diocese of Dublin, was thrown by chance on the coast of England, questioned of his faith, and for his constancy thrown into prison in Chester, where he ended his life and confession of the faith in chains, about 1600. 

M. O'Reilly, Memorials of those who Suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, (New York 1869), p. 165.

Could Father John Walsh be the same person as Father John Wallis ? I strongly suspect that this might be the case. Indeed, by his reference to Bishop Rothe and Molanus and the year 1600 when dealing with Father Wallis, Father Murphy himself seems to link the two. A number of things can be said to support this possibility. Bishop Rothe was closer to the events than Bruodin for he recorded the case of Father Walsh in his De processu martyriali published in 1619, fifty years before Bruodin's own work was issued. The scenario of 'being in the wrong place at the wrong time' as an explanation for the Irish priest's imprisonment is a perfectly reasonable one. Irishmen Christopher Roche and James Dowdall, for example, were martyred in England while trying to make return passage to Ireland. It would also be fair to say that Bishop Rothe has a greater reputation for accuracy than Bruodin, whose work has been shown to have garbled names and dates and places of execution of other Irish martyrs. The names Walsh and Wallis are similar and given the circumstances in which all of these martyrologists were working, writing from exile and often dependent on hearsay reports of varying quality and reliability, it is not surprising if there are inconsistencies in their accounts.

The name of Father John Wallis  does not appear on the Official List of Irish Martyrs (1918) submitted to Rome for consideration and neither have I been able to find him on any of the lists of English martyrs. Father John Walsh, however is number 20 on the 1918 Official List, but no further progress has been made with his cause.

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