The Life Story of an Old Rebel by John Denvir
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page 29 of 281 (10%)
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Denvir, a relative of ours, who afterwards became Bishop of Down and
Connor, Father O'Laverty says: "The Denvirs are a Norman race, brought to Lecale by De Courcy. The late bishop observed the name in several of the towns in Normandy." I only met Bishop Denvir once, when my father--who was his second cousin--took me to see him at the Grecian Hotel, Liverpool, when he was on his way either to or from Rome. I once, when a small boy, incurred my father's displeasure by criticising adversely (from what I had read in the "Nation") Dr. Denvir's support of what was called the "Bequest Bill." There were some strictures in the "Nation" on the favour shown to this Bill by three of the Irish Hierarchy, Archbishops Crolly and Murray, and Bishop Denvir. The last was a man of great learning. An edition of the Bible was published under his auspices by Sims and McIntyre, of Belfast. During my stay in Ireland, I lived in the house of my uncle, Owen (or Oiney, as he was commonly called) Bannon, in the townland of Ballymagenaghy, where my mother was born. No boy could have had a better object lesson in the part of Irish history embracing the Plantation of Ulster than Ballymagenaghy. It is eminently typical of the kind of rocky and barren land to which the children of the soil were driven--land which would hardly bear cultivation. I need scarcely say that the people were "Papishes" to a man. There was a hill behind my Uncle Oiney's house called Carraig (pronounced "Corrig"), in English "rock," and the name might well apply to most of the townland, in which the chief productions seemed to be |
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