Introducing John Edward Walsh. By Dillon Cosgrave.

Ireland Sixty Years Ago

Introduction - The Author.

John Edward Walsh, whose name, as author of this book, first appears in this edition, was born at Tolka, near Finglas, Co. Dublin, the residence of his mother’s family, on the 12th of November, 1816. Already other members of his family had become known by their writings. His uncle, Edward Walsh (1756-1832), eldest son of John Walsh, merchant, of Ballymountain House, Co. Waterford, made several contributions to the miscellaneous literature of his time. A poem of his gained a silver medal offered by a Waterford literary society, and afterwards, being appropriated by another person, gained the medal of the Trinity College Historical Society

But Robert Walsh, the father of John Edward Walsh, has stronger claims to be mentioned in this memoir, for the author of this interesting work derived a great part of the information contained in its subject-matter from his father. The many valuable sketches of life in the city and county of Waterford and the detailed and minute description of’ the life of a student of Trinity College in the last decade of the 18th century seem to have come from Robert Walsh. He was born in Waterford in 1772, entered Trinity College on the 2nd of November 1789, was elected scholar in 1794, and graduated B.A. in 1796. Having been ordained a clergyman of the Protestant Church, then established in Ireland, he was curate of Finglas from 1806 to 1820. Here he married Anne, daughter of John Bayly, of Tolka, and here his distinguished son was born. Another notable event of his residence here illustrates his devotion to those pursuits for which three generations of his family have now become known. This was his discovery of a celebrated ancient cross called the Cross of Nethercross. There was a tradition in the village that it had been buried in a certain place, still known to an old man who had heard it from his father. It had been interred to protect it from the fanatical zeal of Cromwell’s soldiers. Robert Walsh had an excavation made at the spot indicated, and the cross was disinterred and set up in Finglas churchyard, where it may still be seen. Robert Walsh published in 1815, in conjunction with John Warburton and the Rev. James White- law, a History of the City of Dublin in two volumes, which may still be consulted with advantage. He became chaplain to the British Embassy in Constantinople in 1820, acquired a medical degree, and practised for some time as a physician. He returned to Ireland in 1835, obtained the living of Kilbride, Co. Wicklow, and exchanged it for that of his earlier residence at Finglas in 1839, and died there in 1852.

His more celebrated son was educated at Bective College, and matriculated at Trinity College, Dublin, in July, 1832. He graduated B.A. in 1836, obtaining a senior moderatorship in ethics and logics and gaining a gold medal. He was a distinguished speaker also at the College Historical Society. Walsh was called to the Irish Bar in 1839, graduated LL.D. in his University in 1845, and became known in his profession, first as an industrious member of the Leinster Circuit, and afterwards as one of the soundest and most learned lawyers at the Equity Bar. He published, in collaboration with Richard Nun, Q.C., a work on The Powers and Duties of Justices of the Peace in Ireland, which was long a standard text-book on this subject. He was a reporter in the Court of Chancery from 1843 to 1852; was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1857, and Crown Prosecutor for Dublin in 1859.

On the advent to power of Lord of Lord Derby’s third administration in 1866 John Edward Walsh was appointed Attorney-General for Ireland and sworn of the Privy Council. He was elected Member of Parliament for Dublin University in July of that year, the vacancy having been caused by the promotion of James Whiteside to be Lord Chief Justice of Ireland. Walsh spoke only once in Parliament, for his career in the House of Commons was very brief. On the 13th of Auygust, a few weeks after the election of Walsh, Thomas Berry Cusack Smith, the Irish Master of the Rolls, died, and Walsh was appointed his successor on the 27th October. His too short tenure of high office was signalised by important changes due to his zeal and ability. The Irish Public Record Office was reorganised by Mr., afterwards Sir Samuel Ferguson, the distinguished poet and archaeologist, but the initiative of this good work was largely owing to Walsh.

As a judge he was remarkable for his profound knowledge of the law and his patient and upright character. It seemed probable that a long and distinguished career lay before him, but it was not to be. In the autumn of 1869 he went on a tour to Italy, his health not being very robust. He contracted fever in the Roman Compagna and died at Paris on his way home on the 20th of October in his 53rd year.

Walsh is said to have been as beloved in private life as he was eminent in public. He was engaged on a biography of John Fitzgibbon, Earl of Clare, the Lord Chancellor of Ireland in the Union period, but had attained only, at the time of his death, to the acquisition of the materials.

John Edward Walsh married on the 1st of October 1841, Blair Belinda, daughter of Captain Gordon M’Neill, of the 77th Regiment, and aunt of Mr. J. G. Swift M’Neill, M.P., who is well-known also for his knowledge of the history of Ireland in the days of Grattan’s Parliament. One of John Edward Walsh’s sons, the Ven. Archdeacon Walsh, has published an intereshng and valuable work on Fingal and its Churches.

The little book, of which a new edition is now offered to the public, first appeared in 1847 as *Ireland Sixty Years Ago, *having been published originally as a series of articles in the *Dublin University Magazine. *It was afterwards re-issued, without note or comment, in 1877 as *Ireland Ninety Years Ago. *It appears now for the first time as the acknowledged work of John Edward Walsh. The typography has been carefully revised, and new notes have been added which seemed necessary, but the text has, of course, remained sacred. Such a graphic and vivid delineation of life in the wild Ireland of the last half of the eighteenth century and the days of Grattan’s Parliament can be found nowhere else in fact, although the novels of Charles Lever supply, perhaps, much such a picture in fiction. Walsh’s view of the Ireland of that time may seem somewhat more pessimistic than that of Lever, but this may be accounted for by the circumstance that Walsh has plumbed lower depths in Irish life. The prison, the gallows, the bull-baiting, the highwaymen and the feuds between the Dublin butchers and weavers are in a somewhat lower sphere than Lever’s Irish life. But the chapters on duelling, abduction, conviviality, gambling, the troubles of ‘98 in Dublin and life in Trinity College recall the author of *Charles O’Malley *and *Tom Burke. *To every Irishman, and especially to those interested in the history and antiquities of the capital of Ireland, this work of John Edward Walsh should be a source of perennial interest.

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