Fr. Nicholas Sheehy Sagart Arún, 1728 – 1766

Fr. Nicholas Sheehy was publicly hanged, drawn and quartered in Clonmel on 15 March, 1766. A former curate of Newcastle, he was the parish priest of Shanrahan, Ballysheehan, and Templetenny (modern day Clogheen, Burncourt and Ballyporeen) for some years prior to his death. He was the victim of the most bigoted among the Protestant gentry who manufactored evidence to suggest Sheehy was a leader of the Whiteboys, and was implicated in the murder of a man named Bridge. Ned Meehan of Clogheen and Grange was hanged alongside Fr. Sheehy on the same charge – the murder of John Bridge. James Buxton of Kilcorcan, James Farrell of Rehill, and Edmond (Buck) Sheehy of Lodge were publicly executed at Clogheen some weeks later. Canon William P. Burke and Dr. Richard Robert Madden are respected historians who, at different periods, investigated the trial and prosecution of Fr. Sheehy.

The editor’s introduction includes details of the expulsion, in dramatic circumstances of Nicholas Sheehy and others from the Irish College at Salamanca in 1751. The final chapter ‘Fr Sheehy Commemorations at Clogheen and Shanrahan’ is also by the editor, Edmund O’Riordan.