Looking Back: Clerical Fracas

The only information worth transmitting from this quarter (Kilcullen) is that relative to a fracas between two Roman Catholic clergymen, which has excited a good deal of interest as well as amusement.

It appears that a priest, a mild, unoffending, and exemplary man, who resides in ——, County of Kildare, went to visit a friend, not a hundred miles from Old Kilcullen. Having left his gig and horse at the door, he entered his friend's house.

While paying the visit, a brother ecclesiastic, remarkable for his turbulent conduct and for being a violent repealer, came up and inquired to whom the horse and gig belonged. At this moment Father —— made his appearance, after paying his visit, when he was seized upon by the other priest, who dragged him about 60 yards from the door, and after calling him the most opprobrious names, thrust him into a pound, and was going to shut the poor man up, when his hat, which was knocked off in the scuffle, was picked up by some people who witnessed the scene, and who immediately rescued him from the grasp of his assailant, who, foaming with rage, mounted his horse and rode away.

The priest, thus so wantonly attacked by the vulgar bully above alluded to, was set at liberty by the people, who were lost in astonishment at the cruel and unfeeling conduct of the worthy disciple of Maynooth.

— Carlow Sentinel 1843, via Liverpool Standard.

(Credit to Dave Byrne for trawling through the old newspaper files for reports about Kilcullen.)

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