PRE-1817 BURIALS

Between the college's establishment and the opening of its cemetery in 1817, four of the pioneering staff members were buried in the local public cemetery at Laraghbryan, a rural area north-west of Maynooth itself, and one which continues in use to the present day. A fifth staff member, Peter Flood, was buried beneath a side altar in the then college chapel, now St. Joseph's Chapel.

Maurice Ahern (1735-1801)

LARAGHBRYAN CEMETERY, KILCOCK ROAD, MAYNOOTH

The first member of the Maynooth College staff to die was Maurice Ahern, a Kerry-born priest. He was appointed to the staff of the college on its foundation and died in 1801 at the age of sixty-five, having served for six years as Professor of Dogma. He was buried in this parish cemetery, which is still in use. His grave is marked with a plaque.

Peter Flood (c. 1750-1803)

ST. JOSEPH'S CHAPEL (OLD COLLEGE CHAPEL)

Peter Flood was Parish Priest of Edgworthstown at the time of his appointment as President in 1798, having escaped from France in the revolutionary period; he served for six years, but was only fifty-three when he died. He was buried under the north aisle of St. Joseph’s Chapel in a location marked only by a simple cross. He was the third member of the college staff to die in office, but his position as President seems to have warranted a decision to bury him within the college precincts, even though no formal cemetery space had yet been designated. In 2023 a plaque (see below) was installed near the gravesite.

Clotworthy McCormick (c. 1727-1807)

LARAGHBRYAN CEMETERY, KILCOCK ROAD, MAYNOOTH

Clotworthy McCormick, priest-sacristan, who died in 1807, aged about eighty – is also believed to have been buried at Laraghbryan, though the location is unmarked and unknown. He was a native of Antrim who had been educated in Paris, and served at one time as a military chaplain; another reference associates him with the Augustinian order, though this is usually associated with a claim that he was the last 'abbot general of Bangor' (the abbey of Bangor in Co. Down was in the hands of the Augustinian order from 1469 to 1558, but was effectively in ruins during McCormick's lifetime).

Edward Ferris (1738-1809)

VINCENTIAN CEMETERY, CASTLEKNOCK, DUBLIN (reburial)

Edward Ferris, a Kerry priest of the Vincentian order, was seventy-one when he died in 1809, having served for eleven years as the college’s first dean and later Professor of Moral Theology. He was buried at Laraghbryan too, but was reinterred in 1875 in the Vincentian cemetery at Castleknock.

Charles Lovelock (d. 1814)

LARAGHBRYAN CEMETERY, KILCOCK ROAD, MAYNOOTH

Charles Lovelock, a Tuam priest educated at Paris, was parish priest of Abbard or Monivea, Co. Galway when he was appointed Professor of Classics in 1795 and later (1802) of Rhetoric; he died in 1814.