Due to the sad death of my publisher, Mícheál Ó Doibhilín, in July 2022 the first edition of my book A History of St James's Church and Graveyard, Dublin, went out print. A second edition is now available in paperback and hardback formats from Amazon Spain, France, Germany and US (the paperback edition is not currently being sold on Amazon UK).
An estimated total of 100,000 people were buried in St James’s Graveyard, including Bishop Conor O’Devany, Sir Toby Butler, courtesan Peg Plunket, Sir John Trail (architect of Kilmainham Gaol), the distiller James Power, Easter Rising Volunteer John J O’Grady and nine members of Dr Pearse Lyons’s family. The last burial was in 1989 and in 2010 the graveyard was acquired by Dublin City Council, which is currently restoring it as a place of public access.
St James's Church and Graveyard were founded between 1189-92 and dedicated to
the saint said to be buried in Santiago de Compostela in Spain. St James's Church was
attached to St Thomas's Abbey, established in honour of the murdered Thomas
Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury. Following the Reformation in the sixteenth century,
St James’s Church was administered by the Protestant Church of Ireland.
During the Penal Era Catholics were not permitted their own graveyards and so
continued to bury in St James’s Graveyard until modern times. St James’s Church
closed as a place of worship in 1963 and in 2013 it was purchased by Dr Pearse Lyons
who, with his wife Deirdre, converted the restored building into the Pearse Lyons
Distillery.
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