Name Richard Boyle Role Bishop | Died March 19, 1644 | |
Education Corpus Christi College, Cambridge | ||
The Right Rev. Richard Boyle (c.1574–1645) was an English bishop who became Archbishop of Tuam in the Church of Ireland. He was the second son of Michael Boyle (died 2 February 1597), merchant in London, and his wife Jane (baptised 17 January 1548), daughter and co-heiress of William Peacock. His younger brother was Michael Boyle, bishop of Waterford, and
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Biography
Richard Boyle was born around 1574. In 1590, he entered Corpus Christi College, Cambridge but is recorded to have migrated to St John's College, Cambridge. He graduated with a BA in 1595 which led to an MA three years later, and was incorporated MA at Oxford on 16 July 1601. He held vicarage of Finedon in Northamptonshire before embarking on a Church of Ireland ecclesiastical career.
He became warden of Youghal on 24 February 1603, dean of Waterford on 10 May 1603 (until 1620), and dean of Tuam in May 1604, Archdeacon of Limerick on 8 May 1605, and bishop of Cork, Cloyne, and Ross on 22 August 1620, these three preferments being obtained through the interest of his cousin, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork. He was advanced to the see of Tuam on 30 May 1638. On the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion of 1641, he retired with Dr. John Maxwell, bishop of Killala, and others, to Galway for protection, where, when the town rose in arms against the garrison, his life was preserved through the influence of Ulick Burke, Earl of Clanricarde. He died at Cork on 19 March 1645, and was buried in the Cathedral of St. Finbar. He is said to have repaired more churches and consecrated more new ones than any other bishop of his time.
Family
He married Martha, daughter of Rice Wight (died 31 October 1602) of Braboeuf Manor at Artington in Surrey, and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Needler of Holylands at Horley, Surrey. Sources differ over their children, a provisional list being: