Capt. Edward George Harvey 1882 - 1915

Edward George Harvey born on the 7th September 1882 was the eldest son of John George Morewood Harvey of Greglorne, Londonderry and his wife Norma Elizabeth (nee Rogan). He received his education at Foyle College. In his turn J. G. M. Harvey was the youngest son of Capt. Harvey RN of the Warren, Culdaff, Londondery.

Although he was from a scion of the Harveys of Culdaff Edward enlisted as a private in the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. He served in the Transvaal, (10/11/1900 - 8/1/1902), where he was awarded the Queens Medal with two clasps. Subsequently he served as a Sargent in India and it was during his sojourn in India that he was commissioned into the Wiltshire Regiment, (May 1905). In 1913 he was seconded to the Royal Flying Corps, (Military Wing), and within a year he was promoted to the rank of Flight Commander. Subsequent to the outbreak of war he rejoined his regiment, the Duke of Edinburgh's Wiltshire regiment, as a Captain and he joined its 1st Batallion at the Front in February 1915. On 16th June in that year he was leading his Company on an attack on the German trenches near Hooge when he was fatally wounded. His service record confirms his height as being 5 feet 8.75 inches and that he could speak French.

Edward's name appears on the Menin Gate in Belgium and on the the war memorial at the Diamond in Londonderry. He is also honoured by a plaque on the north aisle of St. Columb's Cathedral, Londonderry and his name appears on the war memorial at his alma mater.

The photograph at the head of this post was identified as being of Edward by a member of the Harvey family but it is clearly of a different individual than the person who is identified as Edward in the "Our Heroes," website of South Dublin Libraries.

Grave Visitations

Over the past month I have accompanied my father to two church graveyards. On the first occasion he wanted to visit the grave of paternal great grandparents who had died in the middle of the nineteenth century. The headstone is made of Welsh slate and originally rested on four squat stone legs. The two at the front of the grave have been removed or disintegrated with the result that the stone now lies at a slight angle. The term for this style of headstone is I think, "table."

Neither great grandparent lived to a great age passing away when aged thirty seven years and forty two years respectively. Their daughter and only child Anne, (my father's grandmother) and who was born in 1842 was made a ward of court and was subsequently brought up by a distant relative who resided in the vicinity of Ballyshannon, Co Donegal. Family history would have it that her guardian somehow managed to get her funds mixed up with his funds but that any unpleasantness was resolved by a house being built for her and her husband.

Our second cemetery outing was to St Columb's Parish Church, Moville, (Moville Lower).This time my father wished to visit the grave of a youth by the name of Jack Bennett who had died on 1st August 1941 aged fifteen as the result of a swimming accident. His father William Bennett was the local chemist. My father had attended the funeral almost seventy six years ago. He and Jack were both pupils at Foyle, Jack a boarder and my father, two years his junior, a day boy.

A Teacher Dies.

When I was driving into work on Monday of this week I learnt of the death of one of my teachers from the 1970's - Gordon Fulton. If my memory serves he replaced Mr Shepherd who exited teaching after the murder of his friend Senator John Barnhill on 12th December 1971. Gordon taught English and supervised Foyle College Players of which I was a member during my scholastic years. I was surprised to see that he was only eight years my senior. Maybe it was the presence of his beard that suggested a more advanced age. I think it was in 1975 that he persuaded me to fill a temporary vacancy in a production of the 1971 Players.

In the 1980's Gordon decided that he should disclaim the joys of teaching and become a professional actor. A brave decision but his natural ability proved it to be the correct one.. I was aware of his appearances in, "Game of Thrones," 'Taggart," and " Give my head peace." The last time I saw Gordon was at Glenveagh Castle when I was in the company of my paternal uncle and his wife. My uncle had been a departmental colleague of Gordon.

 

 

Brigadier Edgar James Bernard Buchanan DSO.

Born on 6th May 1892 Brigadier Buchanan was the eldest son of Robert Eccles Buchanan and his wife Ethel Maud, (nee Williams). At that stage the family lived at Harding Street, Londonderry. They subsequently moved to Templemore Park. The young Buchanan entered Foyle's preparatory school in 1899 where he was joined by his younger brother Richard Brendan Buchanan.

He completed his education at Portora Royal School before joining the Royal Engineers. As a career soldier he served in India, Mesopotamia, Singapore, Malta, North Africa and Italy. He was wounded on two occasions during the Great War and was awarded the DSO. After the Second World War he was Director of Fortifications at the War Office. His promotion to the rank of Brigadier appears in the Gazette of 14th November 1947. Brigadier Buchanan died at Halesmere Surrey on 13th September 1979. His brother , a Second Lieutenant with the Royal Scots Fusiliers, also served during the Great War but fell at Galipoli on 20th June 1915.

Foyle College Act 1896

 

 

The Royal Assent was given to the Foyle College Act of 1896 on 20th July of that year. Confirmation of this appeared in the London Gazette on 21st July. This was the Act which provided the legal authority for the amalgamation of Foyle College and the Londonderry Academical Institution.

The passing of the Act was not entirely straightforward. The Hansard reports regarding the first reading of the Bill indicate that Foyle's incumbent headmaster, (Maurice Hime), had initially objected to the Foyle College and Londonderry Academical Institution (Amalgamation) Bill. The MP for Londonderry City one Vesey Knox stated that the Irish Society had come to an arrangement with the headmaster and that, "that gentleman's objections had been entirely removed." It also seems that the Bishop of Derry & Raphoe, (William Alexander), who was in 1896 elevated to the position of Primate of All Ireland, had not signed the memorial in favour of the amalgamation.

Mr. W. Johnston who was MP for Belfast South thought that Foyle College was being dealt with very unjustly. He expressed similar views as to the treatment of Maurice Hime, although the comments of Mr Knox did placate him on that point.

 

 

Sir William Athlestane Meredith Goode KBE

William Athlestane Meredith Goode was born at Channel, Newfoundland on 10th June 1875 the younger son of Rev. Thomas Allmond Goode and his wife Jane Harriet, (nee Meredith). His father was a missionary with the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel and died in 1887. It is likely that his mother died in childbirth or as a consequence of the travails of same, records showing her to have died in 1875.

Young William attended various educational establishments including Foyle College, Winchester and Doncaster Grammar School. He went to sea in 1889 and served as a purser. Three years later he enlisted in the 4th United States Cavalry and upon his discharge he entered upon a career in journalism. From 1896 until 1904 he was with the Associated Press of America, (APA), and was their representative on Admiral Sampson's flagship during the currency of the Spanish- American War. He subsequently wrote an account of his time on board Sampson's vessel throughout the conflict. Secretary of State John Hay was to describe it as a, "splendid little war."

In I904 after six years as APA's special correspondent in London he became managing editor of the Standard. In 1911 he was to become joint news editor of the Daily Mail. Thereafter he entered into public affairs. He served as honorary secretary of the British committe for the Panama Pacific Exposition in 1913-14 and the years of the Great War saw him as the secretary and organiser of the national committee for relief in Belgium; a member of the Newfoundland and West Indian military contingents committees as well as holding positions at the Ministry of Food. Following the ending of hostilities he was to serve as a member of the British delegation at the peace conference and at the Supreme Economic Council. In 1920 he presented a report on economic conditions in Central Europe to Parliament based on the work that had been carried out by the relief missions.

His next appointment was as British delegate and president of the Austrian section of the Reparation Commission. He was to report that the recovery of reparations from Austria was impossible and that a reconstruction programme was required. Prevented from acting as financial advisor to the Austrian government by the intervention of the League of Nations he was to spend most of the interwar years as the London financial agent of Hungary.. In 1939, upon the outbreak of war, he joined the Ministry of Food as chief security officer and director of communications. The year 1942 saw him become chairman of the Council of British Societies for Relief Abroad. He died on 14th December 1944. During the last year of his life he was elected president of Foyle College Old Boys Association.

 

Stewart Connolly - A Headmaster.

The 1970's brought very dramatic changes to Foyle College. Some might say that the amalgamation with the Londonderry High School was the biggest change, bringing as it did females into the dear old Alma Mater. Thankfully I did not have to experience that upheaval to my education. I was however exposed to the other trauma of the decade, the transfer of the headmaster's baton from James. Stewart Connolly, (Stewartie) to one Hugh W. Gillespie in 1973.

 

Stewart Connolly came to Foyle as an English master in 1934 and took on the role of Headmaster in 1960. Foyle was his life, his passion. He not only was the headmaster he looked like a headmaster, (my view.) Some pupils might not have liked him, but they all respected him.

 

Hugh W. Gillespie took on the mantle of headmastership in September 1973. He was a very different individual to Stewartie so of course he could not replicate his predecessor and he did not attempt to. I suppose the general changes in society prompted a different style of leadership. Maybe this was the start of soft touch governance. It may well be that those who experienced the next transition of headmaster think of him, (Hugh Gillespie), with fond remembrance. I suppose that we can all be accused of viewing matters through rose tinted glasses. Most of us do not want change, nor react well to it.

 

The Old Boys Magazine of January 1974 tells us that at his previous school Hugh Gillespie had taken "a special interest in the organisation of pastoral care and in ways of improving communications within the school as well as in the cultivation of links between school and home and in the development of the school as part of the community." As I said a different style of leadership.

 

 

Sir Samuel Irwin, CBE.,DL.,MB.,M.Ch.,FRCS.,MP

Samuel Irwin was born in 1877, the son of John Irwin of Bovalley, Limavady and his wife Margaret, (nee Thompson). At the age of fourteen years he entered the portals of the Londonderry Academical Institution. The Academy amalgamated with Foyle College in 1896 under the latter's name and accordingly the young Irwin concluded his pre university education as a Foyle boy.

His prowess on the school rugby field continued during his undergraduate days. He was capped nine times for Ireland. One of his three sons, all of whom joined the medical profession and served in the R.A.M.C during the Second World War, was also capped for Ireland.

He graduated MB.,B.Ch.,B.A.O from Queen's College Belfast of the Royal University of Belfast in 1902. He obtained his M.Ch in 1906 and his FRCS in 1909. He entered the old Stormont as an MP for Queen's University in 1948 and was re elected on three occasions. His CBE was awarded in 1948 and in 1951 he was appointed DL. In 1957 he was knighted. Sir Samuel was president of the Foyle Old Boys' Association in 1931-32. He died on midsummer's day in 1961.

Sources: British Medical Journal July 1 1961

Sir David Callender Campbell P.C., K.B.E., C.M.G., M.P.

David Campbell was born in India on 29th January 1891, the third of four sons born to Rev. William Howard Campbell and his wife Elizabeth. Rev. Campbell was a Presbyterian missionary working in India under the auspices of the London Missionary Society. The youngest son, William, was to die of malaria during a voyage back to the United Kingdom in 1894.

David along with his two elder brothers received his secondary education at Foyle College before attending Edinburgh University. During the Great War he was to be interned in Hungary where he had gone as a tutor. Both of his surviving brothers served during the War. Thomas who had emigrated to Canada returned home at the outbreak of hostilities and enlisted in the Royal Engineers. An engineer by profession he was granted a commission shortly after joining up. Initially he served with the B.E.F. His unit was then transferred to Gallipoli where he was severely wounded on 5th October 1915. He died three days later. His name appears on Foyle's roll of honour and that of First Ballymoney Presbyterian Church and also the Helles Memorial in Gallipoli. His other brother, Samuel Burnside Boyd Campbell, (known as Boyd), joined the R.A.M.C on the outbreak of war and was to be awarded the MC. He played rugby for Ireland on twelve occasions, (1911-13).

In 1919 David entered the Colonial Service. For seventeen years he served in Tanganyika before being appointed Deputy Chief Secretary, Uganda. He subsequently became Colonial Secretary, Gibralter and in quick succession acting Lieutenant Governor of Malta. Upon his retirement from the Colonial Service he returned to Northern Ireland in 1952 and entered upon a career in politics. He was elected to the House of Commons as MP for Belfast South in the 1952 elections, succeeding Connolly Gage, and continued in this role until his death.

Sources

Foyle College Times Vol 33 No 2

www.36thulster.com

www.mairi-campbell.com

 

 

Sir Michael O'D. B. Alexander GCMG - Son of an Enigma.

Michael Alexander was born on 19th July 1936 the son of Hugh Alexander and his wife Hilda, (née Bennett). He attended Foyle College before taking up a scholarship at St Paul's London. He graduated from King's College Cambridge and continued his education at Yale and Berkeley. In 1960 he was a member of the British épée team which won silver at the Rome Olympics.

 

Michael entered the Foreign Service in 1962. Postings to Moscow and Signapore followed. Between 1972 and 1974 he worked in the Private Office of the Foreign Secretary. By 1979 he was Margaret Thatcher's diplomatic Private Secretary and in 1982 he became the British Ambassador in Vienna. In 1986 he was appointed British Ambassador and Permanent Representative to NATO. He was appointed GCMG upon his retirement from the Service in 1992, having previously been appointed CMG in 1982 and KCMG in 1992. Like his father before him he was to die in his mid sixties, passing away on 1st June 2002.

Despite his very successful diplomatic career Michael was always in awe of his father. His father won the British Chess Championships on two occasions. Along with two other leading British chess players he was assigned to Bletchley Park during the Second World War. Initially he joined Hut 6 but subsequently transferred to Hut 8 where he became deputy head under Alan Turing. MI5's Peter Wright made reference to him in his infamous, " Spycatcher."

Foyle College - Those that perished in the Second World War.

As was the case with the Great War conscription only affected those old boys of Foyle College who were resident in Britain. Accordingly the vast majority of the three hundred and sixty seven who responded to the call to arms were volunteers. Thirty nine of their number were not to return. Their sacrifice was acknowledged, honoured and remembered on a memorial handed over to the school by the Old Boys' Association on Thursday 12th January 1950. The dedication service took place in the School Hall with the entire school in attendance together with many of those who had served and survived.

 

The service opened with the appreciative words of, "O God, our help in ages past ..." Colonel H. I Cunningham then read from Revelation VII, 11-17. and this was followed by words of commemoration by Rev W. I. Steele. The assemblage then all joined in the Lord's Prayer. This was followed by the Headmaster, W. A.C. McConnell M.A reading out the names of the fallen:-

James Logan Adair

Finlay Kerr Austin

Stanley Maurice Austin

Ernest Henry Mackenzie Barr

Tudor Beattie

Walter John Best

Robert Desmond Connell

James Gilbert Crawford

Peter Day

Andrew Woodrow Dunn

Ronald Desmond Fletcher

James Edgar Glendinning

William Harpur

William Cecil Harris

Hugh Desmond Kelly

Mark Kerr

George Newman Laslett

George Ian Wikson Lusk

William McDermott

James Nesbitt McGranahan

Thomas Stanley Clarke McKee

William Alexander McKinley

James McNeary

Robert AllisonMcPhillimy

James Lyle Douglas Mark

Kenneth Arthur Marriott

William Ernest Norman Maxwell

William Daniel Miles

Samuel Cecil Morrison

Alastair William Perry

John Alexander Ree

Maurice Cheyne Reid

William Gardner Shannon

John Alexander Smyth

James Dickson Stewart

James Watson

Hubert Weir

Robert Wilson

Robert Gilmour Young

 

Captain A. F. Pugsley, C.B., D.S.O., RN then proceeded to unveil the memorial. Group Captain P. D. Cracroft, A.F.C read an extract from the Funeral Oration of Pericles. These words may be of considerable antiquity and the values they honour may be old fashioned and some might say irrelevant in the twenty first century but whenever I hear them I always have that lump in my throat and have to surreptitiously, as the lyrics tell me, " wipe that tear baby dear from your eye."

" Let your thoughts dwell day by day on your country's true greatness and when you realise all her grandeur, remember it is a heritage won for you by dauntless men who knew their duty and did it. In the hour of trial the one thing they feared was dishonour - they failed not their Motherland but laid their gallant lives at her feet. In one great host did they give themselves to death: but each one, man by man, has won imperishable praise, each has gained a glorious grave - not the sepulchre of earth wherein they lie, but the living tomb of everlasting remembrance wherein their glory is enshrined, remembrance that will live on the lips, that will blossom in the deeds of their countrymen the world over. For the whole earth is the sepulchre of heroes, monuments may rise and tablets be set up to them in their own land, but on the far off shores there is an abiding memorial that no pen or chisel has traced, it is graven, not on stone or brass, but on the living heart of humanity. Take these men for your example. Like them, remember that prosperity can only be for the free, that freedom is the sure possession of those alone who have the courage to defend it."

 

The dedication of the memorial was then performed by the Dean of Derry and Rector of the Parish of Templemore, The Very Rev. L. R. Lawrenson. This was followed by the sounding of the Last Post and Reveille. That concluded Captain Thomas A. Irvine, R.A. (T.A.) handed over the memorial on behalf of the Old Boys' Association to the Deputy Chairman of the Board of Governors, J. C. Eaton J.P. The School then joined in the singing of, " For all the saints who from their labours rest ..," The service concluded with the Benediction and the singing of the National Anthem.

Foyle College and the Great War

Foyle College's contribution to the Great War was not unusual. As with many schools the faces that stare down from the team photographs of the early twentieth century would volunteer to swap the mud of the rugby field for the clogging mire of the trenches. A total of four hundred and ninety Old Boys would answer the call to arms. To some this may not seem a particularly large number but at that time, long before the Education Act of 1947, the cadre of the school was comfortably under two hundred. Seventy two of their number would not return. Reading through their names and ranks one cannot but notice the percentage who held the rank of Subaltern. It is reported that the average life expectancy for a junior officer at the Front was only six weeks, even less than that of the , "other ranks."

Trooper R. S. Bailey - North Irish Horse

Captain J Ballentine - 11th Batt R. Inniskilling Fusiliers

Lieut. J. H. Barr - Royal Irish Rifles

Lieut. J. J. Beasley - 6th Batt. Royal Irish Fusiliers

Corporal C. H. Binions - Royal Engineers

F. P. Blacklay - 79th Canadian Cameron Highlanders

2nd Lieut W. G. Boyd - Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers

2nd Lieut W. K. M. Britton - Royal Flying Corps

Captain B. Brown, M.C. - R.A.M.C.

Lieut. D. Buchanan - 2nd Batt. Seaforth Highlanders

Lieut. R. B. Buchanan - R. Irish Regiment

R. Burgess - South African Field Force

Lieut. T. C. Campbell - Royal Engineers

Private A. G. Cathcart - 5th Canadian Infantry

J. Clarke - 26th Batt. Royal Fusiliers

2nd Lieut. J. N. Corscaden - Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

2nd Lieut. E. E. Craig - 20th Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

Cadet S. W. Craig - Royal Irish Rifles

2nd Lieut. C. L. Crockett - 12th Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

Captain W. R. Cronyn - Royal Army Veterinary Corps

Lieut. A. J. S. Dick - Royal Inskilling Fuisiliers

Assistant Paymaster J. Diver - Royal Navy

2nd Lieut. J. W. Drennan - 10th Batt. Royal Inskilling Fuisiliers

Flight Sub- Lieut. M. English - Royal Naval Air Service

2nd Lieut. R. R. Gallagher - Attached 4th Worcester Regiment

Captain V. Gilliland - Attached 2nd Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

Lieut. G. Given - Royal Navy

Lieut. V. A. Gransden - Royal Irish Rifles

F. J. Guy - Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry

2nd Lieut. J. H. M. Hadden - Royal Irish Rifles

Flt - Commander E G. Harvey - Royal Flying Corps

2nd Lieut. T. S. Haslett MC. - 17th Batt Royal Irish Rifles

S. Irvine - South African Field Force

J. Kennedy - Canadian Contingent

2nd Lieut. D. L. Kyle - Royal Engineers

F. Lawson

2nd Lieut. J. W. McCarter - Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

2nd Lieut. T. F. McCay - Royal Irish Rifles

Lieut. E. McClure - 10th Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

2nd Lieut. D. McConnell - Royal Flying Corps

Lieut. J. McCurdy - 9th Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

W. McLurg - Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry

2nd Lieut. W. Maultseed - Royal Irish Rifles

2nd Lieut. E. C. Mee - 11th Batt. West Yorkshire Regiment

Lieut. Bruce Millar - 5th Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

Captain R. W. Mitchell - 2nd Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

2nd Lieut J. W. Montgomery - Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

Lieut. J. R. Moore - Connaught Rangers

D. Morgan - Royal Naval Division

Major H. Morrison - Machine Gun Corps

Private H. A. Mulholland - 75th Canadians

Captain H. D. S. O'Brien - Attached Royal Air Force

Trooper J. A. Pinkerton - North Irish Horse

Flt.- Commander L. Porter - Royal Flying Corps

J. L. Quigley - 9th Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

Lieut. R. Shannon - Canadian Infantry

2nd Lieut. W. M. Sheridan - 17th Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

2nd Lieut G. D. L. Smyth - Royal Irish Rifles

2nd Lieut. L. G. Stewart - 15th Royal Welsh Fuisiliers

Lieut. A. Stuart - 2nd Batt. Royal Munster Fuisiliers

2nd Lieut L. W. H. Stevenson M.C. - 9th Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

Captain C. G. Tillie - 1st Batt. Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

Corporal J. A. Walker - Royal Engineers

2nd Lieut. James Watson - 23rd Batt. Manchester Regiment

Lieut. G. C. Wedgewood - Machine Gun Corps

G. White - Grenadier Guards

Captain C. B. Williams - 3rd Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

Captain E. J. Williams - 3rd Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

Lieut. J. A. Williams - 3rd Batt. Royal Irish Rifles

G. Wilson - Canadian Contingent

2nd Lieut. V. J. E. Wilson - Royal Inniskilling Fuisiliers

 

Source: Our School Times Supplement, February 1919

The Right Hon. Sir George Fitzgerald Hill, Bt. PC.

Born on 1st June 1763 the eldest son of Sir Hugh Hill and his second wife Hannah, (dau of John McClintock of Dunmore, Co Donegal), George Fitzgerald Hill was a pupil of the Diocesan School, later to become known as Foyle College. He entered Trinity College Dublin on 22nd June 1780 and graduated with a BA in 1783. During his time at Trinity he befriended Theobald Tone, an individual more usually known by his middle name of Wolfe. The erstwhile friends were to meet again briefly on 8th November 1898. Hill's militia regiment was sent to Buncrana to escort the prisoners from the French vessel, "La Hoche," to Londonderry's gaol.

 

He succeeded to the Baronetcy in 1779 upon the death of his father. On 10th September 1788 he married Jane Beresford daughter of Rt Hon John de la Poer Beresford and Anne Constantia de Ligondes. It seems probable that it was in or about that time that Sir George bought the Brook Hall Estate on the outskirts of Londonderry.

 

Sir George held various public appointments and offices. He was MP for Coleraine, (1791-95) and was appointed Recorder of Londonderry in 1791. He was MP for Londonderry City (1795-1801 and 1802-1830) and MP for County Londonderry (1801-02). From 1796 he was Captain-Commandant of the Londonderry Yeoman Legion and from 1797 until 1823 he was an officer in the County Londonderry Militia, ultimately becoming its Colonel for a brief period.

 

In 1798 he was appointed Clerk of the Irish Parliament and when this was abolished he received an annual pension of £2265 in compensation for his loss of office. Between 1817 and 1830 he was Vice Treasurer for Ireland having previously held a Lordship of the Irish Treasury (1807-17).

 

By 1830 it seems that Sir George was being pursued by creditors and using family influence he was appointed Governor of St Vincent in November of that year. On 14th April 1833 he succeeded Sir Lewis Grant as Governor of the island of Trinidad where he was to die on 8th March 1839. His wife had predeceased him having died on 2nd November 1836.

 

Sources: PRONI; Londonderry Sentinel 4/7/1940; "Romantic Inishowen",H P Swann; The Londonderry Standard 15/7/1839

Sir John Ross, PC. QC.

Born on 11th December 1853 John Ross was the eldest son of Rev. Robert Ross and his wife Margaret Christie. Rev. Ross had been installed as minister of Fourth Londonderry Presbyterian Church, (Carlisle Road) on 29th March 1850 and was to remain in this position until his death on 1st July 1894.

 

The young Ross's elementary education included a period at the Model School, Londonderry, (it had opened in 1862), before proceeding to Foyle College where his contempories included Percy French. He subsequently entered Trinity College Dublin where he graduated with a BA in 1877 and LLB in 1879. A member of Grays Inn, (1878), he was called to the Irish Bar in 1879 and practiced on the North West Circuit. He took silk in 1891 and was elected a Bencher in 1893.

 

Like many of the legal profession he entered politics and served as the Conservative Member of Parliament for the City of Londonderry from 1892 until 1895 when he was defeated. The following year at the age of forty three he was to become the youngest judge in the United Kingdom when he was elevated to the Bench as the Land Judge in the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice in Ireland. He holds the honour of being the first Presbyterian Irish High Court Judge. In 1902 he was sworn into the Irish Privy Council and in 1902 he was created a Baronet. In 1921 he reached the apogee of his legal career when he was appointed Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He was to be the last individual to hold this appointment, it being abolished in December 1922 at which time Sir John retired to London, but ultimately returned to Northern Ireland to live at Dunmoyle Lodge outside Sixmilecross where he was to die on 17th August 1935. He was succeeded to the baronetcy by his only son Sir Ronald Deane Ross KC, MC , MP who for a time was Recorder of Sunderland.

 

Sir John's wife whom he married in 1882 was Katherine Mary Jeffcock Mann, the only daughter of Lieut. Col. Deane Mann of Dunmoyle. The match was not approved of by the Manns. The young Ross had two great failings so far as the Manns were concerned, -that he was not from a landed family and his Presbyterianism. Whilst the couple did not exactly elope, Miss Mann is reputed to have walked from her father's seat to Sixmilecross where she took an early morning train to Dublin and then married Ross at St. Michan's Church, (Parish Church to the Law Courts of Ireland), with her parents being absent. The honeymoon was apparently spent riding a tandem from Dublin to Donegal.

 

Despite the initial antipathy if not hostility between the young couple and the Manns it is clear that relationships must have improved as Dunmoyle would ultimately belong to the Ross's. The house and its large conservatory were demolished in the mid 1960's.

 

A brother of Sir John Ross, Stuart C. Ross was for many years a solicitor in Londonderry. His firm was ultimately taken over by a nephew (?) Frederick Bond who continued trading under the style of "Stuart C Ross & Co," until his death, when the business was subsumed into a larger practice and the name disappeared.

 

Colonel Charles Patton Chambers.

This son of Foyle College and Empire joined the East India Company in 1856. He served throughout the Indian Mutiny and was in Agra during its siege. He fought in the second battle of Agra. This action would prove to be a precursor to the relief of Lucknow. In 1858 Chambers is recorded as being a Lieutenant with the 48th Bengal Native Infantry. By 1876 the then Captain Chambers was promoted to the rank of Major. A further promotion followed and on 23rd July 1879 his retirement on half pay and with the honorary rank of Colonel is formally recorded in the London Gazette. He is described as being late of the 107th Foot. A son, Charles Colhoun Chambers MC served in the Great War with 12th Siege Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery and was killed in action in Flanders on 10th July 1916 at the age of 27. Colonel Chambers died in 1927(?) at King's Langley, Herts at the age of 91.

 

Sources: London Gazette, The Magazine of Foyle College.

Major-General Sir Robert Porter K.C.B., C.M.G.

Born in Co. Donegal in 1858 the young Robert Porter received his initial education at Foyle College before taking up his medical studies at Glasgow University. He entered the RAMC in 1881. This saw him serving in the Ashanti Wars of 1895/96 and he was present at the capture of Coonmassie which event is related in Henty's novel, "By Sheer Pluck." He was awarded the Ashanti Star (1896) and as a veteran of the South African War he received the Queen's South African Medal and the King's South African Medal.

 

Subsequent appointments saw him as Administrative Medical Officer in the Irish Command (1908-10), Principal Medical Officer Western Command (1910) and Deputy Director of Medical Services Malta (1910-14). During the Great War he was appointed Director of Medical Services 2 Army and was mentioned in dispatches no fewer than six times. He was awarded with the honour of Commander of the Order of the Crown and the Croix de Guerre by Belgium. His medals also included a 1914 Star Trio with August- November clasp. He retired from service in 1918. At the time of his death on 27th February 1928 Major-General Sir Robert Porter was resident at Beckenham, Kent.

 

In 2011 Sir Robert's medal group was being advertised for sale at a militaria auction being held by Lochdales of Ipswich. The estimate was £5,500. A sad footnote on a distinguished military career.

 

Sources: The Magazine of Foyle College; Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives.

 

Sir Andrew Searle Hart.

Born on the 14th March 1811 Andrew Searle Hart was the youngest son of Rev. George Vaughan Hart of Glenalla, Co Donegal and his wife Maria. His initial education was received at Foyle College and from thence he went to Trinity College Dublin in 1828. At Trinity he was a classmate of Isaac Butt, the son of another Donegal Rector.

 

Hart graduated in 1833 and obtained the Science Gold Medal. He was a elected a Fellow in 1835, became Master of Arts in 1839, LLD in 1840 and was co-opted as Senior Fellow in 1854. The apogee of his collegiate career came in 1876 when he became the forty second Vice-Provost of Trinity. As was then the custom he retained this position until his death on 13th April 1890. He was the author of an Elementary Treatise on Mechanics (Dublin 1844) and an Elementary Treatise on Hydrostatics and Optics (Dublin 1846). He was a member of the Royal Dublin Society and the Royal Irish Academy.

 

On Monday, 25th January 1886, prior to the levee, The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, His Excellency the Earl of Carnarvon, conferred a knighthood upon this Old Boy of Foyle College. Writing to the then Headmaster of Foyle, Dr Maurice Hine, shortly afterwards Sir Andrew said as follows, - " Many thanks for your congratulations on a honour which is liable to be misunderstood. It was intended by His Excellency as a parting compliment to Trinity College, and my claim to a share in the honour rests solely on the fact that no other living man has been so long connected with the College as I. This is a claim which I can safely undertake to maintain against all the world, which gives me an advantage over many men who have been similarly honoured."

 

Sources: Our School Times March 1886.

 

Right. Hon. George Augustus Chichester May PC QC.

Foyle College, Lawrence Hill, - 12th October 2013.

 

Born in Belfast in 1815 George Augustus Chichester May attended Foyle College during the headmastership of Rev. John Knox. He was a son of the Rev. Edward May and his wife Elizabeth Sinclair. The young George was only four years of age when his father died in 1819. His grandfather Sir James Edward May, 2nd Bt. of Mayfield in the County of Wexford and MP for Belfast had died in 1814. One of Sir Jame's daughters had married the 2nd Marquess of Donegall which presumably explains the inclusion of the name, "Chichester," in George's baptismal records.

 

May's education was continued at Shrewsbury School and Magdalene College Oxford where he graduated in 1838. He was called to the Irish Bar in the Hilary term of 1844 and by 1865 he had been appointed QC. In 1873 he was elected a bencher of King's Inns and in 1874 he was appointed the legal advisor to The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. The following year saw him appointed as the Attorney General of Ireland by Disraeli. His legal career progressed further when on 8th February 1877 he was appointed Lord Chief Justice of Ireland and sworn in as a Privy Councillor. He retained his title of Lord Chief Justice of Ireland until his retirement for reasons of ill health in 1887. He died on 16th August 1892.

 

May's wife, Olivia, was the the fourth daughter of Sir Matthew Barrington Bt. The couple had ten children, one of whom, Sir Francis Henry May would serve as the fifteenth Governor of Hong Kong, from 1912 to 1919.

 

References: Our School Times; The Peerage.

 

An Edwardian Headmaster - Notes on Robert Foster Dill BA (Oxon)

Robert Foster Dill was appointed headmaster of Foyle College in 1911 in succession to John C. Dick. This was not however his first head-mastership. He had been the headmaster of Royal School Dungannon from 1892. The fortunes of the latter school appear to have been languishing somewhat at that stage. Indeed there are reports suggesting that, "Dungannon," was closed for a short period. There were thirty eight day boys at the time of Dill's appointment to the Dungannon headship.

With his move to Londonderry Dill was moving closer to the area where his forebears had settled at the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Fannet Peninsula in Co. Donegal. The family is of Dutch descent.

Robert Foster Dill was not the first of his family to be involved in education. An elder brother, Sir Samuel Marcus Dill, had been appointed High Master of Manchester Grammar School in 1877 and their father Rev. Samuel Marcus Dill was the first President of Magee College in Londonderry. The latter gentleman's surname is remembered in "Dill Park," Londonderry. Teaching and the Presbyterian Church seem to have been the professions of choice for this family.

Dill's years at Foyle were years of international and national strife which impacted on the life of the school and City. The Great War would bring back reports of Old Boys having died at the Front and the years that followed were marred by one of those periods in the history of the island of Ireland when commentators refer to, "the Troubles', and which would lead to Partition.

Born in 1859, it was only in 1912, (9th July), that Dill married. His wife was Evelyn Mary Whitehead, daughter of a George Whitehead. They did not have any children.

He is described as being a proponent of a liberal or rounded education and is reported as realising that, "an unexercised and undeveloped body meant an intellect less keen than might be, a character stunted, and a personality impoverished."

Some years after his retirement, in 1945, Dill was elected President of Foyle College Old Boys Association. He was to pass away on 12th February 1947.

Sources: The Peerage; Our School Times

Tragedy on St Columb's Cathedral Choir Outing

The year was 1889. The date was 29th June. Foyle College had broken up the previous day for the summer vacation. One of the pupils, the seventeen year old Hervey Bruce, had been invited by the clergy of St. Columb's Cathedral to join them and the other cathedral choristers on an outing to Ness Woods.

It is reported that at about four in the afternoon certain of the boys and Mr Pettipice went to bathe in the pool below the waterfall. Bruce and Pettipice jumped in. Bruce clambered out complaining of having hurt his foot ,but then dived in again. The other boys' attention was drawn to Pettipice who was under the waterfall. It was a few minutes before it was realised that Bruce had not surfaced. Rather surprisingly nothing is said of Pettipice attempting any rescue.

The boys apparently ran to bring Canon Boyton and Rev Olphert and Rev Hayes to the scene of the unfolding tragedy. All three of them jumped in but were unable to find Bruce. Using a hammock ,which the party had brought with them, the clergymen dragged the pool, but again with no result. A local resident by the name of Alexander Gallagher then used a long pole to try to locate the body. This he eventually did and Canon Boyton dived in again to retrieve Bruce's body. The boy's remains were transported back to the City in The Lord Bishop's carriage.

Hervey Bruce was a son of Major Stewart Hervey Bruce a grandson of Rev. Sir Henry Hervey Aston Bruce, 1st Bt Downhill. Major Bruce resided at Crawford Square Londonderry and held the office of Governor of Londonderry County Gaol. He had gained the rank of Major with the 102 Royal Madras Fusiliers. Whilst I have not worked out the actual relationship, the deceased chorister would be related, albeit far out, to Lady Victoria Hervey and her sister Lady Isabella.

Sources: "Our School Times," September 1889; "The Peerage."