Cornelius Grogan

Who was Cornelius Grogan?

Cornelius Grogan, was a United Irishman.

Grogan was born about 1738, the eldest son of John Grogan of Johnstown Castle, Wexford, by his wife Catherine, daughter and heiress of Major Andrew Knox of Rathmacknee. His father, a Protestant landlord, was a member of the Parliament of Ireland. Grogan succeeded to the family estates, was High Sheriff of Wexford for 1779 and was from 1783 to 1790 M.P. for Enniscorthy in the Irish parliament.

On the outbreak of the Irish rebellion of 1798 Grogan joined the insurgents, and became commissary-general in their army. When Wexford was taken by the government forces Grogan was tried by court-martial.

He pleaded that he had been forced to take a nominal lead, but had been guilty of no overt act, but was hanged and beheaded on Wexford bridge on 28 June 1798. Two other landlords of Wexford who had taken the same action as himself, John Henry Colclough and Bagenal Beauchamp Harvey, suffered with him, as well as other rebel leaders. Their heads were set up on the court-house, and their bodies flung into the Slaney; but Grogan's body was recovered by his followers, and secretly buried at Rathaspick, near Johnstown. His estates were escheated by the crown, but were restored on the payment of a heavy fine to his youngest and only surviving brother, John Knox. Another brother, Thomas, a lieutenant in the British army, was killed at the battle of Arklow on 9 June 1798. A cousin, Edward Grogan, born in 1802, M.P. for Dublin from 1841 to 1868, was created a baronet on 23 April 1859.