Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 15.djvu/418

 grasped, standing on the side of a steep hill in a remote county, addressing and converting vast crowds of the disaffected people.’ The celebrated charge of Magee, protestant archbishop of Dublin, first brought Doyle prominently before the public as a politician and a controversialist. It was delivered at his primary visitation in St. Patrick's Cathedral on 24 Oct. 1822, and contained the famous antithesis that ‘the catholics had a church without a religion, and the dissenters a religion without a church.’ Doyle at once retorted. Writing under the signature of ‘J. K. L.’ (James, Kildare and Leighlin), he attacked the established church with great vehemence. His attack called forth numerous antagonists, among whom were Dr. William Phelan, writing under the name of ‘Declan,’ and Dr. Mortimer O'Sullivan. In 1824 Doyle replied in ‘A Vindication of the Religious and Civil Principles of the Irish Catholics.’ Friend and foe alike read ‘J. K. L.’ It was impossible not to admire ‘the cunning of fence, the grace of action, and the almost irresistible might’ of his argument. His ‘Letters on the State of Ireland’ (1824, 1825) followed, and were as eagerly read. In March 1825 Doyle went to London to be examined by parliamentary committees on the state of Ireland. He was subsequently examined before the lords' committee, when peers vied with each other in rendering him kind offices and gifts. The Duke of Wellington gracefully acknowledged the rare ability of the prelate by protesting that it was not the peers who were examining Dr. Doyle, but Dr. Doyle who was examining the peers; while another nobleman remarked that Doyle surpassed O'Connell as much as O'Connell surpassed other men in his evidence. Doyle did not, however, speak very respectfully of his noble examiners. (His comment will be found in his ‘Life’ by W. J. Fitzpatrick, 2nd ed., i. 409.) He was again summoned to give evidence in 1830 and in 1832. He wrote much and ably in support of a legal provision for the poor. On this subject he was first supported, then opposed, by O'Connell, but his views prevailed. The repeal agitation he regarded as a mere phantom. A life of unceasing mental toil wore out his body. He died at his residence, Braganza, near Carlow, on 16 June 1834. He was buried at Carlow in front of the altar of the cathedral he had built, being, he said, the only monument he would leave behind him ‘in stone.’ It is now adorned with a fine statue of him by Hogan. In person Doyle was tall and commanding. Of a kindly, generous nature, he was too often austere and even arrogant in his manner towards strangers. Among the priesthood of his own diocese the sternness of his discipline caused him to be more respected than beloved. His unpublished ‘Essay on Education and the State of Ireland’ was printed by W. J. Fitzpatrick in 1880.

There is an engraved portrait of Doyle by R. Cooper, after J. C. Smith, and another by W. Holl from the bust by P. Turnerelli (, Cat. of Engraved Portraits, ii. 130).

[Fitzpatrick's Life, Times, and Correspondence of Dr. Doyle, 1861, new edition, 1880; Reviews in Athenæum, 25 May 1861, pp. 685–7, and in Dublin Univ. Mag. lviii. 237–51; Gent. Mag. new ser. ii. 533–4.] 

DOYLE, JOHN (1750?–1834), general, fourth son of Charles Doyle of Bramblestown, co. Kilkenny, by Elizabeth, daughter of the Rev. Nicholas Milley of Johnville in the same county, was born, according to Foster's ‘Baronetage,’ in 1756, but according to the ‘Reminiscences’ of his great-nephew, Sir Francis Hastings Doyle, in 1750. He was intended for the bar, but the enthusiasm of his younger brother, Welbore Ellis Doyle, who had entered the army, infected him, and he entered the army as an ensign in the 48th regiment in March 1771. He was promoted lieutenant in 1773, and was wounded while on duty in Ireland. In 1775 he exchanged into the 40th regiment, with which he first saw service in the American war of independence. He was soon appointed adjutant of the 40th, and greatly distinguished himself at the battle of Brooklyn, where he rescued the body of his commanding officer, Lieutenant-colonel Grant, from the enemy, and was also present at the affairs of Haerlem, Springfield, Brandywine, Germantown, where he was wounded, and others. His brother, Welbore Ellis Doyle, had brought his wife, afterwards Princess of Monaco, to America with him, and their house became a favourite meeting-place of the British officers. Here John Doyle made the acquaintance of Lord Rawdon, afterwards marquis of Hastings, who became his lifelong friend. He helped Lord Rawdon to raise his loyal American legion, afterwards the 105th regiment, into which he was promoted captain in 1778, and with which he served at the battle of Monmouth Courthouse and the siege of Charleston. He was promoted major in 1781, and still further distinguished himself during the last two years of the war. After the defeat of General Marion he hotly pursued the Carolina dragoons with but seventy men, and killed and wounded more of them than he had men with him; he then acted as brigade-major to Lord Cornwallis at the battles of Camden and Hobkirk's Hill, and finally was adjutant-general to the