Rev. Thomas Connellan (1855 – about 1920) was an Irish writer and Catholic priest, who left the church to become a clergyman of the Church of Ireland.

Life

He was born in the parish of

Geevagh Geevagh () is a village in the south-east corner of County Sligo, Ireland, on the R284 regional road. The name, meaning "the windy (place)", describes a climatic feature of the village and its surrounding countryside. The name Geevagh also r ...

, County Sligo. During his teenage years he went through was he called a "troubled time". He was educated in Athlone Diocesan School and

Maynooth College St Patrick's Pontifical University, Maynooth ( ga, Coláiste Naoimh Phádraig, Maigh Nuad), is the "National Seminary for Ireland" (a Roman Catholic college), and a pontifical university, located in the town of Maynooth, from Dublin, Ireland. ...

and was ordained a Roman Catholic priest for the diocese of Elphin on 20 June 1880.Isaacson: Roads from Rome, London, the Religious Tracts Society, 1903. pp. 10-18 On 20 September 1887 he disappeared, leaving his clothes in a boat on Lough Ree. He was supposed to have been drowned, which attracted great attention at the time, and had the unlooked-for result of procuring some remarkable obituary notices in the ''Roscommon Messenger'' and other papers. The Town Board, Borough Court, and Board of Guardians all adjourned, as a mark of respect to his memory, while the Vicar-General of the diocese wrote a most sympathetic letter to his father. In fact he had fled to London, after which he became a member of the Church of Ireland. He edited a paper called ''The Catholic'',The Gospel Magazine
September 1905. which had a considerable circulation, and wrote Hear the Other Side and a number of other books and pamphlets, which had a wide circulation. He set up a mission at 5IB Dawson Street, Dublin. With the assistance of his brother, Mr Joseph Connellan, he embarked upon the evangelisation of Ireland.

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Irish writers Alumni of St Patrick's College, Maynooth 19th-century Irish Roman Catholic priests Irish Anglicans 1855 births 1920 deaths {{ireland-writer-stub