Bartholomew Purdon

Bartholomew Purdon (–1737) was a County Cork landowner and a long-serving member of the Irish House of Commons. He was also a Justice of the Peace and served as Deputy Lord Lieutenant of County Cork for many years. He was High Sheriff of County Cork in 1708–9.

He was born at Ballyclogh, County Cork, the son of Caption Bartholomew Purdon senior and his wife Alicia Jephson, daughter of Major-General William Jephson of Mallow Castle, County Cork and Alicia Dynham of Boarstall Tower, Buckinghamshire. He had at least one sister Alicia, who married Colonel Thomas Phayre of Mountpleasant, a younger son of the regicide Colonel Robert Phayre. His paternal grandfather Sir Nicholas Purdon (died 1678) founded the Ballyclogh branch of the prominent Purdon family of County Clare, who were of English origin, and who settled in Ireland in the sixteenth century. He sat in the Irish House of Commons as MP for Baltimore 1651-6. Sir Nicholas's wife was Alice or Ellis Stephens, daughter of Henry Stephens of County Cork. Ballyclogh Tower House, the family home, was burnt in the 1690s, and not rebuilt till much later. It is now a ruin.

Bartholomew's father fought on the Williamite side during the Williamite War in Ireland: he was captured by Government forces at Loughrea in late 1688, and imprisoned at Galway. He had surrendered on promise of mercy, and though sentenced to death for treason he was reprieved. He died soon afterwards, still under confinement at Galway. Anne married secondly William Cole, sometime after 1745.

The inscription on Bartholomew's tomb, commissioned by his wife, described him as a man who in his thirty-nine years of public service "strictly observed justice, faithfully served his King and was a patriot to his country".