John Troy

John Thomas Troy, OP (10 May 1739 – 11 May 1823) was an Irish Dominican friar who served as Archbishop of Dublin from 1786 to 1823.

Life Dominican Of Anglo-Norman stock, Troy was born at Annefield House, near Porterstown, County Dublin, and received his early education at Liffey Street, Dublin. At the age of sixteen he joined the Dominican Order and proceeded to their house of St. Clement at Rome. Historian Edward D'Alton notes that he was "amenable to discipline, diligent in his studies, and talented". He made rapid progress, and while still a student was appointed to give lectures in philosophy. Subsequently, he taught theology and canon law, and finally became prior/rector of the convent in 1772.

Bishop of Ossory When the Bishop of Ossory died, in 1776, the priests of the diocese recommended one of their number, Father Molloy, to Rome for the vacant see, and the recommendation was endorsed by many of the Irish bishops. But Troy, who was held in high esteem at Rome, had already been appointed Bishop of Ossory. He was consecrated at Louvain in June 1777 by the nuncio to Flanders, Archbishop (later Cardinal) Ignazio Busca.

Troy arrived at Kilkenny in August 1777 and for the next nine years he laboured hard for the spiritual interests of his diocese. Maddened by excessive rents and tithes, and harried by grinding tithe-proctors, farmers had banded themselves together in a secret society called the "Whiteboys", so called from the white smocks the members wore in their nightly raids. They attacked landlords, bailiffs, agents, and tithe-proctors, and often committed fearful outrages. Bishop Troy frequently and sternly denounced them, declaring any who joined the secret society to be excommunicated. Troy had no sympathy with oppression, but he had lived long in Rome, and did not fully appreciate the extent of misery in which the poor Catholic masses lived.

In April 1815, Archbishop Troy laid the foundation of St Mary's Pro-Cathedral in Marlborough Street, Dublin, but did not live to see it completed. Archbishop Troy died on 11 May 1823 at the age of eighty-four. He died in Dublin very poor, leaving scarce sufficient to pay for his burial, and was interred in the unfinished St Mary's Pro-Cathedral.