O'Donnell, Edmund
O'DONNELL, EDMUND
First Jesuit martyred by the English government; b. Limerick, Ireland, 1542; d. Cork, Oct. 25, 1572. He entered the Society of Jesus in Rome in 1561. After studies in Loreto and Florence, he was sent to Flanders for his health. He returned to Limerick in 1564 to teach in the school established by David Woulfe, SJ. The school was dispersed in 1568, and O'Donnell stayed with his family until January of 1570, when he left for Madrid to raise funds for Woulfe's release from prison. In 1570 he returned to Ireland with the money but left again for the Iberian Peninsula sometime later. Although his journeys were undertaken in behalf of Woulfe, there is some evidence that he must also have acted as courier in bringing to James Fitzmaurice the bull of Pius V excommunicating Elizabeth. On his last return to Ireland, he was arrested on the warrant of Thomas Fitz John Arthur, a Catholic, and was tried, condemned, and then executed with great barbarity on Oct. 25, 1572. That O'Donnell was in minor orders at the time of his death is clear from the appeal of Arthur to Rome for absolution from the censure he had incurred. Arthur also stated that O'Donnell was unjustly condemned.
See Also: irish confessors and martyrs.
Bibliography: Archives, Society of Jesus, Rome. e. hogan, Distinguished Irishmen of the 16th Century (Dublin 1896). d. murphy, Our Martyrs (Dublin 1896).
[f. finegan]