Thomas Connellan (priest)

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, 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 and was ordained a Roman Catholic priest for the diocese of Elphin on 20 June 1880.

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, 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.