County Cavan
An Cabhán
- IrishAn Cabhán
- ProvinceUlster
- County townCavan
- Local governmentCavan County Council
- Area1,931 km²
- Population81,704 (2022)
- Highest pointCuilcagh, 666 m, shared with Fermanagh
Belturbet bridge
The rising of 1641 reached Cavan in October. The O'Reillys took Belturbet. The townspeople gave up their arms on a promise of safety.
In the winter that followed, Protestants held in the town were drowned in the river. One deponent put the number at about thirty four and named many of them. Another said fifty eight were thrown off the bridge and held under with pikes. That one adds that Philip McHugh O'Reilly seemed highly displeased.
The depositions date this to January and February 1641. The year then began in March, so by the modern calendar it was 1642.
The record shows sworn statements, taken in 1644 from people who had lost everything. They are the best evidence there is. They are not neutral.
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Clough Oughter Castle
A round stone tower on a small island in Lough Oughter. In the 1640s it belonged to the O'Reillys.
In the winter of 1641 they held William Bedell, the Protestant bishop of Kilmore, there for a short while before he was exchanged.
In the autumn of 1649 Owen Roe O'Neill, the ablest general the Confederates had, was carried south against Cromwell. He got no further than this castle. He died there on the sixth of November.
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William Bedell
An English scholar who had been provost of Trinity College. He was made bishop of Kilmore in 1629.
He learned Irish, had services read in it, printed a primer in it, and set Murtagh King to translate the Old Testament.
When the rising came in 1641 he was left alone for two months and his house filled with refugees. Then he was held at Clough Oughter, exchanged, and died of fever in February 1642. The rebels escorted his body to Kilmore churchyard and fired a volley over the grave.
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