Gideon Ouseley (24 February 1762 – 13 May 1839) was born into an

Anglican Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...

gentry family in Dunmore, County Galway.

Biography

His father, although a deist, intended that his son enter the clergy, but Ouseley spent much of his childhood in the cabins of peasant neighbours. He was tutored with his cousins Gore and William, and all three had notable careers. Married at age 20, Ouseley led a wild life that dissipated both his own and his wife's fortunes. After losing an eye when shot in a tavern brawl, a loss that reputedly left him with a frightening appearance, Ouseley left his wild ways behind him. In 1791 he was converted to Methodism by English soldiers stationed in Dunmore, and he set out in turn, to convert and reform others. Ouseley preached the gospel, mostly in Ulster, until his death, preaching up to 20 sermons a week. His knowledge of the

Irish language Irish ( Standard Irish: ), also known as Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Insular Celtic branch of the Celtic language family, which is a part of the Indo-European language family. Irish is indigenous to the island of Ireland and was ...

and of peasant mores— not to mention his eccentric preaching astride a white horse— won him renown as Methodism's 'apostle to the Irish'.

Works

*''A Short Defence Of The Old Religion'' (1812
2nd Ed. 1829
*''Rare discoveries'' (1823)
''Old Christianity''
(1827)
''Four letters''
(1829) Oliver St. John Gogarty wrote an autobiographical novel ''Tumbling in the Hay'' and two plays under the pseudonym Gideon Ouseley, ''A Serious Thing'' and ''The Enchanted Trousers''. The writer John Mulvey Ousley was of a later generation of the same family.

Notes

External links

Gideon Ouseley, From A Compendium of Irish Biography, 1878Dun Laoghaire Methodist Church: How it began
1762 births 1839 deaths People from County Galway Irish Methodists 18th-century Anglo-Irish people 19th-century Anglo-Irish people Converts to Methodism from Anglicanism {{christianity-bio-stub