The Rev. James Whitelaw BA, MRIA (1749 – 4 February 1813) was an Irish historian, writer, statistician, Anglican priest and philanthropist.

Life

He was born in

County Leitrim County Leitrim ( ; ) is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Connacht and is part of the Northern and Western Region. It is named after the village of Leitrim, County Leitr ...

and educated at

Trinity College Dublin Trinity College Dublin (), officially titled The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin, and legally incorporated as Trinity College, the University of Dublin (TCD), is the sole constituent college of the Unive ...

. He was elected a Scholar in 1769, and graduated in 1771 with a BA. He was ordained in the

Church of Ireland The Church of Ireland (, ; , ) is a Christian church in Ireland, and an autonomy, autonomous province of the Anglican Communion. It is organised on an all-Ireland basis and is the Christianity in Ireland, second-largest Christian church on the ...

and became rector of St. James and then St. Catherine's in Thomas St. in Dublin. He carried out a great deal of work on behalf of the poor, including establishing the Erasmus Smith Free School on

the Coombe The Coombe (; ) is a historic street in the south inner city of Dublin, Ireland. It was originally a hollow or valley where a tributary of the River Poddle, the Coombe Stream or Commons Water, ran. The name is sometimes used for the broader area ...

and other institutions. In 1798 he carried out a census of the city of Dublin (a difficult undertaking at the time on account of the

1798 Rising The Irish Rebellion of 1798 (; Ulster-Scots: ''The Turn out'', ''The Hurries'', 1798 Rebellion) was a popular insurrection against the British Crown in what was then the separate, but subordinate, Kingdom of Ireland. The main organising force ...

). Epidemic diseases were then frequent in Dublin, but, undeterred by the fear of infection, he personally inspected nearly every house in the city and questioned nearly every inhabitant. Hitherto the extent of the population had been only vaguely conjectured - he counted a total population of 182,370. He published the results of his investigations in 1805 in his ''Essay on the Population of Dublin in 1798''. The many detailed statistics which he accumulated were stored in the city archives in

Dublin Castle Dublin Castle () is a major Government of Ireland, Irish government complex, conference centre, and tourist attraction. It is located off Dame Street in central Dublin. It is a former motte-and-bailey castle and was chosen for its position at ...

, which were among those destroyed in the

Four Courts The Four Courts () is Ireland's most prominent courts building, located on Inns Quay in Dublin. The Four Courts is the principal seat of the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeal, the High Court and the Dublin Circuit Court. Until 2010 the build ...

during the Irish Civil War in 1922. In 1805 he was made one of the members of the commission to inquire into the conduct of the paving board of Dublin. He formed the Meath Charitable Loan in 1808. He collaborated with John Warburton, deputy keeper of the records in

, in writing a ''History of Dublin'', completed after his death by Robert Walsh.Irish Times, 3 November 1934, p. 6 He ministered to the poor in the vicinity of Cork Street Fever Hospital, where he caught a fever himself and died in 1813.

Bibliography

*Whitelaw, Jame
''An essay on the population of Dublin, being the result of an actual survey taken in 1798''
Dublin, 1805.
''History of the City of Dublin''
by Whitelaw, Warburton, and Walsh. Vol. 1 of 2, London, 1818. *''Parental Solicitude'' (Dublin, 1800) *''A System of Geography'', of which the maps only (engraved by himself) were published *''An Essay on the best method of ascertaining Areas of Countries of any considerable Extent'' (Transactions of

Royal Irish Academy The Royal Irish Academy (RIA; ), based in Dublin, is an academic body that promotes study in the natural sciences, arts, literature, and social sciences. It is Ireland's premier List of Irish learned societies, learned society and one of its le ...

, vol. vi.)

Notes

References

* * * * * F. Elrington Ball: A History of the County Dublin. 1903. Part II. *St. James' Graveyard, Dublin - History and Associations (Dublin, 1988)

External links

Ireland Sixty Years Ago
online book, based on the memories of Robert Walsh. {{DEFAULTSORT:Whitelaw, James 1749 births 1813 deaths 18th-century Irish historians 19th-century Irish historians Alumni of Trinity College Dublin Irish statisticians 19th-century Irish writers Members of the Royal Irish Academy Christian clergy from County Leitrim Scholars of Trinity College Dublin Writers from County Leitrim Scientists from County Leitrim