Harcourt Lees
Irish activist
The Reverend Sir Harcourt Lees (29 November 1776 – 7 March 1852 in Blackrock, near Dublin) was an Irish clergyman and political pamphleteer on behalf of Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. He is best known for his strongly worded pamphlets attacking Roman Catholicism.
Life
Harcourt Lees was the eldest son of Sir John Lees, Bt. (created 1804), by Mary, eldest daughter of Robert Cathcart of Glandusk, Ayrshire. He graduated B.A. at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1799, and proceeded M.A. in 1802. His father saw service in Germany under the Marquess of Granby, and had been private secretary to Lord Townshend during his administration of Ireland, where he was secretary to the post-office from 1784 until his death in 1811.
Sir Harcourt Lees took holy orders, and was preferred to the rectory and vicarage in the Parish of Killanny, a parish partially in County Monaghan and partially in County Louth. He was collated to the prebend of Fennor in the church of Cashel 21 November 1800, and to that of Tullycorbet in the church of Clogher in 1801. He resigned both stalls in July 1806. He died at Blackrock, near Dublin, on 7 March 1852.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q5655028. VIAF identifies the subject as 243426557. The Library of Congress control number is n88088950. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1776, 1852, 1804 and 1799.
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This entry incorporates text from “Harcourt Lees” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.