Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Kennedy, James (1793-1864)
KENNEDY, afterwards KENNEDY-BAILIE, JAMES (1793–1864), classical scholar, son of Nicholas Kennedy, a schoolmaster in Ireland, entered Trinity College, Dublin, as a pensioner 6 July 1807, aged 14. He obtained a scholarship in 1810, graduated B.A. in 1812, was elected a junior fellow in 1817, and proceeded M.A. in 1819, B.D. 1823, and D.D. 1828. In 1824 Kennedy was Donnelan lecturer in his university, and delivered in the Trinity College Chapel ‘Ten Lectures on the Philosophy of the Mosaic Record of Creation,’ which he published in two volumes in 1827. He resigned his fellowship in 1830 on being presented to the college living of Ardtrea, co. Tyrone. He assumed in 1835 the additional surname of Bailie. In manner he was vain and pompous, and he is said to have claimed relationship with the Marquis of Ailsa, which the latter declined to admit, although Kennedy offered to make him his heir on condition that the relationship were acknowledged. He died unmarried at Ardtrea on 18 Jan. 1864, leaving his property to a nephew.
Kennedy was an excellent classical scholar. He published: 1. ‘Lachrymæ Academicæ: comprising stanzas in English and Greek, addressed to the Memory of the Princess Charlotte,’ Dublin, 1818, 12mo (Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. v. 241). 2. ‘Select Speeches of Demosthenes,’ translated, with notes, n.d. 3. An edition of Homer's ‘Iliad,’ with Latin notes, Dublin, 1822, 2 vols. 8vo. 4. Æschylus's ‘Agamemnon,’ from the text of Blomfield, with Voss's German version and an original rendering into English blank verse and full notes, Dublin, roy. 8vo, 1829. 5. ‘Prælections on the Language and Literature of Ancient Greece,’ delivered in the university of Dublin, Dublin, 8vo, 1834. 6. ‘Fasciculus Inscriptionum Græcarum,’ London, 1842–9, 3 vols. 4to, with Latin text, a work of great research.
[Taylor's Hist. of Univ. of Dublin, p. 497; Graduates of Dublin, p. 317; information kindly supplied by the Rev. Dr. Stubbs of Trinity College, Dublin.]