Protestant Exiles from France/Volume 2 - Book Third - Chapter 20 - Dubourdieu
Dubourdieu. — I here give some memoranda, taken almost entirely from an article in the Ulster Journal of Archeology, by Dr. De la Cherois Purdon. The Dubourdieu family became an Irish one. Rev. Charles De la Valade, a refugee pasteur, was the first minister of the French Church of Lisburn, he being the brother-in-law of Alexander Crommelin, who had married his sister; another sister was Madame Du Bourdieu (already memorialised), the widowed mother of Rev. John Armand Du Bourdieu, who died in 1726, minister of the London French Church in the Savoy. Saumarez Du Bourdieu, the only son of the latter (born 1st September 1717), thus became an orphan at the age of nine, and was welcomed to their home by his Franco-Hibernian relations. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin. Uncle De la Valade was French minister in Lisburn for upwards of forty years; the second minister remained only two years and a half; the third and last minister was Saumarez Du Bourdieu, “who was minister for forty-five years, and was so beloved in the neighbourhood that in the insurrection of 1798 he was the only person in Lisburn whom the insurgents had agreed to spare.” He died the Incumbent of Lambeg parish [in 1813], aged ninety-six. He left three sons, John, Shem, and Saumarez; the third was a military surgeon, unmarried; Shem’s grandchildren settled in Dublin.
John was the Rev. John Dubourdieu, author of two statistical volumes on the Counties of Antrim and Down; he died aged eighty-six. His eldest son, Captain Saumarez Dubourdieu, on the surrender of Martinique to the British, received the sword of the French commandant, who addressed him thus:— “My misfortune is the lighter as I am conquered by a Dubourdieu, a beloved relative. My name is Dubourdieu.” The second son was Colonel Arthur Dubourdieu, who died of wounds received at Badajoz; the third was John Armand Dubourdieu, of H.M.’s Customs; the fourth was Captain Francis Dubourdieu, of the Royal Hanoverian Engineers. “The youngest son, George, joined the patriots under Bolivar in South America, and perished there.”
The following letter from the reverend author, addressed to Bishop Percy, was printed in Nichols’ Literary Anecdotes:—
Annahilt, June 20, 1799. — My Lord, in compliance with your Lordship’s request, I sit down to relate, as well as I can at this distance of time, what I saw in 1790, immediately after the demolition of the Round Tower which stood adjoining the ruins of the old Abbey of Downpatrick. Happening to go into the churchyard just as the foundation of the Round Tower was cleared away, I observed underneath the tower part of a wall, evidently a continuation of the wall of the old cathedral or abbey. It immediately struck me that the Round Tower must have been built upon the ruins of part of the cathedral. Mr. Lilly, the architect, who was present, had the same idea, who likewise pointed out to me the continuation of a wall in the same line considerably further. I find that it was likewise seen by several other persons, as the circumstance happened during the Spring Assizes. I have drawn the underneath sketch, which I think is nearly the situation of the different foundations. I have the honour to be, my Lord, your Lordship’s most obedient, humble servant,