and morocco boots, and a montero cap of leopard skin. The Duke of Leinster, Lord Charlemont, Right Hon. George Ogle, . . attended with white staves, as regulators of the business of the day." 7 We are not furnished with any particulars of Crosbie's life, further than that he devoted attention to aeronautics. 7(1795) 338(1785)
Crotty, William, was a notorious highwayman and rapparee, who carried on his depredations in the south of Ireland early in the 18th century. His name is given to a cave and a lough amongst the Comeragh mountains. He was regarded as a man of desperate courage, and unequalled personal agility, often baffling pursuers even when mounted on fleet horses. He frequented the fair green of Kilmacthomas, and openly joined with the young men in hurling and football on Sunday evenings, danced with the girls at wakes and patterns, and was familiarly received in farmers' houses. At length a Mr. Hearn, guided by the wife of one of Crotty's partners in crime, captured him after a struggle in which Crotty was shot in the mouth—a judgment, in the estimation of the people, for his having once shot a countryman through the mouth at his own fireside: Crotty and a confederate were outside the man's cabin, and the former wagered that the ball in his pistol would pass the peasant's mouth sooner than a potato they saw him lifting to his lips. Crotty was executed at Waterford, 18th March 1742, and for a long time his head remained spiked over the gateway of the jail. 146 181
Crowley, Peter O'Neill, a prominent Fenian, was born 23rd May 1832, at Ballymacoda, County of Cork, where his father was a respectable farmer. His uncle, Rev. Peter O'Neill, was flogged at Cork in 1798 for alleged complicity in the insurrection of that year. Peter inherited his farm, and cultivated it with great industry and thrift. He was a teetotaller from ten years of age; he was studious in his habits, and was greatly beloved by relatives and friends. He early joined the Fenian movement, became an active propagandist, took the field in March 1867, and formed one of a party under command of Captain M'Clure in the attack on the Knockadoon coastguard station. Afterwards he took refuge with a few comrades in Kilclooney Wood, County of Cork, where, on Sunday 31st March, his small party was attacked and defeated by military and constabulary. He was mortally wounded in the fight, and died a few hours afterwards at Mitchelstown, whither he was conveyed—being treated with the greatest kindness and consideration by his captors. One who was with him to the last remarked: "His death was most edifying. Never did I attend one who made a greater impression upon me. He begged of me to tell his sister not to be troubled because of his death, which he hoped would be a happy one." An immense concourse attended his funeral at Ballymacoda. 130
Crozier, Francis Rawdon Moira, Captain, R.N., a distinguished arctic voyager, was born at Banbridge, September 1796. He entered the navy as a first-class volunteer on the Hamadryad, 12th June 1810, served in the Pacific, at the Cape of Good Hope, and elsewhere, and was appointed Midshipman, June 1812. He sailed with Captain Parry on three of his arctic voyages—in the Fury in 1821, in the Hecla in 1824, and again in the Hecla, as Lieutenant, in 1827. After some years' home service, he was despatched to Davis's Strait and Baffin's Bay, in search of missing whalers, and after his return was appointed Commander in 1837. From May 1839 he was absent some years in command of the Terror, in the expedition under Captain Ross, upon a voyage of discovery in the Antarctic Ocean. During this period he was promoted to post-rank. On 26th May 1845 he sailed in command of the Terror, in company with Sir John Franklin, who commanded the expedition, in the Erebus, in search of the North-west Passage. The crews were picked, and the ships were as strong as art could make them, and well found in every respect. They were last seen by a whaler, on the 26th July, in Baffin's Bay, progressing favourably. In the autumn of 1847 anxiety began to be manifested for the safety of the explorers. Expedition after expedition (some twenty in all) was sent in quest of them—not alone by the United Kingdom, but by France and the United States. In August 1850 traces of the missing ships were discovered, and it was ascertained that their first winter had been spent behind Beechey Island, where they had remained at least as late as April 1846. No further tidings were obtained until the spring of 1854, when Dr. Rae learned from the Esquimaux, that in 1850 about forty white men had been seen dragging a boat over the ice near the north shore of King William's Island, and that later on the bodies of the whole party, dead of cold and starvation, had been found by the natives, on Montreal Island, at the mouth of the Fish River. On 30th June 1857 Captain M'Clintock was despatched in the Fox, fitted out by Lady Franklin and a number
