Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Parker, John (d.1681)
PARKER, JOHN (d. 1681), archbishop of Tuam, born in Dublin was son of John Parker, prebendary of Maynooth. He took the degree of doctor of divinity in Trinity College, Dublin, received deacon's orders in 1638, obtained prebends in the two Dublin cathedrals, and was appointed a chaplain to the Marquis of Ormonde. The parliamentarian government deprived Parker of his ecclesiastical offices, and, on suspicion of being a royalist spy, he was committed to prison. Through an exchange of prisoners he regained his liberty, and when Ormonde left Ireland in 1650, Parker went to England, where he resided till the restoration of Charles II.
In 1660 Parker was appointed bishop of Elphin, whence in 1667 he was promoted to the archiepiscopal see of Tuam. He was translated in 1678 to the see of Dublin, in which he continued till his death on 28 Dec. 1681. A sermon preached by Parker before the House of Commons, Dublin, was printed in 1663. Some of his letters are extant in the Ormonde archives.
[Works of Sir J. Ware, 1739; Dalton's Archbishops of Dublin, 1838; Cotton's Fasti, 1851.]