Charles Brodrick, Archbishop of Cashel

The Hon Charles Brodrick (3 May 1761 – 6 May 1822) was a reforming Irish clergyman and Archbishop of Cashel in the Church of Ireland.

Charles Brodrick was the fourth son of the 3rd Viscount Midleton and Albinia Townshend, sister of Viscount Sydney. He was educated, like his maternal uncle, at Clare Hall, Cambridge.

In 1787 he was ordained in Cloyne by the Bishop, his father-in-law, Richard Woodward, first deacon (24 August) and then priest (9 December). He was appointed Rector of Dingindonovan (or Dangan) and Prebendary of Killenemer, and established a reputation for himself by choosing to live in his remote parish “at a period when very lax notions prevailed respecting clerical residence”. For a brief period in 1789 he was Prebendary of Donoughmore, before being appointed in June 1789 the Treasurer of Cloyne, where he served until 1795.

In 1795, Brodrick was consecrated as Bishop of Clonfert and Kilmacduagh, whence he was translated to Kilmore in 1796. In 1801, following the preferment of Charles Agar to Dublin, Brodrick was appointed Archbishop of Cashel and Emly (and Primate of Munster) in his place and remained in that post until his death in 1822, when he was succeeded by Richard Laurence. From 1811 until 1820, he also took on the administration of the diocese and province of Dublin, as a result of the mental incapacity of the Archbishop, Euseby Cleaver.

Brodrick was a committed ecclesiastical reformer. One obituary following his death described him as “a prelate of distinguished piety, and of the most exemplary attention to the duties of his high station, as evinced by his increasing vigilance in enforcing the residence of the clergy, and by his disinterested appointments to the vacant livings” in his diocese, while Bishop O’Beirne of Meath described him as “an ornament and blessing to the Church of Ireland.”

On 8 December 1786, Brodrick married Mary, the daughter of Richard Woodward, Bishop of Cloyne. Of their children, Charles and William succeeded eventually as, respectively, the 6th Viscount Midleton and 7th Viscount Midleton (the latter being also Dean of Exeter), while Mary married the Earl of Bandon and Albinia married James Ashley Maude.