Overview
A niece of Jane Austen is buried in the graveyard at Conwal Parish Church – a daughter of the novelist’s brother Edward, laid to rest beside her husband, the Donegal landlord Lord George Hill. That single grave is the most interesting thing about an otherwise modest building, and it sets the tone: the real reward here is the churchyard, not the interior.
The church sits at the top of Church Street in Letterkenny’s Cathedral Quarter, directly across from the Roman Catholic Cathedral of St Eunan and St Columba. It’s a Church of Ireland church dating to the 17th century, which means it pre-dates the far grander cathedral opposite by roughly two hundred years. One honest caveat before you make a special trip: as a working church it’s frequently locked outside service times, and visitors have found the door open only by chance. Come for the graveyard, which is open, and treat the interior as a bonus.
The building
The present church is believed to have been built when an older church at Conwal, near Churchill, fell into ruin. A ‘fair Church’ in Letterkenny is recorded in the Civil Survey of 1652–56, and in 1733 the building was slated and one side seated under the rector, the Rev William Spann – whose 1744 chalice and paten the parish still uses at communion.
What survives is rubble-built with an ashlar spire, though the church you see is largely a 19th-century one: the south aisle was added in 1865 to designs by the ecclesiastical architects Welland & Gillespie. If you do get inside, the thing to look up at is the early-19th-century cast-iron circular roof, with its iron trusses, a short gallery and twisted brass brackets – an unusual bit of industrial-age engineering for a small parish church.
The graveyard
This is where the hour goes. The churchyard holds a genuine cross-section of old Letterkenny: landowners, clergy and the town’s own founder, George Murbury, who is interred here. The oldest marker is the Wray family vault of 1750 – or what’s left of it, since vandals ‘smashed it to smithereens’ in 1971.
The Jane Austen connection is the draw for most who seek the place out. Lord George Hill, a notable and much-debated 19th-century Donegal landlord, lies beside his wife, Austen’s niece; literary-minded visitors come specifically to find the stone. The parish also counts the Rev John Kinnear among its figures – a Letterkenny minister who became an MP for County Donegal and campaigned for tenants’ rights in the 1880s.
Visiting
- Admission: No charge, but the church is often locked outside services – there’s no guarantee the interior will be open when you arrive.
- Services: Sunday worship is at 10.30am, with an early Eucharist at 8am; the interior is closed to general visitors during services.
- Parking: On-street spaces on Church Street and around the Cathedral Quarter fill quickly on shopping days. The Letterkenny town car park off Main Street is about a five-minute walk.
- Nearby: St Eunan’s Cathedral is directly across the road, and the Donegal County Museum is a short walk through the town centre.
If the door is shut, don’t count it a wasted trip: spend the time among the headstones, find the Austen-Hill grave, and read the inscriptions shifting from 18th-century Latin to plainer 19th-century English as you move through the yard.