L. A .G. Strong in his 1937 biography of Thomas Moore opined that the ballad The Night That Larry was Stretched was "magnificent", and one wonders how he might have evaluated it in relation to Moore's melodies. Saying that Moore attributed this ballad to Robert Burrowes, Strong concedes that "the anthologists have not followed his lead". Burrowes, who was Moore's tutor while at Trinity College, is described as "a clergyman, a good scholar with a considerable reputation as a wit, who became Dean of Cork".
Moore entered Trinity in 1795, at which time Peter Burrowes (1753-1841), king's counsel, was among Wolfe Tone's friends. Of Burrowes, Tone wrote that he was "a man whose talents I admire, whose virtues I reverence, and whose person I love". Burrowes was an anti-Union MP who defended Robert Emmet at his trial, and was later discovered to be discreetly making a small annuity to Mrs Tone, his friend's mother, who was living in cheap lodgings in Monck Place in Dublin's Phibsborough.
This English surname, meaning "of (i.e. at) the fort/manor", is variously spelt Borrow(e)s, Burrow(e)s, Borrough(e)s and Burrough(e)s. Burrows is the most common spelling in Ireland, and current telephone directories list 230 so-named north of the Border, and 40 to its south. Burrowes is the next most common spelling. The name which was but little-known in Ireland before the 17th century, was wrongly claimed to be Brugha in Irish. De Bhulbh's Sloinnte na hEireann/ Irish Surnames gives de Bru as the Irish.
Five gardens and several houses in St Andrew's parish, to the south of Dame Street had been occupied by George Burrowes prior to 1628. In the 1638 will of Sir Edward Wingfield (to be buried at Powerscourt) left £20 each "to his dear & well beloved friends Edmund Blunt and Erasmus Burrowes, who are appointed executors". A Census of Ireland 1659 lists persons of this name as tituladoes in Lower Fisherstreet, Kinsale; Kilbrittain, Co Cork; Aghaboy, Co Monaghan; St Warburgh Street, Dublin, and Grange mellon, Co Kildare. Sir Walter Burroughs was a Co Kildare commissioner for the Poll-money Ordnances of 1660 and 1661, while Thomas and Richard Burrows were 1661 commissioners for Co Cavan. Taylor & Skinners Maps of the Roads of Ireland (1778) shows Rev Dr Burrows at Blackrock, Co Dublin, and Burrows esq., at Stradone, Co Cavan.
The 1814 Directory lists the residences of seven of this name - in Cos Tyrone, Longford, Westmeath, Kildare, and three in Co Cavan. One of the latter was at Stradone House. In 1876 Stradone House was the site of the 9,572 acres holding of Robert Burrowes as listed in Owners of Land of One Acre and Upwards. Persons bearing this surname had land in half of Ireland's 32 counties, and in all four provinces. Of the larger ones two were in Co Kildare, and one each in Cos Offaly, Meath, Laois, Clare and Leitrim. Sir Erasmus Dixon Burrowes, Baronet, Barretstown Castle, Ballymore Eustace, Co Kildare, had 2,351 acres there, as well as holdings in Cos Meath (247 acres), Laois (2,467 acres) and Roscommon (462 acres).
Erasmus was the literary name of an eminent Dutch scholar (1466-1536), who advocated a system of pronunciation of ancient Greek, and this first-name was used by the Burrowes family down through the ages. We find it in 1638, 1789, 1837 and 1876.
The Ulster Volunteer Force was set up in April 1913, and the monthly reports of the county inspector noted that its members were "drilling vigorously" in January. He also reported that an attempt had been made to injure Lord Farnham, when he and Mr T. J. Burrowes of Stradone were returning from a volunteer drill. Barbed wire had been stretched across the road at a height of 31/2 feet. The attempt was unsuccessful as Lord Farnham stopped his motor car before striking the wire. When the Co Cavan War Relief Fund was established in 1914 the conveners of the first meeting were largely the wives of the gentry, among whom was Mrs Burrowes.
Stradone names a townland in the Co Cavan parish of Larah, and derives from Sraith an Domhain. Sraith is defined as holm, "a piece of flat low-lying ground by a river or stream". Domhain? world, earth.