He lived in one of the most beautiful parts of Ireland - north Co Antrim. The Glens of Antrim, the Giant's Causeway, the ancient castles of Dunluce and Dunseverick would be known to him. There were turf moors and turf-cutters around him. Rathlin was a short boat journey from Ballycastle. There were the great salmon rivers of Bush and Bann. The Sea of Moyle he could overlook from the cliffs around Fair Head - "Silent, O Moyle, be the roar of thy waters", as Moore's melodies invoke the Children of Lir. And, of course, Scotland was no more than 13 miles away from the nearest point on the lovely coast road.
He was a Presbyterian minister. An advocate of Home Rule for all of Ireland. He was a fighter. For the rights of farmers and all who were oppressed. He differed from most of the Ulster of his day, wrote his son, in his realisation of the inherent justice of the claims of Catholic Ireland, and in his active championship of its cause. In education, his ideal was equal opportunity for all sects. He objected to his Presbyterian Church being seen as an appendage of, or an element in, the Unionist party. He was vigorous, outspoken, fierce even. Robert Lynd, the famous man of letters from Belfast, noted that this cleric, a Liberal and land-reformer, had always found that the most active and dangerous opponent of the Ulster Protestant farmer was not the Irish Catholic tenant, but the Irish Protestant landlord.
He was one of those people, Lynd went on, who brightened existence for their fellows by leading original and fearless lives, and of whom their fellows come to be proud, whatever their differences of opinion.
In a speech in the early Nineties of the last century, the Minister said: "I am sure that a race of Presbyterians and Protestants worthy of the best traditions of our faith will arise in the near future, with their minds cleared of Unionist cant, and blood purified from the rust or serfdom, and that they will claim to dwell in the land, not under the protection of the Saxon, not by permission of the Celt, but in virtue of the services they will render to a county which we love and for whose welfare we pray. And if I have contributed anything to that happy issue, I will be content to endure the toothless bites of the political clegs with which Ulster is swarming and whose presence only indicates the heat of the social atmosphere."
He was the Reverend J. B. Armour - Armour of Ballymoney.