Kingsley Porter
Taken from The Secret Places of Donegal by John M. Feehan

A few miles west of Bloody Foreland is the delightful strand of Magheroarty from where you can make arrangements to travel to Tory Island or Inishbofin. The nearer island of Inishbofin is only 3 miles away and it is well worth a day trip. On the northern part of the island there is a stone cottage which was once the summer home of Professor Kingsley Porter, an American archaeologist, probably one of the greatest authorities on Irish high crosses. Porter was a wealthy man who had purchased Glenveagh Castle, but as it was a little far from the sea he had a stone cottage built on the most remote part of Inishbofin. Together with his wife Lucy he spent many summers in this most secret corner of Donegal.

In July 1933 tragedy struck. His wife. Lucy Porter describes what happened:

...in the morning he (Kingsley) had gone out ahead of me and it must have been to the cliffs above the sea and he must have drowned. And the spring tide ebbing (it was the time of the summer moon) and the strong offshore wind blowing, must have swept his body out to sea, while a storm had come up bringing thunder, lightning and rain. Although Owen, Pat (two fishermen) and I searched all day long and into the night we had found no trace of him... no physical sign of him was ever again to be found.

There has always been some element of mystery about Kingsley Porter's death. According to newspaper reports at the time he was drowned off Tory Island from a curragh. It seems strange that he should have gone so far away to Tory in a curragh without his wife knowing it. The mystery deepens if one pays attention to the rumour that years later he was seen in New York. Yet another story says that a jealous rival turned the cursing stones of Innishmurray against him. Whatever happened he disappeared and it may well be that only the wild lonely cliffs of Inishbofin hold the answer.

Click here to read more about the history of Glenveagh Castle

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