(1743-28 July 1789), clergyman. John McKenna was born at Brownstown, County Meath, Ireland. His father, Michael McKenna, was a farmer. John McKenna studied on the Continent for the priesthood. He was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop John Macdonald in Scotland in 1768. Immediately after ordination, he was made resident priest of Lochaber, in the Highlands, with responsibility also for Badenoch. (Fr Alexander Macdonell was later a priest in the same area, becoming ultimately, of course, the first bishop of Upper Canada.) As a native speaker of Irish Gaelic (the language for which the preferred name is now “Irish”), essentially the same language as the Scottish Gaelic, Fr McKenna was able to offer the Highlanders religious consolations in a language they understood, both in Scotland and, afterwards, across the Atlantic. In 1773, Fr McKenna accompanied the Roman Catholic emigrants on the Pearl on their voyage to the New World. He then served as the pastor of the emigrants in Sir William and Sir John Johnson’s settlement in New York province. On the outbreak of the American Revolution, Fr McKenna took the loyal side. He travelled to Canada in the later part of 1776 to acquaint General Guy Carleton with conditions in the area of the Highlanders’ settlements in New York province, and to arrange for the migration of the Highlanders to Canada. He also served as chaplain to the Roman Catholics in the King's Royal Regiment of New York and the Royal Highland Emigrants. (Rev. John Bethune was also a chaplain in the latter regiment.) In 1777, as a chaplain, Fr McKenna was present at the attack on Fort Stanwix. In 1778, suffering from ill health, he returned to Ireland.

     At first in Ireland, his ill health continuing, he did not serve in any parish, but later he was parish priest of Donaghmore and Kilbride in County Meath. He is buried at Danestown in the same county. A man of great stature, he was known in his early years for his unusual strength. General Carleton, in a testimonial dated at Quebec 25 June 1778, wrote, “I do hereby Certifye that the Rev. Mr. McKenna at a great Risque and Hazard came into the Province with a great number of Royalists whom he has Excited to follow his Example from Johnstown in Summer 1776, and that ever since his Residence here, he has shown an Zeal and Attachment to the Kings Service, and went as Chaplain to partys of Roman Catholic Royalists and Indians upon the Expedition to Fort Stanwix under the command of Lieut. Col. St. Leger.” Fr McKenna is a figure of significance in the history of Glengarry and Stormont County through his work in supporting and encouraging the loyalty of the Highlanders and in assisting their emigration from New York province to Canada, where they were prominent among the founders of those counties. There appears to be no evidence that he himself was ever in the counties mentioned. However, he has been seen as particularly associated with the founding of the Parish of St. Andrew’s, at St. Andrew’s West, through his influence on Highlanders who came to St. Regis, and then to the GC-Cornwall area. A writer in 1933-34 mentioned that it was “fitting that this man who did so much in bringing to Canada the germ of the Glengarry Colony should be remembered during this U. E. L. year.” (Kelly)

Rev. Edward Kelly, “The Reverend John McKenna, Loyalist Chaplain,” The Canadian Catholic Historical Association, Report 1933-1934, pp. 31-44 (Carleton quotation from this source) * Richard K. MacMaster, S. J., “Parish in Arms: a Study of Father John MacKenna and the Mohawk Valley Loyalists, 1773-1778,” United States Catholic Historical Society, Historical Records and Studies, XLV (1957), 107-125 * Kathleen Toomey, “Emigration from the Scottish Catholic Bounds, 1770-1810 and the Role of the Clergy,” Ph. D. thesis, University of Edinburgh, 1991 * Bibliography of Glengarry: index, GHS Newsletter Feb. 1997 * Cruikshank King's Royal Regiment of New York 239 *MS history of diocese of Alexandria, Archives of Ontario, Papers of Mgr Ewen Macdonald, “History of St. Raphael’s Continued,” p. 5: GC-area oral traditions about him described * Dictionary of Canadian Biography, IV, 271 (mentioned) * Sinnsearachd 75 (mentioned) * Villeneuve, 163