Robert Sibthorp

Sir Christopher Sibthorpe (died 1632), justice of the Court of King's Bench (Ireland), was one of his brothers.

[2] This friendship no doubt fostered the career of Robert, who presumably shared his brother's Puritan and Anti-Catholic beliefs, (as did Ussher).

Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, also praised Robert as an "honest and able man", and he has the respect of his fellow Bishops, who in 1640 recommended him for the vacant See of Ossory.

Formerly Treasurer of Killaloe and Prebendary of Maynooth in St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, he was nominated Bishop of Kilfenora on 19 June 1638 and consecrated on 11 November that year.

[3] In 1643 he was translated to Limerick, where he found that the Diocese had been so utterly wasted by the ravages of the Civil War that he was unable to derive any revenue from his bishopric.