MacGurk Memorial, St Colombkilles Roman Catholic Church, 1 Creggan Road, Carrickmore, Omagh, Co. Tyrone, BT79 9BD

The MacGurk Memorial is a freestanding monument erected in 1944, located within the grounds of St Columbkille's Roman Catholic Church on the north side of Creggan Road in Carrickmore. The memorial comprises a tapered and stepped reconstituted stone plinth surmounted by a Celtic cross, all set upon a blockwork plinth wall formerly finished with roughcast and concrete coping.

The plinth displays inscriptions on its south elevation in both Gaelic and English, commemorating the Right Reverend Bryan MacGurk, Dean of Armagh and Vicar General: "In Memory of Rt. Rev Bryan MacGurk Dean of Armagh and Vicar General of Blessed Oliver Plunket. Born in this parish 1622. For the faith he laboured and endured much and was often imprisoned. He died in Armagh Jail 1713". The Celtic cross surmounting the plinth is carved with Celtic motifs and features a beaded edge, with a monogram carving to its centre and gablet coping. The north elevation of the plinth remains blank. The memorial is constructed of reconstituted stone.

The memorial stands in an elevated churchyard position to the south of St Columbkille's Church, overlooking the village of Carrickmore. The graveyard to the south and west contains nineteenth and twentieth-century grave markers and memorials. The site is bounded to the road at the south by rendered and rubble walling, and to the car park at the west by a rendered retaining wall. The memorial appears to have inspired various later memorials within the adjacent graveyard.

Bryan MacGurk was Dean of Armagh and Vicar General during the Penal Laws period, when priests faced arrest and trial on suspicion of treason. He was tried repeatedly at Dungannon, Armagh, and Monaghan in 1682–1683 on charges of "extolling foreign jurisdiction" for exercising ecclesiastical authority under papal authority. Though acquitted each time, he endured repeated imprisonment and attempts to bail him before trial. In an unusual step toward self-protection, MacGurk notified local justices of his meetings with clergy and invited Protestant observers, fearing false denunciations from fellow priests. His poor command of English caused him concern that his words might be misconstrued against him. By 1712, at the age of ninety and in failing health, MacGurk was captured by magistrate Walter Dawson for the £50 reward offered for a popish dean. Dawson's own brother protested to Dublin Castle, describing the prisoner as bedridden, senile, and "the most miserable wretch as he now lies in Gaol that ever was seen". MacGurk died in Armagh Gaol in February 1713, five months after his capture.