Eliza O’Neill, Lady Becher – Actress of Renoun

Miss O’Neill (eventually Lady Becher) was born in Ireland about the year 1791 and died at Mallow in September 1872. The following interesting details concerning her career are extracted from Sir Bernard Burke’s “Family Romance”

…..Her father, Mr John O’Neill , was at the time of her birth the manager of a strolling company, whose wanderings were pretty extensive, being bounded on the south by the ocean at Kinsale, and on the north by the Giants’ Causeway. Her mother’s maiden name was Featherstone, and to her care the future tragedian was chiefly indebted for her education. She made her first essay as the little Duke of York in Shakespeare’s King Richard the Third, her father playing the part of the crook-backed tyrant. Such was the admiration excited by her talent, that she proved no small pecuniary advantage to her family. Continue reading “Eliza O’Neill, Lady Becher – Actress of Renoun”

Perceval – Earls of Egmont

The first member of the Perceval family who settled in Ireland was Richard, eldest son of George Perceval Lord of Tykenham and Rolleston. He was born in Somerset in 1550 and educated at St Paul’s Westminister and Lincoln’s Inn where brilliance as a student was only matched by his dissipated and disorderly conduct. His father cut him off from his inheritances when he married a Miss Young of Dorset. He quickly acquired a large family and took himself off for Spain at the age of a effort to support them.

When his wife died in the year 1586, Estranged from his father, Richard Perceval won the patronage of Lord Burleigh and a lowly position of great trust and secrecy in the service  of Elizabeth I. Documents recently captured from a Spanish ship on its way to Holland lay in Elizabeth’s court but could not be de-coded and Perceval got the task of and decoding them, having an exceptional aptitude for languages and for code-breaking. He returned the documents the next day to Elizabeth in person, deciphered, translated and fairly written in Spanish, Latin and English.

Spanish Armada

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A Castlemagner Castaway

Denis Higgins was born in Castlemagner in 1787. A shepherd/labourer, he married Honora (Norry) Murphy in 1822, he 35, she 19 and they had 5 children in the next 6 years; John (1822), Mary (’23), Catherine (’25) followed by Joanna and Denis Jnr, both of whom died in childhood.

Circa 1820, the introduction of the steel plough resulted in massive unemployment and acute privation and although Geoff O’Donoghue has posthumously pardoned Denis of sheep-stealing, he was, nonetheless, dispatched to Sydney Cove aboard the ‘Governor Ready’, arriving down-under on 16th January, 1829 after a journey of 117 days. Continue reading “A Castlemagner Castaway”

Assolas House

Assolas House is the oldest known and perhaps the most historic residence in Duhallow. It was the focal point in the Battle of Knocknanuss in November 1647. Prior to the reformation (1558), it is generally accepted that Assolas was occupied by a community of Catholic monks.

The present stone out-offices with the still visible castings of closed-up windows, all in an excellent state of preservation, bear ample testimony to its monastic nature. A unique feature of this building is the presence of a “Leper’s Peep”, still visible, and which lends much weight to the theory of its religious origins. It notable that the “Leper’s Peep” has been a source of much interest and controversy to historians during the past century.

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Sir Timothy O’Brien

Sir Timothy O’Brien was not only a resident of Lohort but also was a local ‘character’. A man of exceptional sporting fame himself, he was connected with events and people of great national moment through the Parnell period and the early days of Irish national emergence. He was associated with Lohort for about forty years until 1917.

In the last quarter of the 19th century, Lohort was owned and occupied by a man called Sir Timothy O’Brien. Unusual for a resident of this latterly very English retreat, he was a Catholic. He inherited his knighthood from his grandfather. He inherited the castle and land from his father who had purchased it at the break-up of the Egmont/Perceval estates. His father was a prosperous Dublin publican, a younger son of Sir Lucius O’Brien of Dromoland, a nephew of William Smyth-O’Brien, the famous Irish Nationalist and liberal politician from County Clare, and close friend and confidante of the great Daniel O‘Connell. The family was a cadet branch of the extended Earls of Thomond and Inchequin whose less reputable roots led back to Morrogh O’Brien Lord Inchequin, ‘Morrogh of the Burnings’, well known to the people around Castlemagner for his victory over Lord Taaffe and Sir Alasdair McColla Ciotach McDonnell at Knocknanuss in 1647. Continue reading “Sir Timothy O’Brien”

The Kingdom of Dal Riada

The origin of the Dal Riada lies with the Conn, the ancient Iberian-Celtic tribe who gave their name to Lough Conn and to the ancient province of Connaught. By pre-Christian times, they were powerful in North Ulster and had penetrated the Pictish kingdoms on the west coast of Scotland. By Christian times, the tribe had split into an Irish-based Dal Riada and a Scottish-based Dal Riada. The tribe got its name from Cairbre Riata, son of Cormac McArt (227-266). Cairbre was the first to found a settlement of any size in Alba (the west coast of Scotland). His wife was Oileach, a Pict and relations with the Picts were largely peaceful. His son Colla Uais built up the strength of the settlement and gave his name to Clann Colla, his descendants in Alba, and also to the Maguires McConnells and McMahons in Ulster who shared that descent.

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McAlasdrum – Sir Alasdair McColla Ciotach McDonnell

For the ethnic roots of McAlasdrum, we must go back in time to Irish pre-history and the ancient Ulster kingdom of Dal Riada. The territory of Dal Riada lay along  the north and east coasts of Antrim, the Western Isles of Scotland and the west coast of Scotland. It flourished as an independent Gaelic kingdom through to the 12th century when it’s Scottish territories were incorporated into the Kingdom of Scotland. The Antrim territories were in the kingdom of Ireland. Continue reading “McAlasdrum – Sir Alasdair McColla Ciotach McDonnell”

Protestantism in Castlemagner

The first Protestant Church in Castlemagner was converted from the early Roman Catholic church (circa 800) that was attached to the old Gaelic settlement of Munemanarrach (shrubbery of the sheepfold).

The majority of the ruling classes in Cork ignored the reformation in England (1543) even though they had all signed for the Act of Supremacy (1560). They conveniently ignored its contents and openly practised the Roman Catholic religion. Although all the leading families who took part in the unsuccessful Fitzmaurice rebellion in 1579 got the Queen’s pardon, allowing them to hold on to their land, property and titles, they were forced to adopt the Protestant religion. Edmond Magner became the first Protestant vicar of the old Gaelic church which was now for Protestant worship only. Continue reading “Protestantism in Castlemagner”