Nick Maxwell By John Rodden A once-famous and now all-too-forgotten episode in the annals of ‘sensational spats’ was the belligerent confrontation between the 60-year-old Daniel O’Connell, then near the height of his reputation and influence, and the brash, ambitious, 31-year-old Benjamin Disraeli, future Conservative prime minister of the United Kingdom. It was a historic encounter—indeed, it resulted … Read more
Ellis Lynch was a companion and business partner to Peregrine Tasburgh and connected her English husband with the Catholic society of Connacht. When Peregrine was summoned to the Church of Ireland consistory courts of Tuam and of Killala, it being ‘impossible for him to be at both places at one time’, Ellis wrote that she … Read more
The estate included lands in the counties of Mayo and Galway, some quite widely dispersed but mostly around the town of Cong, as well as fisheries and ‘impropriate’ tithes (that is, tithes enjoyed by lay owners rather than the clergy). The lands were reckoned to comprise 2,502 acres in 1698 and 7,770 acres in 1852. … Read more
By John Bergin Catholics of the early modern era in Ireland and in England have often been considered as quite distinct and unconnected. In fact there were links, not least at the level of the landed gentry, who crossed the Irish Sea in both directions, settling, intermarrying and owning property in each other’s countries. The … Read more
Tower Hill, Portlaw, Co. Waterford By Damian Murphy The nineteenth-century fascination with Early Christian round towers prompted the repair of antiquities and the construction of facsimiles as monuments to Daniel O’Connell (1851–5) in Glasnevin and to the casualties of the Crimean War (1857–8) near Wexford. The revival of interest can be traced back to the … Read more