Born Barbara Fagan in the early 1750s to Bryan and Elizabeth Fagan in Dublin, Verschoyle was the sixth daughter of eight in the family. Her father was a land agent for the FitzWilliam estate in Dublin and brewer for the brewery on Usher's Island in Dublin.
When her father died in 1761, her mother continued running both businesses until her own death in October 1789.[1]
The FitzWilliam estate at this time was undergoing significant development in the Merrion street and surrounding area.[2]
In 1750, there were believed to be about 35 breweries in the city.[3][4]
Family
Barbara Fagan took over the family business at some point after her mother died, certainly by 1796. The Catholic Fagan married a Protestant merchant, Richard Verschoyle of the Verschoyle family.
Her husband was born in Donore, County Meath in 1751 to Joseph and Margaret (Mottley) Verschoyle. His paternal lineage was Huguenot. He died in 1827 in Brighton, Sussex, England.[2][4]
The couple had no children and Verschoyle remained working for the FitzWilliam estate until her husband's death in 1827. The couple lived in Mount Merrion House on the estate in Dublin.[2][4]
Career
She worked very closely with Richard FitzWilliam, 7th Viscount FitzWilliam of Merrion and managed a significant and valuable estate. In 1816, the estate was estimated to be worth £14,000 per year and over 1,275 acres in size. Typical work for an agent included the negotiation of leases, selection of new tenants, collecting rents from existing tenants and ensuring the franchise rights of freeholders. This made the role an inherently political one considering the changes the country was undergoing during the late 1700s.
The passing of the 1793 relief act and the uncertain economic conditions. The 1798 rebellion made rents particularly difficult to college. Though Verschoyle had some ideas on how to adjust the leases to reduce periods when rent was almost impossible to collect, the rebellion and the Acts of Union 1800 made the situation even more difficult.[5][2][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13]
Church of the Assumption Booterstown
With the loss of the Parliament in Dublin in 1801 there were economic difficulties in the city. However, the estate value continued to rise. Verschoyle was able to convince FitzWilliam to donate land for a church in Booterstown and the 1812 Italianate church was erected and paid for by Viscount FitzWilliam. Verschoyle also oversaw the transformation of adjoining land into a girls school and she donated personal funds to assist in the running of it each year. In 1826, she oversaw the construction of the parish school. In 1816, FitzWilliam died and the estate passed to his heir, George Herbert, 11th Earl of Pembroke. Verschoyle continued in her role as agent until her husband died. At that point, she retired.[2]
Legacy
Once retired Verschoyle focused on her charities. She worked to establish a new convent using money bequeathed to her by Fitzwilliam to build a convent school and gave more from her own funds to pay for the school chaplain. She was patron of the school and invited the Sisters of Charity to run it. They were in Stanhope street in Dublin and they took over the school in Sandymount in 1831.[2][14][9]
Verschoyle died in Dublin on 25 January 1837. There is a small memorial to her in the church recording her role in its erection.[2][15][4]
John FitzGibbon, 1st Earl of Clare PC (Ire) was Attorney-General for Ireland from 1783 to 1789 and Lord Chancellor of Ireland from 1789 to 1802.
Mount Merrion is a suburb of Dublin, Ireland. It is roughly 7 kilometres (5 mi) south of Dublin city centre and is situated on and around the hill of the same name.
Richard FitzWilliam, 5th Viscount FitzWilliam, PC (Ireland), of Mount Merrion in Dublin, was an Irish nobleman and Whig politician.
Viscount FitzWilliam, of Merrion in the County of Dublin, was a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1629 for Thomas FitzWilliam, along with the subsidiary title Baron FitzWilliam, of Thorncastle in the County of Dublin, also in the Peerage of Ireland. He was succeeded by his son Oliver, the second Viscount. In 1661 Oliver was created Earl of Tyrconnell in the Peerage of Ireland. The earldom became extinct on his death in 1667, but he was succeeded in the barony and viscountcy by his younger brother William FitzWilliam, the third Viscount. William's grandson Richard, the fifth Viscount, represented Fowey in the British Parliament. His son Richard, the sixth Viscount, was a member of both the Irish and English Privy Councils. The seventh Viscount was a benefactor and musical antiquarian. The titles became extinct on the death of the ninth Viscount in 1833.
Booterstown is a coastal suburb of the city of Dublin in Ireland. It is also a townland and civil parish in the modern county of Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown. It is situated about 7 km (4.3 mi) south of Dublin city centre.
Oliver FitzWilliam, 1st Earl of Tyrconnell and 2nd Viscount FitzWilliam, was an Irish nobleman.
Richard FitzWilliam, 7th Viscount FitzWilliam of Mount Merrion, Dublin, Ireland, and of FitzWilliam House in the parish of Richmond in Surrey, England, was an Anglo-Irish nobleman in the Peerage of Ireland who was a benefactor and musical antiquarian who founded the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England, with a bequest of his library and art collection. He was also a significant urban developer in the City of Dublin. He served as a Member of Parliament for Wilton in Wiltshire, England, from 1790 until his death.
Fitzwilliam Square is a Georgian garden square in the south of central Dublin, Ireland. It was the last of the five Georgian squares in Dublin to be built, and is the smallest.
Milton Hall near Peterborough, is the largest private house in Cambridgeshire, England. As part of the Soke of Peterborough, it was formerly in Northamptonshire. It dates from 1594, being the historical home of the Fitzwilliam family, and is situated in an extensive park in which some original oak trees from an earlier Tudor deer park survive. The house is a Grade I listed building; the garden is Grade II*.
Margaret Butler, Countess of Ormond, Countess of Ossory was an Irish noblewoman and a member of the powerful and celebrated FitzGerald dynasty also known as "The Geraldines". She married Piers Butler, 8th Earl of Ormond, by whom she had three sons and six daughters.
Richard FitzWilliam, 6th Viscount FitzWilliam, KB, PC, FRS, of Mount Merrion, near Dublin, Ireland, was an Anglo-Irish peer and property developer.
Merrion Castle was a castle situated about 300m south of the present-day Merrion Gates, to the south of Dublin city centre. Built in the early fourteenth century, it was from the sixteenth century to the early eighteenth century the principal seat of the Fitzwilliam family, who acquired the title Viscount Fitzwilliam. After the Fitzwiliams moved to Mount Merrion House in about 1710 the castle fell into ruin, and it was demolished in 1780, though there were remains visible as late as 1837. No trace of Merrion Castle survives today. It was located opposite Merrion Gates, on the site of St. Mary's Home and School for the Blind. Its location, and the modern site of St.Mary's, can be seen on historical maps, including the six-inch (1829-1841) Ordnance Survey of Ireland maps.
Thomas FitzWilliam, 1st Viscount Fitzwilliam (1581–1650) was an Irish nobleman of the Stuart age. He was born to wealth and privilege, and acquired a peerage, but due to his loyalty to the English Crown, he suffered considerable hardship during the English Civil War, and died in poverty.
William FitzWilliam, 3rd Viscount FitzWilliam (c.1610–1674) was an Irish nobleman of the Stuart era. He fought on the Royalist side during the English Civil War, but later made his peace with the Cromwellian regime. In his later years, he openly professed the Roman Catholic faith, which was then illegal.
James Fitzwilliam was an Irish landowner and judge who held the office of Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer. He was the ancestor of the prominent Dublin landowning family which acquired the titles Viscount FitzWilliam and Earl of Tyrconnell.
General the Honourable John Fitzwilliam was a British Army officer.
William Lane-Joynt (1824-1895) was an Irish barrister and politician, and is the only person to have been both Mayor of Limerick and Lord Mayor of Dublin.
Henry Watkins (1666-1727) of Christ Church, Oxford, and Duke Street, Westminster, was an army administrator and diplomat who served briefly as a Member of Parliament for Brackley in Northamptonshire.
Sir John Cruys or Cruise was a prominent Irish military commander, diplomat and judge of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. He was one of the most substantial landowners in County Dublin and County Meath and built Merrion Castle near Dublin City in the 1360s. His marriage to the heiress of the powerful Verdon family of Clonmore brought him in addition substantial lands in County Louth. He sat in the Irish Parliament and was a member of the King's Council. He was a highly regarded public servant, but also a determined and acquisitive man of business, who fought a ten-year battle to establish his wife's right to her inheritance.
The Royal Hibernian Marine School, also known for a period as Mountjoy & Marine School, was a charity school in Dublin, Ireland established in 1766 to care for and educate the orphaned children of seamen. The school's building on Sir John Rogerson's Quay was in use as a school from 1773 until 1904 and continued to be used as offices and storage until the 1970s before being demolished in 1979.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
