Bishopscourt | |
|---|---|
Town | |
  Bishopscourt Location in Ireland | |
| Coordinates: 53°18′N6°30′W / 53.3°N 6.5°W Coordinates: 53°18′N6°30′W / 53.3°N 6.5°W | |
| Country | Ireland |
| Province | Leinster |
| County | County Kildare |
| Elevation | 61 m (200 ft) |
| Time zone | UTC+0 (WET) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC-1 (IST (WEST)) |
Bishopscourt is a townland and historic site in County Kildare, Ireland, near Kill, Ardclough and Straffan and beside the N7 road. The estate was once held by the Bishops of Kildare.
In 1527, Thomas, Bishop of Kildare, granted Bishopscourt to Piers Butler, 8th Earl of Ormond, and his wife Margaret. In 1537 it passed to John Alen, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. In 1676 it passed to John Margetson, later to die at the Siege of Limerick in 1690 fighting for William of Orange. His daughter married Brabazon Ponsonby, recorded in folklore as a fortune hunter.[ citation needed ]
The Ponsonby family became the most powerful political dynasty in 17th century Ireland. John Ponsonby was speaker of the Irish House of Commons (1753–1761), and William Ponsonby was leader of the Irish Whigs (1789–1803) and birthplace of his brother George Ponsonby (1755–1817) leader of the Whig Party in the British House of Commons at Westminster (1808–1817), his uncle Major-General Sir William Ponsonby (1772–1815) whose inept charge at the Battle of Waterloo resulted in his death at the hands of the Polish Lanciers and was studied as an example of failed battle strategy for generations afterwards, and of his sister Mary Ponsonby, wife of The 2nd Earl Grey, British Prime Minister from 1830 to 1834 and best known nowadays as the Earl Grey of the tea brand.
The fabric of the house was reconstructed to the design of Sir Richard Morrison in 1790. [1] It was on the grounds of the estate that Daniel O'Connell fought a duel with John d'Esterre on 1 February 1815. Subsequently, the house burnt down in the 1950s and was rebuilt.
At the walled west corner of the estate is a small blue door, and the adjacent road junction on the Straffan-Kill road is referred to as the Blue Door.
In 1838 Bishopscourt was sold by Frederick Ponsonby to The 3rd Earl of Clonmell, and in 1914 sold on to Edward Kennedy from Baronrath, at the time the most famous breeder of racehorses in Ireland. Kennedy's stallion The Tetrarch, standing at Bishopscourt, is confirmed as the most successful sire in the world in 1919. In 1938 the house passed to Edward's daughter Patricia (Tiggie) Kennedy and her husband, Dermot McGillycuddy, heir to Senator McGillycuddy of the Reeks, an ancient clan chiefdom from County Kerry. Edward Kennedy's son Major DM (John) Kennedy won an MC at Anzio whilst serving with 1st Battalion Irish Guards and was later killed at Terporten Castle in Germany in February 1945. It is now home to the Farrell family.
John William Ponsonby, 4th Earl of Bessborough, PC, known as Viscount Duncannon from 1793 to 1844, was a British Whig politician. He was notably Home Secretary in 1834 and served as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland between 1846 and 1847, the first years of the Great Famine.
Earl of Limerick is a title that has been created twice in the Peerage of Ireland, associated first with the Dongan family, then with the Pery family.
Earl of Bessborough is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1739 for Brabazon Ponsonby, 2nd Viscount Duncannon, who had previously represented Newtownards and County Kildare in the Irish House of Commons. In 1749 he was given the additional title of Baron Ponsonby of Sysonby, in the County of Leicester, in the Peerage of Great Britain, which entitled him to a seat in the British House of Lords. The titles Viscount Duncannon, of the fort of Duncannon in the County of Wexford, and Baron Bessborough, of Bessborough, Piltown, in the County of Kilkenny, had been created in the Peerage of Ireland in 1723 and 1721 respectively for Lord Bessborough's father William Ponsonby, who had earlier represented County Kilkenny in the Irish House of Commons.
Celbridge is a town and townland on the River Liffey in County Kildare, Ireland. It is 23 km (14 mi) west of Dublin. Both a local centre and a commuter town within the Greater Dublin Area, it is located at the intersection of the R403 and R405 regional roads. As of the 2016 census, Celbridge was the third largest town in County Kildare by population, with over 20,000 residents.
George Ponsonby, was a British lawyer and Whig politician. He served as Lord Chancellor of Ireland from 1806 to 1807 in the Ministry of All the Talents.
William Brabazon Ponsonby, 1st Baron Ponsonby , PC (Ire) was a leading Irish Whig politician, being a member of the Irish House of Commons, and, after 1800, of the United Kingdom parliament. Ponsonby was the son of the Hon. John Ponsonby, the Speaker of the Irish House of Commons and Lady Elizabeth Cavendish, daughter of the 3rd Duke of Devonshire. He was invested as a Privy Counsellor of Ireland in 1784. He served as Joint Postmaster-General of Ireland (1784–1789).
Straffan is a village in County Kildare, Ireland, situated on the banks of the River Liffey, 25 km upstream of the Irish capital Dublin. As of the 2016 census, the village had a population of 853, a nearly two-fold increase since the 2006 census.
Ponsonby may refer to:
Kill is a village and parish in County Kildare, Ireland near the county's border with Dublin beside the N7. Its population was recorded as 3,348 people in the 2016 census.
Ardclough, officially Ardclogh, is a village and community in the parish of Kill, County Kildare, Ireland. It is two miles (3 km) off the N7 national primary road. It is the burial place and probable birthplace of Arthur Guinness, who is said to have returned to the maternal homestead of the Reads at Huttonread to give birth in the tradition of the time.
County Kildare in the province of Leinster, Ireland, was first defined as a diocese in 1111, shired in 1297 and assumed its present borders in 1836. Its location in the Liffey basin on the main routes from Dublin to the south and west meant it was a valuable possession and important theatre of events throughout Irish history.
Oughterard is an ecclesiastical hilltop site, graveyard, townland, and formerly a parish, borough and royal manor in County Kildare, nowadays part of the community of Ardclough, close to the Dublin border. It is the burial place of Arthur Guinness.
Bishopscourt may refer to:
Whitechurch is a townland, monastic site, and former parish situated between Straffan and Kill county Kildare near the M7 motorway in Ireland.
Turnings is a townland and historic site in County Kildare, Ireland, situated on the banks of the Morell River, a tributary of the River Liffey 25 km upstream from the Irish capital Dublin. It is a rural area, and a planning application has been lodged with Kildare County Council (2007) to develop a town in the district.
The Straffan Rail Disaster occurred on 5 October 1853, when a goods train ran into the back of a stationary passenger train one-quarter mile (400 m) south of Straffan station in County Kildare.
William Robert FitzGerald, 2nd Duke of Leinster, KP, PC (Ire) was an Irish liberal politician and landowner. He was born in London.
The Hon. George Ponsonby, was an Irish politician, who served as a Junior Lord of the Treasury in the governments under Earl Grey and Lord Melbourne from 1832 to 1834.
Brabazon Ponsonby, 1st Earl of Bessborough, was a British politician and peer. He was the son of William Ponsonby, 1st Viscount Duncannon, and Mary Moore. He was an active politician from 1705 to 1757 in Great Britain and Ireland. He represented Newtownards and Kildare County in the Irish House of Commons. He inherited his father's viscountcy in 1724 and was made Earl of Bessborough in the Peerage of Ireland in 1739. He is buried in Fiddown, County Kilkenny, Ireland.
The High Sheriff of Kildare was the British Crown's judicial representative in County Kildare, Ireland from the 16th century until 1922, when the office was abolished in the new Free State and replaced by the office of Kildare County Sheriff. The High Sheriff had judicial, electoral, ceremonial and administrative functions and executed High Court Writs. In 1908, an Order in Council made the Lord Lieutenant the Sovereign's prime representative in a county and reduced the High Sheriff's precedence. However the sheriff retained his responsibilities for the preservation of law and order in the county. The usual procedure for appointing the sheriff from 1660 onwards was that three persons were nominated at the beginning of each year from the county and the Lord Lieutenant then appointed his choice as High Sheriff for the remainder of the year. Often the other nominees were appointed as under-sheriffs. Sometimes a sheriff did not serve his full term due to death or another event, and another sheriff was then appointed for the remainder of the year. The dates given in this article are the dates of appointment.