Famous O'Briens in History
| WILLIAM SMITH O'BRIEN - (1803-1864) NATIONALIST |
| Born at Dromoland, Co. Clare, 17 October 1803, son of Sir Lucius O'Brien; educated at Harrow and Cambridge University. Conservative MP for Ennis 1825 and for Co. Limerick in 1835, but his views changed with experience of Parliament, and by 1844 he was a convinced Repealer. He became a leading member of the Young Irelanders and with the help of Gavan Duffy and others who had seceded from O'Connell founded the Irish Confederation in 1847. At a great meeting of the Confederation in Dublin on 15 March 1848 he urged the formation of a National Guard, with the example of Paris in mind. After the arrest of most of their leaders later that year and the suspension of habeas corpus, the Confererates still at liberty decided on an armed rising. They had made no real preparations, and the Famine had left the countryside spiritless. In the closing days of July a small party under O'Brien clashed with forty six policeman at Ballingarry, Co. Tipperary. This skirmish brought the rising of 1848 to an inglorious end. O'Brien was arrested shortly after, tried, and sentenced to death. The sentence was commuted to penal servitude for life and he served five years in Tasmania. He was released in 1854 on condition that he stay outside the United Kingdom. His pardon was made unconditional in 1856; he returned to Ireland but took little part in politics. Died at Bangor in Wales on 16 June 1864. |
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