Rory O'Donnell, 1st Earl of Tyrconnell

Rory O'Donnell (Irish: Rudhraighe Ó Domhnaill) (1575 – 30 July 1608), younger brother of Hugh Roe O'Donnell, was the last King of Tyrconnell and 1st Earl of Tyrconnell.^[2]

Early life[]

O'Donnell was one of nine known children of Sir Hugh O'Donnell, who reigned from 1566 until he abdicated in favour of his eldest son by his second wife, Hugh Roe O'Donnell, in 1592. By this point the sons of his first wife had been disabled or killed, mostly by his Scottish-born second wife the Inion Dubh.^[a]

After the defeat at Kinsale in December 1601, Rory became acting chief when his older brother left to seek help from Spain. He led the clan back to Connaught and maintained a guerilla warfare until December 1602, when he submitted to Lord Deputy Mountjoy at Athlone.

Head of the clan O'Donnell[]

In 1602, O'Donnell succeeded his recently deceased brother Hugh as King of Tyrconnell and head of the clan O'Donnell. Having submitted in London to the new King, James I, he was created Earl of Tyrconnell^[1] per letters patent of 4 September 1603, with the subsidiary title Baron of Donegal reserved for his heir apparent. He was further granted the territorial Lordship of Tyrconnell per letters patent of 10 February 1604.

Flight of the Earls[]

There was much fury in Ireland and England that he and Hugh O'Neill, 2nd Earl of Tyrone had been treated so gingerly after allegedly committing treason (this became known as the Sham Plot), but time was on the side of the English authorities. On 14 September 1607, both Earls set sail from Lough Swilly with their families and followers for eventual exile in Spanish Flanders and Rome. Tyrconnell died in Rome in 1608.

Visit to Rome[]

O'Donnell visited Rome, and was given a hero's welcome by the Pope and Roman nobility. He paid homage to Pope Paul V at the latter's residence in the Quirinal Palace. He most likely also visited St. Peter's Basilica, then under construction in its current form. As such, he would also have had the royal privilege of ascending and later descending the Scala Regia in the Vatican. Some decades later, when Bernini restored the Scala Regia, he placed a sculpture of his own making there, an equestrian statue of Emperor Constantine, and re-designed the stairway such that light shines down through a window above, with the (inter alia) O'Donnell motto In Hoc Signo Vinces, reminiscent of Constantine's vision, overhead. The motto appears prominently placed on a sculpted ribbon unfurled with a passion cross to its left, beneath the window over the Scala Regia, in order that all monarchs and royalty thenceforth visiting the Pope, would be reminded on leaving, to follow the Cross, and thence turn right into the atrium of St. Peter's Basilica, ostensibly so inspired.

Death and burial[]

Shortly thereafter, O'Donnell died in Rome, after a short sojourn in Ostia due to his fever (probably malaria). As was customary for his forebears' funerals, he was laid out dressed in Franciscan robes. He was then given a prince's burial in the Church of San Pietro in Montorio on the Janiculum Hill. The Church was commissioned by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, and marks a traditional location of St. Peter's crucifixion. Historically under Spanish protection, it now forms part of a Franciscan monastery and adjoins a Spanish Royal Academy under the custody of the Spanish Embassy in Rome. O'Donnell's tombstone is a flagstone under a carpet lying before the high altar in that church.

Family[]

O'Donnell married Bridget, daughter of Henry FitzGerald, 12th Earl of Kildare,^[1] by whom he had two children: Hugh and Mary. After his death Bridget married Nicholas Barnewall, 1st Viscount Barnewall (1592–1663) with whom she had five sons and four daughters that survived him.

O'Donnell's only son, Hugh, was three weeks shy of his first birthday when the Earls sailed from Lough Swilly, and was raised in Louvain, Spanish Flanders. In time he joined the service of the King of Spain, and was killed in action when his ship engaged a French vessel in August or September 1642 and caught fire. He succeeded his father as 2nd Earl of Tyrconnell, but left no offspring; the title of Earl would have descended to his first cousin Domhnall Oge's line were it not meanwhile attainted in 1614.

O'Donnell's youngest child, Mary Stuart O'Donnell, left a more lasting impression on posterity. Born in England in 1608. After her father's death, King James I of England, the first Stuart King of England, who was James VI of Scotland gave her the name Stuart, in recognition of their common Stuart ancestry – they were ninth cousins – hence she was known as Mary Stuart O'Donnell. She was descended, through her mother, Bridget née Fitzgerald, from the Stuarts. She was raised by her mother in Kildare lands in Ireland until she was twelve years old. In 1619 Mary was sent to live with her grandmother, Lady Kildare in London where Lady Kildare aimed to educate the girl and make her her heiress. Her mother Bridget meanwhile remarried and had a further nine children.

She made her way to Brussels to the court of Archduchess Lady Isabella Clara Eugenia whom she begged for financial support. Here Mary could have ended a rift between the O'Neill and O'Donnell families by agreeing to marry Sean O'Neill, but she refused this and went against the wishes of her brother Hugh and the King of Spain. Disgraced and cast out by her brother, Mary and her lover left for Genoa where she married her lover Dudley O'Gallagher. The couple had two children that died as infants after Mary wrote to the papacy for help on numerous occasions stating that she had been reduced to a wretched state and was living "in two miserable rooms". Help did not come and Mary's family survived on a small sum from the archduchess and her husband's army wages. Mary's husband died in Austria in Imperial service in 1635 and it seems Mary married again to an Irish naval captain in 1639, nothing more is known of her life.

Family tree[]

Notes[]

References[]

• Meehan, Charles Patrick (1870). The Fate and Fortunes of the Earls of Tyrone (Hugh O'Neill) and Tyrconnel (Rory O'Donel), their flight from Ireland and death in exile (2 ed.). London: James Duffy. OCLC 17958027.
• O’Donnell, Francis Martin (2018), The O'Donnells of Tyrconnell – A Hidden Legacy, Washington, D.C.: Academica Press LLC, ISBN 978-1-680534740
• Wealth of Dignity, Poverty of Destiny – The Destitution of a Catholic Princess for her Devotion (The tragic story of Mary, Princess of Tyrconnell, Rory's daughter), by Francis Martin O'Donnell, Knight of Malta, in pages 3–6 of O'Domhnaill Abu, the O'Donnell Clann Newsletter no. 32, published by V. O'Donnell, Inver, County Donegal, Summer 2004 [ISSN 0790-7389].
• History of Killeen Castle, by Mary Rose Carty, published by Carty/Lynch, Dunsany, County Meath, Ireland, April 1991 (ISBN 0-9517382-0-8) – page 18 refers to Elizabeth O'Donnell as 1st Countess of Fingall.
• Calendar of State Papers – 1603-4 – James I (item 123, pages 79–80), National Library of Ireland, Dublin.
• Red Hugh O Donnell's sisters, Siobhan and Nuala, Paul Walsh, in Irish Leaders and Learning, ed. O'Muraile, Dublin, 2003, pp. 326–29.
• http://www.araltas.com/features/odonnell/

Further reading[]

• Bagwell, Richard (1895). "O'Donnell, Rory" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. 41. London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 444–447.
• Burke, Sir Bernard (1866), "O'Donnell–Earl of Tyrconnell", A Genealogical History of the Dormant: Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages of the British Empire, Harrison, pp. 408–410
• Kinney, Arthur F; Copeland, Thomas W; Kinney, Arthur F; Swain, David W; Hill, Eugene D; Long, William A (2000), "O'Donnell, Hugh Roe, Lord of Connell", Tudor England: An Encyclopedia, Routledge, p. 517, ISBN 978-1-136-74530-0
• Silke, John J. (May 2006) [2004]. "O'Donnell, Rury, styled first earl of Tyrconnell (1574/5–1608)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/20559. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)