Donal IV O'Donovan

Donal IV, or (Colonel) Daniel O'Donovan (Irish: Domhnall Ó Donnabháin), The O'Donovan,^[1] of Clancahill (died 1705), was the son of Donal III O'Donovan, The O'Donovan of Clancahill, and Gyles (Sheela) O'Shaughnessy, daughter of Elis Lynch and Sir Roger Gilla Duff O'Shaughnessy, The O'Shaughnessy.

Career

Father's estates

Accused of High Treason

Patriot Parliament

O'Donovan was MP for Baltimore, County Cork, Ireland, in James II's Patriot Parliament of 1689,^[2] along with his kinsmen Jeremiah O'Donovan, The O'Donovan of Clan Loughlin, and Daniel O'Donovan. Following the Parliament, Donal was outlawed in 1691. At the time he was outlawed, he was characterised as a gentleman, of Benlahane, an archaic spelling of Bawnlahan, then the family seat.^[3] Donal's grandson, Daniel, son of Richard, changed the name of the family estate from Bawnlahan to Castle Jane when he married (at age 60) Jane Becher, who was then 15.^[4]

O'Donovan's Infantry Regiment

O'Donovan served during the Siege of Cork, as Deputy Governor of the 1200 strong garrison of Charles Fort, Kinsale under Sir Edward Scott.

His regiment also appears later in the preparations for the Siege of Limerick.

See also D'Alton, pp. 708 ff.

Marriages and issue

Although it is likely that Donal IV was Catholic, as he was a member of the House of Commons of the James II Parliament in 1689 and subsequently outlawed, neither of his wives was Gaelic. This may have contributed to his success in avoiding confiscation of his remaining lands. From his tenure his branch made a massive shift to anglicise and conform, inevitably ruining their reputation (which was already low due to his gandfather's surrender and regrant of clan lands) but which facilitated their retention of property during the Penal Laws.

He was first married to Victoria Copinger, daughter of Captain Walter Copinger of Cloghan, by whom he had a daughter, Helena, who married her 2nd cousin Conn (Cornelius) O'Donovan of Montpellier, ancestor of the present O'Donovan, Lord of Clancahill.

Secondly, he married in 1665 Elizabeth Tonson, daughter of Major Richard Tonson (ancestor of Baron Riversdale), by whom he had:^[5]

Daughters

• Sarah, married Samuel Morris of Skibbereen
• Honora, married ?
• Catherine, married ?
• (Elizabeth), married ?

Sons

• Richard I O'Donovan
• Daniel, who died young
• Barry, who died young
• Cornelius (Conor), married Honora, daughter of O'Sullivan MacFineen Duff. He died in 1737. According to O'Hart he was called Conchobhar-na-Bhuile, or "of the madness", and had his residence at Achres in the parish of Drimoleague.^[6]
  • Richard
    • Cornelius, died 1841, last descendant in the male line
  • Honoria, born 1741, possible great grandmother of Edmond Roche, 1st Baron Fermoy and ancestor of Diana, Princess of Wales is claimed as a daughter of Cornelius. This claim is doubtful as Honoria's birth in 1741 would have been fours years after her father's death in 1737, when he would have been around 65 years of age. Neither John O'Donovan, in the Appendix to the Annals of the Four Masers listing the descent of this family, nor O'Hart, credit Cornelius with a daughter, Honoria.^[7]

His son Captain Richard I O'Donovan, The O'Donovan of Clancahill, would marry Elinor FitzGerald, daughter of John FitzGerald, 13th Knight of Kerry, by Honora O'Brien, daughter of Connor O'Brien, 2nd Viscount Clare. Their issue was (1) Daniel V O'Donovan, The O'Donovan of Clancahill, (2) Richard, who died unmarried, and (3) some daughters, the eldest of whom Elizabeth married Sylvester O'Sullivan, head of the sept MacFineen Duff of Derreenavurrig in Kerry, by whom she had numerous issue. The eldest son of Daniel V O'Donovan was Richard II O'Donovan, the last Lord of Clancahill in the male line from Donal IV. But through Helena Donal IV is still an ancestor of all subsequent Chiefs of the Name of O'Donovan.

Ancestry

Ancestors of Donal IV O'Donovan

16. Teige O'Donovan               8. Donal of the Hides                       17. Helena O'Donovan               4. Donal II O'Donovan                             18. O'Leary of Carrignacurra               9. Ellen O'Leary                       2. Donal III O'Donovan                                   20. James de Barry, 4th Viscount Buttevant               10. William de Barry, Barryroe                       21. Ilen MacCarthy               5. Helena de Barry                             22. Finin MacCarthy Reagh               11. Shely MacCarthy                       1. Donal IV O'Donovan                                         24. Rory Gilla Duff O'Shaughnessy               12. Dermot O'Shaughnessy                       25. Honora O'Brien               6. Roger Gilla Duff O'Shaughnessy                             13. Shyly Ni Hubert                       3. Gyles O'Shaughnessy                                   7. Elis Lynch

Notes

1. Lundy, Darryl. "p. 27681 § 276802". The Peerage.
2. Tenison, p. 136
3. 'Irish Pardons of King James II, 1685–1699, Outlawed Or Pardoned By King William III, 1689–99' (List from Trinity College, Dublin, MSS N.1.3., Analecta Hibernia, No. 22 1960) originally published in O Kief, etc, Vol. 6.
4. "Story of West Carbury" W.J. Kingston
5. For the following see O'Donovan, Volume VI, p. 2458. He does not mention Honoria as a daughter of Cornelius O'Donovan and Honora O'Sullivan MacFineen Duff, but she is apparently known from other sources, and appears in Burke's Irish Family Records.
6. O'Hart, p. 201
7. Lundy, Darryl. "p. 37991 § 379908". The Peerage., Honoria O'Donovan mother of Margaret Deasy, mother of Margaret Honoria Curtain, mother of Edmond Roche, 1st Baron Fermoy, great-great grandfather of Princess Diana. See also Evans.

References

• Burke, Bernard and Hugh Montgomery-Massingberd, Burke's Irish Family Records. London: Burke's Peerage Ltd. 5th edition, 1976.
• Burke, Bernard and Ashworth Peter Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Ireland. London: Harrison & Sons. 9th edition, 1899.
• Sir Richard Cox, 1st Baronet, Carberiae Notitia. 1686. extracts published in Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society, Volume XII, Second Series. 1906. pp. 142–9
• D'Alton, John, Illustrations, Historical and Genealogical, of King James's Irish Army List, 1689. 2 vols. London: J.R. Smith. 2nd edition, 1861. "O'Donovan's Infantry": Vol II, pp. 708–21
• Evans, Richard K., The Ancestry of Diana, Princess of Wales: for Twelve Generations. New England Historic Genealogical Society. 2007.
• O'Donovan, John (ed. & tr.), Annála Ríoghachta Éireann. Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters, from the Earliest Period to 1616. 7 vols. Dublin: Royal Irish Academy. 1848–51. 2nd edition, 1856. Volume VI, pp. 2451–8
• O'Hart, John, Irish Pedigrees. Dublin: James Duffy and Co. 5th edition, 1892.
• Murray, Robert Henry (ed.), The Journal of John Stevens, containing a Brief Account of the War in Ireland, 1689–1691. Oxford: The Clarendon Press. 1912.
• Ó Murchadha, Diarmuid, Family Names of County Cork. Cork: The Collins Press. 2nd edition, 1996.
• Smith, Charles, eds. Robert Day and W. A. Copinger, The Ancient and Present State of the County and City of Cork. Volume I. Volume II. 1750. Cork: Guy & Co. Ltd. 1893.
• Tenison, C. M., "Cork M.P.'s, 1559–1800", in Journal of the Cork Historical & Archaeological Society. Volume II, Second Series. Cork: Guy & Co. Ltd. 1896.