Russell Walker, a postal history collector in Glasgow, recently acquired a document relating to journalist and founder of The Tralee Chronicle, James Raymond Eagar Esq of Tralee. The document, with stamped addressed envelope, related to a life insurance sought by Eagar from the Albion Life Insurance Company, London.
In this document, dated 9 November 1856 (received (promptly) on 11 November 1856), Edward Lynch Esq, Church Street, Tralee, an acquaintance of Eagar for more than twenty-five years, acted as his referee. He was asked to provide information about such things as health, habits, and family history, including hereditary disease and consumption. In 1856, James Raymond Eagar was active and in good health. Seven years on, however, he was dead.[1]
The envelope containing the reference, addressed to the Secretary of the Albion Life Insurance Company, 42, New Bridge Street, Blackfriars, London complete with a one penny stamp was, of course, the item of interest to Russell Walker. However, Russell, a member of the Caledonian Philatelic Society in Glasgow – which he says is ‘a posh name for stamp collectors’ – has an interest in the broader value of philately:
Collectors do not only acquire stamps. There is a lot of interest in early postal items – often called “entire letters.” Many collectors however confine their interest to the postal markings on such items investigating the charges made to carry mail and the routes that were taken – in Ireland’s case much of the mail from Great Britain passing through Wales and Scotland (Portpatrick). For some time I’ve encouraged other collectors to widen their interests into those sending, receiving or mentioned in the letters too. In the case of Scottish material it is often the case that links to families involved in the slave trade can be found – mail was expensive in earlier centuries so it was usually the well-off who were writing and receiving letters (until 1840 and the penny post).[2]
Indeed, last year Russell published an article, ‘Postal History and History in the Post,’ about the work stamp collectors can do to share material.[3] Russell suggests that many collections in Ireland may hold items of historic interest which could be shared more widely. He found the Eagar document of great interest:
What I found interesting was that it was sent not so long after the Great Hunger when areas like Tralee must have had such recent memories of a terrible human tragedy and presumably emigration and poverty were ongoing – so interesting to see local “gentlemen” taking out life insurance. I cannot imagine too many of the famished were able to seek out life insurance!
Russell advised that he had read elsewhere that an old brewery in Tralee owned by a Mr Eagar was used as a temporary poor house during the famine, and wondered if this may have been the same person as the newspaper owner. It is certain that his namesake, the late Tralee historian Russell McMorran, would have been able to answer this question, but now it might perhaps be best answered by a member of the old and established Eagar family.
James Raymond Eagar
James Raymond Eagar, founder of The Tralee Chronicle, was the only son of Thomas Spring Eagar, JP, of Cottage, Kerry. He received his early education in Killarney College but rather than pursue a professional career he chose to ‘indulge his elegant literary taste in contributing reports and articles to local journals.’ Politically, he was a liberal, and designed the Chronicle to be a neutral newspaper:
He wished to establish a paper through which men of all opinions might address the public and obtain an impartial hearing – a paper which might be a common medium of communication for Protestant and Catholic – Liberal and Conservative.[4]
He was a skilled stenographer:
Mr Eagar’s remarkable skill in stenography contributed much to the success and utility of his enterprise. O’Connell declared that he never met any man to report him with more minute accuracy, and other public speakers have been astonished to find themselves, to use his own familiar phrase, photographed in his columns. All the proceedings of our courts of sessions and assizes, of our grand juries, and boards of guardians, were recorded with a fidelity which tended to make men cautious in their speech and careful in their conduct. As a descriptive writer, embodying in words every busy scene whether of sadness or of joy, few could excel Mr Eagar; and his keen appreciation of what was interesting, instructive and agreeable enabled him to compile the news of the day as to make the Chronicle welcome to many a fireside. The work was so much his own, the paper so completely represented the man and his mind that we have no fear of incurring the charges of egotism, when we praise that in which we bore so humble and so subordinate a part.
He was chosen to second the nomination of Charles O’Connell of Bahoss, son-in-law of the great Daniel O’Connell, when he was elected to represent this county in Parliament. The Chronicle’s neutrality meant it was ‘more valued by liberal men than other papers in which liberal opinions were more directly and passionately advocated.’
James Raymond Eagar Esq never married, and died from protracted fever at Killarney on 12 July 1863 at age 57.[5] Hopes were entertained for the future of the Chronicle:
Its friends and supporters will be doubly anxious to uphold the paper when they learn that the last wish of its deceased founder was that a portion of its proceeds should be applied to the support of his only sister, who has a large family much in need of that support. I believe the warm-hearted friends of the Chronicle will, when this becomes known, exert themselves doubly in its interests.[6]
The paper continued for more than twenty years, and folded c1881.[7]
The Eagar Family
The first of the Eagars to settle in Ireland was Robert Eagar, a Major in the Army, temp Charles I, who had a grant of land in the Queen’s County. He married a lady of the name of Hamilton, and left a son, Alexander Eagar, who sold the property he derived from his father, and settled in the county of Kerry at the Restoration, where he acquired a considerable landed estate, including Ballymalis Castle (c1667), Cottage, Currane, &c:
In 1674 Alexander bought the lands of Tarmons and Currane, Currane Lake and Skellig Island. After buying this property he exchanged it for the remainder of the Ballymalis property and for Kilbonane – later called Cottage and Culleeny More.[8]
Alexander Eagar died between the years 1696 and 1700, leaving by Rose his wife, daughter of Captain O’Toole of Limerick, a daughter, Rose, married to Captain Clarke, and six sons, four of whom founded branches of the Eagar family.[9]
Second of the six sons, James Eagar Esq of Ballymalis and Cottage, Co Kerry was founder of the first branch.[10] He married first Cecilia Holmes of Kinsale and secondly, Barbara, daughter of Captain Richard Loughlin of Ballydowney. By the former he had one daughter Dosey, who died unmarried, and one son Thomas. By his second marriage, he had a son, Alexander.
Thomas Eagar Esq of Cottage and Ballyhar, Co Kerry, eldest son, married first Letitia Chute of Chute Hall, who died without issue, and secondly, in November 1729, Jane, daughter of Walter Spring Esq by whom he had four daughters and three sons.[11]
James Eagar Esq (1731-1818) JP of Cottage, eldest son, married in 1760 his cousin Catherine, daughter of Francis Spring Esq of Ballycrispin and left issue four sons.[12] The eldest son, Thomas Spring Eagar JP of Cottage married Mary, daughter of Samuel Raymond Esq of Ballyloughran and at his decease in 1808, left two daughters and one son, James Raymond Eagar, founder of The Tralee Chronicle.[13] James Raymond Eagar, having no issue, sold the lands of Cottage to his cousin, Rowland Tallis Eagar Esq.
Rowland Tallis Eagar
Rowland Tallis Eagar Esq (1800-1863) of Culleenymore, who purchased his cousin’s lands of Cottage, was the son of Rowland Eagar Esq of Lahard House, and Jane, daughter of James Eagar Esq of Cottage.[14] Rowland Eagar Esq of Lahard, who died in 1800, descended from John Eagar Esq of Ballinacourty and Culleenymore, third son of Alexander Eagar Esq of Ballymalis and Rose O’Toole.[15]
Rowland Tallis Eagar Esq married first, in 1822 Anne, daughter of John Henry Blennerhassett Esq of Tralee and had by her five children, none of whom left issue.[16] Anne Eagar died in April 1838 and Rowland Tallis Eagar Esq married secondly, in Killorglin Church on 25 May 1841, Lucinda (who died in September 1851), youngest daughter of Oliver Stokes Esq and sister of Major General Stokes. By Lucinda he had Hanoria, Margaret, and Oliver Stokes Eagar (1854-1894) of Ballygrennane.
Rowland Tallis Eagar Esq died in Tralee on 23 February 1863 aged sixty-three. His only son, Oliver Stokes Eagar, married Mary Wilhelmina, daughter of Hugh Eldon Yielding (and widow of Henry Moore Sandes) and had issue twin sons, John Henry Tallis Eagar and Richard Hugh Yielding Eagar, and a daughter, Olive Margaret Jane Eva Eagar of Bedford, Listowel.
Oliver Stokes Eagar died on 1 November 1894 at age 40:
At Farnham House, Finglas, of general paralysis, result of foreign climate, Oliver Stokes Eagar, Surgeon-Major, FRCSI. Funeral left Tralee for Kilbonane at 10am on Monday 5 November. There shall be no night there, neither shall there be any more pain Rev xxi, 25, 4.[17]
His twin sons died in their teenage years, one year apart.[18] His surviving daughter and heiress, Olive, inherited the lands of Cottage, Ballymalis and Cullenymore from her father, lands held by her family since the arrival of the first settler of the name in Kerry 1667-77. In King’s History of Kerry, in his notes on the Eagar family in Kerry, he writes:
I have to thank Miss Olive Eagar, of Bedford, Listowel, for most of the information given about the Eagar family. In compiling this family history much original matter from wills and other private papers has been utilised.[19]
On 17 June 1914, at the parish church, Listowel, Olive Margaret Jane Eva Eagar married Henry George Owen, second son of Henry Amyrald Owen of Foyle House, Johnstown, Co Kilkenny.[20] A daughter, Eileen Olive Rosemary Owen, was born on 6 December 1916 at 8 Catherine Place, Limerick.
Olive Margaret Jane Eva Owen of Aghatrohis, Bedford, Listowel, died on 8 February 1934.[21]
In 1949, Aghatrohis, a 109-acre farm, was up for auction.[22] Henry George Owen, formerly of Aghatrohis, Listowel, died at his residence, Logatrina, 47 Whitebeam Road, Clonskeagh, Dublin on 9 October 1955 at age 76.[23]
Eileen Olive Rosemary Owen married, in 1971, Major Hugh Nicholson Goodbody (1917-2011) . Major Goodbody was the son of Gerald Ernest Goodbody (1873-1941) of Woodsdown, Lisnagry, Co Limerick, a director of Ranks (Ireland) Ltd.
In 1976, the Goodbody residence was Logatrina, Dublin.
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[1] Mr Lynch may also have died at about the same time. One Edward Lynch Esq, formerly proprietor of the Tralee Mercury newspaper, died from bronchitis at 28 Mall, Tralee on 15 March 1863 aged 62. However, it is not clear if the two are the same. Griffith’s Valuation does not record an Edward Lynch at Church Street though it does record James R Eagar leasing a house, office and yard there from George Gunn. In a case of libel taken against the Tralee Mercury in 1837, Edward Lynch submitted an affidavit in which he stated that he sold the newspaper to his brother, John Lynch, an attorney. Lynch was said to be possessed of considerable freehold property though he refuted this and stated ‘he was not able to get himself registered as a ten pound freeholder.’ He stated that he had a sister in poor health dependent on him and that his mother, ‘who had died recently’ had also been living with him (Freeman’s Journal, 27 April 1837, David Thompson Esq v Lynch and McCarthy, Proprietor and Printer of the Tralee Mercury) The following is worth noting in relation to the Tralee Mercury: ‘Died on Sunday 13 August 1865, at his residence, 63 Sunday’s Well, Mr Patrick Tuohy, for twenty-four years publisher of the Cork Examiner … the deceased, who was a native of Tralee, served his apprenticeship in the old Tralee Mercury printing office’ (Kerry Evening Post, 16 August 1865). [2] By email to Castleisland District Heritage, 14 September 2022. [3] Russell has kindly shared the article with Castleisland District Heritage, by email 14 September 2022. Postal History and History in the Post by Russell Walker Living in Edinburgh in the 1970s, I spent some happy hours browsing through boxes of postcards in Mrs Humphries bric-a-brac shop just off the Cowgate. On one occasion I bought a series of First War postcards from France sent by an Edinburgh soldier, R MacLeod, to his young family. I was interested in the army postmarks and, as with most such cards, the messages home said little about what these men were experiencing. However a final French card in different handwriting to the same address revealed much more. After a comment about the weather and the trip, it finished with “I’m just going to daddie’s grave”. It was from Mrs MacLeod, who was probably on one of the sponsored visits to the war graves organised in the 1920s. I realised then that much of what we collectors were putting together in our postal collections also had a hidden personal history. Like archaeologists, we were looking at the bare bones and that with some further searching, we might reveal much more about the items we held. Of course, in the 1970s, such searching was often difficult and time consuming. A letter to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) resulted in locating the grave which I was able to visit a few years later when in France. I left copies of Private MacLeod’s postcards home in the CWGC records box at the cemetery. Nowadays a world of readily accessible information has opened up to all of us through the wonders of the internet. We can sit at home and discover details, sometimes in minutes, which in the past could have taken years and much travelling. For example, for any cards from soldiers which I now acquire, where there is a distinguishable name or service number, I will check against the records held on the CWGC website (https://www.cwgc.org/). Indeed, the CWGC at one point were considering how to record material held by collectors relating to the individuals on their database. Imagine how interesting it would be for families and researchers to find not just the basic records of the war dead but also copies of their correspondence home. For some time in my own philatelic society, I have encouraged my fellow collectors to look deeper into some of the material which they hold. In traditional postal history, we have concentrated on postal markings, rates and routes. However, this forgets that the post was primarily about people – and that with the resources of the internet, we can now open many more doors than was once possible. With some searching, we can often unearth much more detail about recipients and senders of the material that we hold. I believe that this can only add to the interest by giving further background and colour to our collections. Such detail is also something that is likely to be of more interest to non-collectors – and may attract in a new cohort to our hobby. And even where information may only be available in a foreign language, we can even get a working translation free on sites such as Google. So I would encourage all postal history collectors to delve more deeply into the background of the material they hold – it may throw up some surprises.’ [4] Obituary, Tralee Chronicle, 17 July 1863. Obituary in full: ‘The mourning lines which this day darken the pages of the Tralee Chronicle will cast their gloomy shadow on the hearts of its many readers and subscribers. The good man whom they all loved as a friend, who through so many long and eventful years was the faithful chronicler of our county, the founder and editor of this journal, is no more. On Sunday last, in his fifty-seventh year, James Raymond Eagar departed this life in Killarney, where a few months ago he was suddenly stricken down by severe illness. While he guided the pen, which has but just fallen from his hand, public or private worth was never allowed to pass from amongst us without a graceful tribute, and a truthful record. It now becomes the sad duty of those who have been his fellow-labourers, and who have worked under his wise and gentle guidance, to honour his memory by the simple expression of the affectionate esteem and sincere regret which have followed him to the grave. Our venerable chief was a native of this county, a member of an old and respected family, the only son of Thomas Spring Eagar Esq JP of Cottage. He received his early education in the College of Killarney, and we have often heard him speak with warmth and with tenderness of the associations and friendships contracted in these schoolboy days of his – friendships which, we know were never forfeited or interrupted, which smoothed the rugged path of life, and were to him a source of comfort and solace in his dying hours. The esteem which his kindly nature and high integrity inspired to those who were the companions of his youth and the intimates of his maturer years, eminently fitted him for the important position he was destined to fill amongst us; for James Eagar was known, and trusted, and loved, by men of every rank, and creed, and party. Commencing life with a handsome competence, derived from his paternal estate, he did not devote himself to any professional pursuit, but he indulged his elegant literary taste in contributing reports and articles to local journals. It was thus he formed the business and purposes of his life. He observed that the newspapers published in this county were conducted for the most part, in a narrow spirit of party, and that they represented the sectarian acrimony of a bygone time. He thought – and he thought rightly – that with the greater extension of political rights, and the breaking up of the old system of exclusive privilege, the common ground on which men could think and talk together was enlarged, and that it would be for the common good of all to cease wrangling about differences which existed no more. He therefore designed the establishment of a neutral paper, which should faithfully and impartially report all matters of importance connected with our county, and exercise a salutary influence on public men and public bodies, not by insulting abuse or angry vituperation, but by the mere force of truthful publicity. He wished to establish a paper through which men of all opinions might address the public and obtain an impartial hearing – a paper which might be a common medium of communication for Protestant and Catholic – Liberal and Conservative. For this purpose he founded the Tralee Chronicle in the year 1842, and such is the mission which under his able editorship, it has never since ceased to fulfil. The enlarged views which actuated our departed friend necessarily imply that though no party man, he was a liberal in politics, and that he leaned to the side of those who were yet struggling for the full enjoyment of rights which they had legally recovered. We remember that he was chosen to second the nomination of Charles O’Connell of Bahoss, the son-in-law of the great Daniel O’Connell, when he was elected to represent this county in Parliament. In good truth the Chronicle, by the very fact of being neutral, became in his hands an organ more valued by liberal men than other papers in which liberal opinions were more directly and passionately advocated. Truth and justice need only a plain and fair statement, and such they always obtained in the Chronicle. Mr Eagar’s remarkable skill in stenography contributed much to the success and utility of his enterprise. O’Connell declared that he never met any man to report him with more minute accuracy, and other public speakers have been astonished to find themselves, to use his own familiar phrase, photographed in his columns. All the proceedings of our courts of sessions and assizes, of our grand juries, and boards of guardians, were recorded with a fidelity which tended to make men cautious in their speech and careful in their conduct. As a descriptive writer, embodying in words every busy scene whether of sadness or of joy, few could excel Mr Eagar; and his keen appreciation of what was interesting, instructive and agreeable enabled him to compile the news of the day as to make the Chronicle welcome to many a fireside. The work was so much his own, the paper so completely represented the man and his mind that we have no fear of incurring the charges of egotism, when we praise that in which we bore so humble and so subordinate a part. As a journalist Mr Eagar rendered important service to his county, and his loss will not be easily repaired. But at this moment, while the earth is still fresh on his grave, and his kind, good-natured heart yet scarce cold, we prefer to remember the virtues which won for him the respect, and the genial qualities which won for him the love of all who knew him; – and how few there are in this county who did not meet James Eagar as a familiar acquaintance? Connected by his paternal and maternal descent with the most respectable Protestant families – mixing in intimate, social interview with the Catholic gentry and clergy, wherever he went he was beloved as an old friend; and now that he is gone the first testimony borne to him by every tongue is that he passed through life without ever giving wilful offence or saying an unkind word to any one. He was not selfish. He was not even worldly-wise. He spent his patrimony in acts of disinterested kindness, and in the unremunerated enterprise to which he devoted the last twenty-one years of his life. He lived content with little, and yet he found means to befriend some. He particularly delighted in encouraging and directing the talents of his young collaborateurs, and rejoiced in their after success. Though he was a hard-worked man, and of strictly temperate habits, he loved the innocent enjoyments and relaxation of the social circle; and when we remember how his warm poetic soul used to expand when he spent a day of leisure with his friends in the midst of nature’s beauties – ‘On Dinis green isle or Glena’s woody shore.’ We might have thought his the ideal of the old free-hearted poet when he sang: Est qui nec veteris poenla Massici/Nee parten solido demere de die/Spernit, nune vididi membra sub arbuto/Stratus, nune ad acquae lene caput sacrae. His sparkling wit gladdened many a social circle, and it has left among those who enjoyed his acquaintance the remembrance of happy and mirthful hours. Mr Eagar never married; and though he has left no wife or child to mourn his loss, he has descended to the honoured grave with the kind regret of a more extended sympathy and a wider affection. The following is an extract from a letter of a correspondent: ‘Forty years ago James Eager and I were learning the Odes of Horace at the Old College of Killarney, and never did I meet a man of whom Integer vitae scelerisque purus may with more truth be predicated than of him. He was, indeed, ‘in wit a man – simplicity a child.’ Inheriting an independent property and taking his station amongst the gentry of Kerry, he at a time when liberal sentiments were not fashionable, was ever a sincere Liberal, always active in procuring signatures to the Protestant petitions in favour of Emancipation from this county, and ever the friend and advocate of Parliamentary Reform, and all other steady rational progress. Steering clear on the one hand of the domineering of an aristocratic oligarchy, and on the other of the equally objectionable sway of an uneducated and senseless mob. These were his principles, and when circumstances compelled him to set up a newspaper, such were the moderate and rational principles which that paper ever advocated, and consistency in those principles was ever and I trust ever will be, the leading characteristic of that journal. For, I trust, it has taken such deep root amongst the institutions of Kerry that those who cherish his principles and respect his memory, and ‘their name is legion,’ will never let the good impartial Chronicle, the faithful and unbiased reflex of the public mind, the public events, and the public opinion of Kerry die out from amongst us. In newspaper management he achieved the golden mean – he realised that the in medio tutissimus ibis of the ancient poet. He saw that journals of extreme popular opinions, reflecting the notions of the ‘extreme left,’ somewhat similar to the Montagne party in the old French invention, never throve on Kerry soil. He saw two, if not three such fail successively in his day, and the lesson was not thrown away on him. The popular party in Kerry would justly be branded with deep ingratitude if they ever deserted the paper which our lamented friend so wisely conducted, and which, I make no doubt, will henceforth be conducted on the same steady, sound, moderate principles – the same impartiality, and the same accuracy in chronicling public meetings and public events in Kerry, which has heretofore, and will, I trust, ever characterise the Tralee Chronicle. Its friends and supporters will be doubly anxious to uphold the paper when they learn that the last wish of its deceased founder was that a portion of its proceeds should be applied to the support of his only sister, who has a large family much in need of that support. I believe the warm-hearted friends of the Chronicle will, when this becomes known, exert themselves doubly in its interests.’ [5] He had been ‘ailing for three months of fever’ (Freeman’s Journal, 18 July 1863). For genealogy of the Eagar family, see ‘Eager of Kerry’ in The Royal Lineage of our Noble and Gentle Families (1886) by Joseph Foster, pp210-221. [6] Tralee Chronicle, 17 July 1863. The sister alluded to, Catherine, was the wife of William Fitzmaurice Sealy of Brickfield. Catherine died a widow in June 1868 at Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. [7] http://www.odonohoearchive.com/stop-press-michael-odonohoe-and-the-kerry-newspapers/. [8] From letter of E F Eagar, The Grove House, Charlton Kings, Cheltenham, England, dated 24thAugust 1954. It is worth noting that Tithe Applotment records for the parish of Kilbonane contain a far greater number of townlands than are more standardly recognised today. Cottage is mentioned as a townland in Tithe records, and E F Eagar’s remarks place it in the area of Kilbonane. Valerie Bary (Houses of Kerry, p131) identifies Gortroe House in the townland of the same name in the parish of Aghadoe as ‘Cottage.’ It seems likely the name transferred to there with the Eagar family, one-time occupants of Gortroe House, or it may have been another ‘Cottage.’ O’Donovan’s Name Books record ‘one trigonometrical station called Cottage’ at Ballymalis. [9] Robert (born c1665); James, founder of the 1st branch; John, founder of the 2nd branch; Alexander; Francis, founder of the 3rd branch; and George, founder of the 4th branch. Of these, Robert, who married the daughter of Major Steers, and Alexander, who, in 1694, married Elizabeth, daughter of Rev Pierce Butler of Iveragh, left no male descendants, but the other four sons established families still existing. [10] The ruined Ballymalis Castle, said to have been built by the O’Moriarty, is the most notable landmark of the Eagar family association with the district. The following account of the castle is taken from The Schools’ Collection, (Ballymalis Castle (Béal Átha Málais), Volume 0458, pp21-23): The ruins of this old castle stand on the right bank of the River Laune almost opposite the mouth of the Giddough river (which flows into the Laune) – and quite close to the only ford by which the Laune could be crossed for nearly two miles at either side of the castle. According to local tradition the castle was built on a big earthen fort (hence name mag-lios) – but there is no trace of that fort now – nor was there a trace of it in living memory. There is however the remains of a trench or moat surrounding the castle – and it is possible that the moat was made at the expense of the old fort. One old fort still exists about 200 yards east of it, and also on the right bank of the Laune. About three miles east of the castle on the same bank of the Laune are two old forts in the same field (about 200 yards apart). One is a very big fort with two earthen circular rings and a deep trench between the rings - and the other is a single ring fort about the size of the one at Ballymalis Castle. Both these are in Kelly's farm, Lahard, Beaufort. No information can be got about these, and they are merely mentioned to help the old story that there may have been two forts in Ballymalis also. Very little information can now be got about the castle itself, but over 20 years ago I collected a lot of local traditions from the old people whose forefathers had lived in the district for generations. If any credence is to be placed on these old traditions – the castle at Ballymalis was one of the great strengths of the O'Moriarty Clan. It may have been built by the Desmonds – but there is no doubt that it was occupied by the Moriartys after the battle of Callan 1261 and until after 1600. The lands nearby were owned by them before the Anglo-Norman Invasion. Tombs and graves just outside the walls of the old ruined church at Kilbonane (one mile east of the castle) and a line of graves underneath the altar space inside in the old ruin – are still the burial places of the Moriarty families who (rightly or wrongly) claim to be descendants of the old clan. King and other Kerry historians call Ballymalis Castle the Ferris Castle. They probably wrote without any knowledge of local history. From the old people I gathered that the Ferris family was an offshoot of the Moriarty clan. They said that the first Ferris was a son of Fergus (Mac Fergus) Moriarty, that he was granted some of the clan lands and kept the name Mac Fergus. The Ferris family have only one grave in the old grave yard in Kilbonane. Perhaps King and others got their information from State papers which state that the lands of Ballymalis were confiscated from Donal Mac Fearriss and granted to Southworth in 1613. Another old man once told me that the Ferrises came to the castle through marriage with ‘one’ Ellen Moriarty. Finally the castle was partially destroyed by Ireton’s Soldiers on their journey up the Laune to Ross Castle and was never afterwards repaired or occupied. The Mac Sheehy family rented the lands of Ballincarrig (Firies parish) and other lands about Killarney from the Brownes (Lord Kenmare) over 200 years ago. They sub-let some of these lands – but one branch of the family lived in Ballincarrig until about the time of the famine. It is generally believed that it was one of the Mac Sheehys who wrote 'the address to Irish people' for Wolfe Tone, whilst he was in France making preparations for the rebellion of 1798. Many members of the family in later generations were supposed to have got very good positions through the influence of the Kenmares. One of them was an inspector of National Schools, and according to a Mr Cronin who taught in Ballinalo [illeg] National School until 1908 or 1910, this MacSheehy had satisfied himself that the above story of the address was quite true and that he himself was a grandnephew of the Mac Sheehy of '98. The following is from the Westmeath Offaly Independent, 7 September 1979: ‘In an Irish College in Flanders, Owen Ferris of Ballymalis, Co Kerry, was educated; after his ordination in 1700, he went on pilgrimage to Rome. Pope Innocent XII enlisted his services as a ‘holy smuggler,’ entrusting him with the Bulls, nominating Edward Comerford Archbishop of Cashel. Though Father Ferris delivered the documents safely, the authorities learned of his mission and kept so close a watch on him afterwards that he had to keep constantly on the move.’ [11] His four daughters were Avice, married to Lowther Godfrey, Esq; Martha, who died unmarried; Margaret, who married John Sullivan of Cahirciveen; and Jane, who married Thomas Giles of Wood Lodge. His sons were James Eagar Esq (1731-1818) JP of Cottage; John Eagar Esq (born 1733) of Ballyhar, Knocknaboula and Ballinacourty, and Walter Eagar Esq of Killarney. [12] Thomas Spring Eagar JP of Cottage; Francis Spring Eagar, in Holy Orders; John Moore Eagar and James Day Eagar (born 1772) an officer in the army. [13] The two daughters were Frances Eagar, who died unmarried, and Catherine Eagar, who married in 1824 to William Fitzmaurice Sealy Esq and settled in America. [14] Lahard House in the townland of Lahard, Kilbonane, adjoins Culleeny Beg, in the proximity of Kilbonane townland with graveyard, which adjoins Ballymalis townland. Some genealogies place Lahard in Co Cavan. See Bary’s Houses of Kerry pp164-165 for account of Lahard House. ‘Before the end of the eighteenth century, Rowland Eagar, who married his cousin, Jane Eagar of Cottage, was residing at Lahard.’ [15] John Eagar Esq married Dorothea, daughter of Philip Tallis Esq Sovereign of Dingle and had six sons, Robert, James, Philip, John, Francis and Alexander of Ardrinane and two daughters, one of whom, Rose, married Robert Saunders and the other to Murtogh Moriarty, and stated by some to be the mother of Admiral Moriarty. Second son James Eagar married Margaret, daughter of Thomas Day Esq of the Manor and had a son, Captain Tallis Eagar of Culleenymore. Captain Tallis Eagar married Millicent, daughter of Robert Blennerhassett Esq of Killorglin and had five daughters: Lucy, who married James Murphy; Alice, who married Samuel de Landre (Landers) in 1795; Sarah who married Thomas Webb; Frances, who died unmarried, Millicent, who married in 1798 Geoffrey Eagar of Ballinvoher, and one son, Rowland of Lahard, father of Rowland Tallis Eagar of Culleenymore. Mary Agnes Hickson, in her genealogy of the Eagar family (Kerry Evening Post, 12 April 1913), noted that from this marriage of Rowland Eagar of Lahard and his wife Jane descended solicitor Samuel Albert Quan-Smith Esq (1864-1919) of Bullock Castle, Dalkey, Dublin. This would seem to be from the marriage of Alice Eagar and Samuel de Landre (Landers). Samuel Albert Quan-Smith Esq, following his death in August 1919, was described as one of the leading lights in Dublin in the organisation of Baden Powell’s Boy Scouts. Chief mourners at his funeral in Dalkey Protestant Church (interment at Mount Jerome) were Charles Lynn Grant, cousin (son of Henrietta Lander Grant); W G Armstrong, George O Lee, Rev H F Lambert, CC, Wexford and Alfred Mulloy. Funeral report, Irish Independent, 11 August 1919. The following is of relevance: ‘Killed in action about 23 February 1917, Morgan Jones Ross, MGS, Australian Imperial Forces, only son of William Smith Ross late of Grove Park, Co Dublin, and formerly of Sharvogues House, Co Antrim, grandson of the late Edward Jones, of Poulavenogue, Clonmel, Co Tipperary, and dearly loved ward of S A Quan-Smith, Bullock Castle, Dalkey’ (Wicklow Newsletter, 31 March 1917). [16] Elizabeth Eagar died in July 1841, in the 15th year of her age, of decline, unmarried; John Henry Eagar died unmarried; Jane Eagar; Anne Eagar died unmarried; Morgan O’Connell Busteed Eagar died unmarried ‘after a long and painful illness’ in June 1845. [17] Kerry Reporter, 10 November 1894. Mary Wilhelmina Eagar, later of Spraymount Lodge, Ballybunion, Co Kerry, died tragically in a house fire in October 1928. She was aged 73 years. See Irish Examiner, 24 October 1928 for a report of the inquest. [18] ‘Died April 13 1904 at his mother’s residence, Richard Hugh Yielding, dearly loved younger twin son of the late Surgeon-Major Eagar, Ballymalis, Killorglin, and of Mrs Eagar, Bedford-Aghatrohis, Listowel, aged 15 years’ (Weekly Irish Times, 23 April 19040. ‘Died, 23 July 1905, John Henry Tallis, dearly loved surviving twin son of the late Surgeon-Major Oliver Stokes Eagar, Ballymalis, Killorglin, and Mrs Eagar, Bedford, Listowel, in his 17th year’ (Kerry Evening Post, 26 July 1905). [19] He added, ‘The account of the family compiled by J F Eagar many years ago, has been availed of’ (Kerry Evening Post, 19 April 1913). [20] John Hely Owen of Ballyhorgan, Listowel, brother of Henry George Owen, married Lurline (Kitty) Ellis, younger daughter of R H W Ellis of Glenesrone, Abbeyfeale, on 8 September 1910. The couple were married by Rev W E Bentley, MA, in the parish church, Abbeyfeale. [21] Probate to her husband, Henry George Owen, farmer … She left her India 3½ per cent stock and money in cash or in bank to her husband and the residue of her property upon trust for her children (Irish Examiner, 4 September 1934). Henry George Owen was the beneficiary of the will of spinster Margaret Eagar of The Terrace, Tralee, who died on or about the 26 December 1935. See Liberator Tralee, 15 December 1936. [22] It was withdrawn from sale, the highest bid £3,000. Aghatrohis, set on 80 acres, was up for auction in the 1960s. It was by then the residence of the Sayers family. [23] Funeral to Galey Cemetery, Listowel.
