Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 31.djvu/40

 O'Connell replied with some truth: ‘If you did, they are such men as realise Shakespeare's idea of Nature's journeymen having made them, and made them badly.’ But the Relief Act of 1793 was very largely due to his generalship of the catholics at a time when they were sunk in apathy and despair.  KEOGH, WILLIAM NICHOLAS (1817–1878), Irish judge, belonged to a Roman catholic family formerly settled at Keoghville, co. Roscommon. He was born at Galway on 7 Dec. 1817. His father, William M. Keogh, was a solicitor, and sometime clerk of the crown for the county of Kilkenny; his mother was Mary, daughter of Mr. Austin Ffrench of Rahoon, co. Galway. He was educated at the school of the Rev. Dr. Huddard in Mountjoy Square, Dublin, then in high repute, entered Trinity College, Dublin, in 1832, and obtained honours in science in his first and second years. He left in his third year without having taken a degree. While at Trinity he was a frequent speaker in the debates of the Historical Society, and was awarded the first prize for oratory at the age of nineteen. In Michaelmas term 1835 he was admitted a student of the King's Inns, Dublin, and in Michaelmas term 1837 of Lincoln's Inn. In Hilary term 1840 he was called to the Irish bar, and joined the Connaught circuit, where his family connections lay. In the same year he published, in conjunction with Mr. M. J. Barry, ‘A Treatise on the Practice of the High Court of Chancery in Ireland,’ but he never obtained any considerable practice in that court. His natural gifts were those of an advocate rather than of a lawyer; a powerful voice, an impressive face, and impassioned delivery were combined with a ready flow of vigorous and ornate language.

He soon acquired a fair practice, principally on circuit, where, as a junior, he held leading briefs in the most important cases, and his powers of advocacy were considered so formidable that special counsel were sometimes brought down to oppose him. At the general election of 1847 he was returned for Athlone as an independent conservative, being the only Roman catholic conservative elected to that parliament. After a time he was ranked as a Peelite. In 1849 he was made a Q.C. In 1851 he took an active and prominent part in opposition to the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill passed by Lord John Russell. His action largely increased his reputation and popularity in Ireland. He was the principal speaker at a mass-meeting of Roman catholics held in Dublin in August 1851 to protest against the measure, and was one of the founders of the Catholic Defence Association established in consequence of it. He also took part in the tenant-right movement, speaking at various meetings held in support of it, and in the session of 1852 seconded in the House of Commons the Tenant Right Bill of William Sharman Crawford [q. v.] At the general election of 1852 he was again returned for Athlone. In December 1852 Keogh and the bulk of the Irish party voted in the majority which upset Lord Derby's ministry. In the new ministry of Lord Aberdeen Keogh became solicitor-general for Ireland (December 1852). His acceptance of office gave great offence to the extreme wing of the Irish party, who considered it inconsistent with the speeches which he had made in Ireland during the preceding eighteen months. He was bitterly assailed by Gavan Duffy in the ‘Nation’ and by Lucas in the ‘Tablet,’ and his re-election for Athlone was opposed. His appointment was also distasteful to the conservatives, and was attacked by Lord Westmeath in the House of Lords. At Athlone he was supported by the catholic bishop (Dr. Browne) and clergy, and was re-elected by a large majority. In January 1855 the Aberdeen ministry resigned; a new ministry was formed by Lord Palmerston. Keogh was appointed attorney-general for Ireland and was sworn of the Irish privy council. He was re-elected at Athlone without opposition. In April 1856, on the death of Mr. Justice Torrens, he was appointed a judge of the court of common pleas in Ireland. Among the remarkable cases in which he was counsel while at the bar were Birch v. Somerville (December 1851), an action by the proprietor of the ‘World’ newspaper against the Irish chief secretary on an alleged agreement to pay him for supporting law and order in his paper; Handcock v. Delacour, in the court of chancery (February 1855), a case of a painful nature, involving the title to a large estate in Galway, in which Keogh's reply for the plaintiff was so touching and eloquent as to draw tears from the chancellor; and Reg. v. Petcherine (December 1855), the trial of a Redemptorist monk on a charge of profanely and contemptuously burning a copy of the authorised version of the Bible; Keogh conducted the prosecution as attorney-general.

On the bench he soon acquired the repu-