Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 41.djvu/352

 O'CALLAGHAN, JOHN CORNELIUS (1805–1883), Irish historical writer, son of John O'Callaghan, who was one of the first catholics admitted to the profession of attorney in Ireland after the partial relaxation of the penal laws in 1793, was born at Dublin in 1805. He was educated at the jesuit school of Clongoweswood, co. Kildare, and afterwards at a private school at Blanchardstown, near Dublin, and was called to the Irish bar in 1829, but, preferring a literary life, did not practise. He contributed to a weekly newspaper, published in Dublin from 1830 to 1833, called ‘The Comet,’ which advocated the disestablishment of the protestant church in Ireland, and which counted O'Connell among its contributors. When the ‘Comet’ ceased he wrote for the ‘Irish Monthly Magazine,’ and his contributions to these two journals were collected, and were, with other writings of his, published under the title of ‘The Green Book; or Gleanings from the Writing Desk of a Literary Agitator’ (Dublin, 1840, 8vo). When the well-known ‘Nation’ newspaper was started in 1842 as the organ of the party afterwards known as the Young Ireland party, O'Callaghan joined the staff, and its first number contained ‘The Exterminator's Song,’ written by him, and subsequently republished in the ‘[Spirit of the Nation]],’ a collection of the poetry of the ‘Young Irelanders.’

It is, however, as an historical writer that O'Callaghan has acquired fame. His first principal work of the kind was his edition of the ‘Macariæ Excidium; or the Destruction of Cyprus,’ the secret history of the revolution in Ireland from 1688 to 1691, written by Colonel [q. v.], an officer of James II's army. On this work, which was published in 1846 (Dublin, 4to), O'Callaghan spent four or five years, and his notes to it are most valuable. About twenty-three years after this he published his greatest work, his ‘History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France, from the Revolution in Great Britain and Ireland under James II to the Revolution in France under Louis XVI’ (Glasgow, 1869, 8vo), on which he spent ‘more than twenty-five years' research and labour,’ but for which he could not find a publisher in Dublin. Though very diffuse in style, and in some respects unscholarly (both index and references being very incomplete), this history displays the most careful research, and must always be considered a standard work. The ground that it breaks is, moreover, practically new, the previous work by [q. v.] being little more than an essay which was left unfinished owing to O'Connor's death.

Though by nature a student, O'Callaghan took a keen interest in politics, and was a strong admirer and supporter of O'Connell; it was he, with [q. v.], the sculptor, who placed a crown on O'Connell's head at one of the well-known ‘monster’ meetings of O'Connell's supporters held at the Hill of Tara, the ancient crowning-place of the kings of Ireland.

O'Callaghan died in Dublin on 24 April 1883, in his seventy-seventh year.

Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, in his ‘Young Ireland,’ describes him as a tall and strong man, ‘speaking a dialect compounded apparently in equal parts of Johnson and Cobbett, in a voice too loud for social intercourse. “I love,” he would say, “not the entremets of literature, but the strong meat and drink of sedition;” or “I make a daily meal on the smoked carcass of Irish history.”’



O'CALLAGHAN, ROBERT WILLIAM (1777–1840), general, second son of Cornelius O'Callaghan, first baron Lismore, and Frances, second daughter of Mr. Speaker Ponsonby, was born in October 1777. He was descended ‘from one of the very few native families that have been dignified by the peerage of Ireland.’ He was appointed ensign in the 128th regiment of foot 29 Nov. 1794, and was transferred as lieutenant to the 30th light dragoons 6 Dec. 1794, in which regiment he became captain 31 Jan. 1795. He was transferred to the 22nd light dragoons 19 April 1796. These three corps were all subsequently disbanded. He was appointed major to the 40th regiment of foot 17 Feb. 1803, and became lieutenant-colonel in the 39th regiment of foot 16 July 1803. In March 1805 he embarked in command of the first battalion of the 39th regiment, which had been selected to form part of the expedition destined for the Mediterranean under Lieutenant-general Sir James Craig, and subsequently proceeded from Malta to Naples with the flank companies. When those companies returned to Malta in February 1806, he remained in Sicily, and at the battle of Maida (4 July 1806) he commanded a grenadier battalion, receiving after the victory a gold medal. At the end of August 1811 he went with the first battalion of the 39th regiment from Sicily to join the army in the Peninsula. He was advanced to the brevet rank of colonel. At the battle of Vittoria (21 June 1813) he was placed in temporary command of the brigade, and his con-