William Plunket, 1st Baron Plunket
William Conyngham Plunket, 1st Baron Plunket PC (Ire) (1 July 1764 – 5 January 1854) was an Irish politician and lawyer who eventually became Lord Chancellor of Ireland.
The son of a Presbyterian minister, Rev. Thomas Plunket of Dublin, and his wife Mary (née Conyngham).[1] He was born in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, and educated at Trinity College Dublin. After graduating in 1784, he was admitted as a student at Lincoln's Inn, and was called to the Irish bar three years later. He was made a King's Counsel in 1795, and three years later was elected to the Irish House of Commons as a Member of Parliament for Charlemont.
After the Act of Union was passed, Plunket lost his seat, and failed to be elected to Westminster for the University of Dublin in 1802, but he subsequently became Solicitor-General for Ireland in 1803, a post he held for two years before becoming Attorney-General for Ireland, again for two years. He was appointed a member of the Privy Council of Ireland on 6 December 1805.
In Dublin, he was a member of Daly's Club.[2]
In January 1807, he was returned to British House of Commons as a Whig member for Midhurst, representing the constituency for only three months, although he subsequently returned to the House of Commons in 1812 as a member for Dublin University. Between 1822 and 1827, he was again Attorney-General for Ireland, and in the latter year he became the island's Chief Justice of the Common Pleas.
In 1827, Plunket was ennobled in the Peerage of the United Kingdom as Baron Plunket, of Newton in County Cork. He was an advocate of Catholic Emancipation,[3] and served as Lord Chancellor of Ireland from 1830 to 1841, with a brief interval when the Tories were in power between 1834 and 1835. He was forced into retirement to allow Sir John Campbell to assume office, and died at the age of 89 at his home in County Wicklow.
The title was inherited by his eldest son, Thomas.
[edit] Family
Plunket was married to Catherine MacCausland, daughter of John MacCausland (Irish parliamentarian) of Strabane and Elizabeth Span, daughter of Rev. William Span of Ballmacove, County Donegal.[4] Their son Thomas became Church of Ireland Bishop of Tuam, Killala and Achonry and 2nd Baron. Thomas's eldest daughter Katherine (1820–1932) was the longest-lived Irish person ever. Their other children included sons Patrick (d 1859) and Robert (Dean of Tuam from 1850), and a daughter, Louisa.[5]
[edit] References
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Wikisource has original works written by or about: William Plunket |
- ^ The Peerage Of The British Empire, 27th Edn, 1858, Edmund Lodge Esq, accessed 25 December 2008
- ^ T. H. S. Escott, Club Makers and Club Members (1913), pp. 329–333
- ^ On Catholic Relief, speech delivered on 28 February 1821 by Plunket in the House of Commons, adjudged by Sir Robert Peel as “it stands nearly the highest in point of ability of any ever heard in this House.”, accessed 24 December 2008
- ^ A Genaeologyical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland: MacCausland of Strabane Vol II, John Burke Esq, 1836, accessed 24 December 2008
- ^ The Peerage, Baronetage, and Knightage, of Great Britain and Ireland, for 1860, Robert P. Dod Esq, 1860, accessed 25 December 2008
- 1764 births
- 1854 deaths
- Attorneys-General for Ireland
- Barons in the Peerage of the United Kingdom
- Lord Chancellors of Ireland
- Irish MPs 1798–1800
- Members of the Parliament of Ireland (pre-1801)
- Members of the Privy Council of Ireland
- Members of the United Kingdom Parliament for English constituencies
- Members of the United Kingdom Parliament for Irish constituencies (1801–1922)
- Members of the United Kingdom Parliament for university constituencies
- Members of the United Kingdom Parliament for Dublin constituencies (1801–1922)
- People associated with Trinity College, Dublin
- People from Enniskillen
- Solicitors-General for Ireland
- UK MPs 1806–1807
- UK MPs 1812–1818
- UK MPs 1818–1820
- UK MPs 1820–1826
- UK MPs 1826–1830
