A Cyclopaedia of Canadian Biography: Being Chiefly Men of the Time: A Collection of Persons Distinguished in Professional and Political Life, Leaders in the Commerce and Industry of Canada, and Successful Pioneers — John Shaqi
A Cyclopaedia of Canadian Biography: Being Chiefly Men of the Time: A Collection of Persons Distinguished in Professional and Political Life, Leaders in the Commerce and Industry of Canada, and Successful Pioneers
History
A Cyclopaedia of Canadian Biography: Being Chiefly Men of the Time: A Collection of Persons Distinguished in Professional and Political Life, Leaders in the Commerce and Industry of Canada, and Successful Pioneers
1066 to 1617, is in the possession of the present head of the D’Arcy
house, Mrs. Ussher’s cousin. This history says, that Nicholas D’Arcy, of
Platyn, espoused the cause of King James II., and was a captain in his
army. He was consequently attained in 1690, and his estates were
forfeited and sold in 1691; his only son Christopher, dying unmarried,
George D’Arcy, the surviving lineal heir, male, succeeded to the family
headship. This George D’Arcy entertained James the Second in his Castle
of Dunmow the night after the battle of the Boyne, and King William was
his guest previous to the battle. King James in his hurried departure
next morning forgot his pistol which yet remains in the D’Arcy family.
It is related of him that on the occasion he repeated the following
couplet:
“Who will be king I do not know,
But I’ll be D’Arcy of Dunmow.”
He was declared an innocent Papist in 1693, and died in full possession
of his estates in Meath and Westmeath, in 1718. His descendant John
D’Arcy, born 1700, married, 1727, and was the first of the family to
conform to the Protestant faith, which took place before his marriage
with Miss Judge, of Grangebey, county Westmeath. He died in 1785,
leaving four sons, Judge, Francis, Arthur, and James. Francis D’Arcy, on
the death of his brother, Judge D’Arcy, became heir male of Sir William
D’Arcy, of Platyn, second son of Lord D’Arcy, viceroy of Ireland. On the
death of Robert D’Arcy, fourth Earl of Holderness, in Yorkshire, 1778,
heir male of John D’Arcy and Norman D’Arcy. Francis D’Arcy died in 1813,
without issue, and his youngest brother James D’Arcy, who alone had sons
and daughters, thus continued the line—his eldest son, John, claimed
the older D’Arcy baronies, held by the last Earl of Holderness, and this
claim after trial was established. But it appears that as Robert D’Arcy,
fourth Earl of Holderness, left an only child, Lady Amelia, who married
the Marquis of Carmarthan, afterwards fifth Duke of Leeds, thus carrying
off the Yorkshire estates into the Osborn family, the title has not been
resumed by the present family. James D’Arcy, born in 1740, had three
sons, John, born 1767, Joshua, the grandfather of Mrs. Ussher, and
Thomas, who was a major in the army, and at his death, Inspector General
of Police, in Ulster. It is interesting to know that the marriage of
Lady Amelia D’Arcy, Baroness Conyers in her own right, was dissolved by
Act of Parliament in May, 1779, after the birth of three children, and
both parties remarried the following year, the Lady Amelia marrying John
Byron, father of the poet, Lord Byron (she died January 20th, 1784,
Dodd’s Peerage, Genealogical Volume and Plates of Arms, page 5). The
foregoing is a very condensed account, necessarily, of Mrs. Ussher’s
family history. A more extended history involving, as it would, the
introduction of many other distinguished families in every department of
the state, and covering many professions, literary, scientific, military
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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