Fitzgerald, Peter George (1808–80), 19th knight of Kerry , philanthropist, was born 15 September 1808, eldest surviving son among six sons and four daughters of Maurice Fitzgerald (qv), 18th knight of Kerry, and his first wife Maria, daughter of David La Touche (qv) (1729–1817), of Co. Dublin. Raised in Dublin, at the banking-house of his maternal grandfather, he decided on a career in politics, and entered public life in 1841 when he was appointed vice-treasurer of Ireland (1841–6) under the ministry of Sir Robert Peel (qv).
He became 19th knight of Kerry on the death of his father (7 March 1849). Abandoning a public career, he moved to his family estate on Valentia Island, and resided chiefly there for the remainder of his life. A proud and stubborn man, with a very old-fashioned, and increasingly anachronistic, attitude about the rights and duties of a landlord, he engaged in many improvements on the island. Under his direction Valentia became the European terminus of the Atlantic Telegraph Co. cable, and for long periods he ran the island's slate quarry, selling many of its products in England. In January 1867 he organised an anti-Fenian demonstration at Knightstown, flanked by local clergy of all denominations, in which he pledged the island's loyalty to the crown.
Although he was never considered a bad or tyrannical landlord, his career was somewhat different from the posthumous tributes that were bestowed on him. In 1870 the Kerry Farmer's Club criticised him for the poor condition of the houses on his estates, claiming that only one house was properly slated – that belonging to his steward. In 1872 he was criticised by the Cork Examiner for attempting to impose his wishes on his tenants, and arrogantly assuming that his conscience was ‘the ultimate measure of the tenant's rights’. This charge perhaps encapsulates Fitzgerald's attitude. An old-fashioned believer in the importance of the improving landlord, he was sceptical about the advantages of education for the peasantry and critical of any land act that obliged a proprietor to act beneficently, believing that it took away the merit of voluntary behaviour. Politically, his views were similarly dogmatic and he opposed the disestablishment of the church of Ireland, the land act of 1870, and home rule. A regular correspondent to The Times, he defended the landlord class from the indiscriminate censure they were receiving, and sympathised with the conditions they laboured under.
He married (1838) Julia, daughter of Peter Bodkin Hussey of Farranikilla House, Co. Kerry. They had four sons and seven daughters. He died at Valentia on 6 August 1880, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Capt. Maurice Fitzgerald, a soldier who fought with distinction in the Ashanti war. A monument to Peter Fitzgerald's memory was erected on the grassy hill at Glanleam, a large Celtic cross made of limestone with an inscription on Valentia slate that was a tribute from the tenantry of his Kerry and Carlow estates ‘to mark their gratitude for his lifelong devotion to their welfare and their deep sorrow for his loss’.