Haugh, Kevin O'Hanrahan (1901–69), attorney general and judge, was born 17 November 1901 in Dublin, second among four children of Professor John Joseph Haugh (d. 1908), mathematician, of Cooraclare, Co. Clare, and Kathleen (O'Hanrahan) Haugh (d. 1938). His father, author of Haugh's higher arithmetic, taught at Blackrock College, Dublin. The family lived at Castelnau, Herbert Avenue, Ballsbridge, Co. Dublin, and later at 31 Northumberland Road, Dublin.
After Kevin Haugh's early education at Belvedere College, he attended Blackrock College as a boarder (1916–18) and then as a day student (1918–19) before entering UCD (1919). There he became involved in republican politics and was one of the party who raised a tricolour to half-mast over the Earlsfort Terrace building after the hanging of Kevin Barry (qv) in November 1920. In 1922 he graduated BA in legal and political science and then went on to study for the bar at the King's Inns. To finance his postgraduate education he worked as a teacher at Belvedere College and was called to the bar in 1925. Opting to practise on the western circuit, he quickly established himself and became a leading junior prosecutor for the state. He was made a senior counsel on 21 December 1938, and in January 1940 succeeded Patrick Lynch (qv) as attorney general. In the Easter term of 1940 he was elected a bencher of the King's Inns, and in October 1942 was appointed to the high court bench, where he presided over many noteworthy cases including the three-year fraud trial (1959–61) of Dr Paul Singer (qv). During November and December 1947 he was a member of the Locke's Distillery tribunal, appointed to investigate allegations of political corruption. After a brief stint as a judge in the chancery court, he became a supreme court judge in 1961, serving till his death in 1969. Away from the Four Courts, Haugh was chairman of the censorship appeal board and chairman of the Irish Red Cross. He died 5 April 1969 in Dublin.
He married (15 October 1941) Brenda, daughter of John A. Cullen, solicitor, and Rita Cullen (née Delaney) of Greenoge, Merrion Road, Ballsbridge, Dublin. They had three daughters and two sons, including Kevin J. Haugh, who became a judge of the circuit court. The family lived at Danesfort, 79 Ailesbury Road, Dublin, and later at 10 Airfield Park, Donnybrook, Co. Dublin.