Kirwan, Owen (c.1770–1803), rebel, was born in Dublin but there are no details about his family or early life. He was apprenticed to a tailor, and later went into business for himself as a dealer in second-hand clothes. He married and leased a house at no. 64 Plunket Street, where he lived for the remainder of his life. Joining the United Irishmen, he became involved with Robert Emmet (qv) in plans for a rebellion, and helped to organise the making of weapons at the Patrick Street depot. On the night of 23 July 1803 his house was used as a mustering point for the rebels who were gathering in the city. Shortly after nine o'clock in the evening the march on the castle began, and Kirwan told his wife: ‘Here are our forces coming. Here is the signal, give me my green jacket’ (Angell, 8). However, his wife refused to give him the green military uniform that had been designed for the rebel leaders, and instead he marched out onto the street wearing a cotton jacket. Attempting to rally support for the rebellion, he shouted repeatedly: ‘Turn out my lads, let every man take a pike. The town [or city] is our own this night, God's blood.’ He ran with about ten men to Thomas Street where he joined up with the main group of rebels. However, as the evening progressed the rebellion lost all coherence as increasingly disjointed mobs rampaged around the city. At around ten o'clock Kirwan's wife provided porter to refresh one rebel group which passed up Plunket Street.
After the rebellion Kirwan was arrested for his involvement in the conspiracy. At his trial on 1 September a neighbour, a Mr B. Adams, testified against him. However, in a brilliant cross-examination, John Philpot Curran (qv) revealed that Kirwan had seduced Adams's wife eighteen months earlier, causing the break-up of his marriage; this destroyed the witness's credibility. It nevertheless took the jury only four minutes to return a guilty verdict and Kirwan was executed on 3 September at 1 p.m. on Plunket Street. He left three children. While some modern scholars have been keen to stress the importance of Owen Kirwan in the rebellion of 1803, it is clear that he assumed a significant leadership position only on the night of 23 July, when he played a major role in sustaining the ill-fated insurrection with his attempts to give it some semblance of credibility.