Windsor, William
Windsor, William (c.1325–1384), Baron Windsor , lord lieutenant of Ireland, was the son of Sir Alexander Windsor of Grayrigg, Westmorland, and his wife, Elizabeth (d. 1349). He was a minor when his father died in 1343, but had attained his age of majority by 1349. He took…...
Wingfield, Mervyn Edward
Wingfield, Mervyn Edward (1836–1904), 7th Viscount Powerscourt , landowner, politician, and connoisseur, was born 13 October 1836 at Powerscourt Castle, near Enniskerry, Co. Wicklow, the eldest of the three sons of Richard Wingfield (1815–44), sixth viscount, and his wife, Lady…...
Wingfield, Mervyn Richard
This is a co-subject for the entry on Wingfield, Mervyn Edward. View the original entry....
Winter, Catherine
Winter, Catherine (fl. 1848–70), publicist and campaigner, was apparently the only daughter among four children of James Nicholas Maillard, brigade major in the army, and Catherine Stubber, who were married in Dublin in 1801. Her father's family was from the West Indies.…...
Winter, Dan
Winter, Dan (b. c.1730), founder of the ‘Orange Society’ and tenant farmer, was born at the hamlet of the Diamond in the townland of Grange Lower in the barony of Oneilland, near Loughgall, Co. Armagh. Little is known of his immediate ancestry, except that his antecedents…...
Wise (Wyse), Andrew
Wise (Wyse), Andrew (d. 1567), vice-treasurer of Ireland, was a younger son of Sir William Wise of Waterford and his wife Elizabeth Plunket. Andrew continued the family tradition of public service and by autumn 1548 was involved in supervising payments to royal soldiers. By 1550 he…...
Wogan, John
Wogan, John (d. 1321), justiciar of Ireland and lord of Picton castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales, was the son of Matthew Wogan and his wife Avicia, daughter of Matthew Malefant. Nothing is known of his very early career. He first appears in the employ of William de Valence, lord of…...
Wogan, Sir Charles
Wogan, Sir Charles (1698?–1757?), ‘the Chevalier Wogan’, soldier, Jacobite, and man of letters, was born in Rathcoffey, Co. Kildare, second son of William Wogan and Anne Wogan (née Gaydon). He passed most of his boyhood in Kildare but also spent some time in Windsor, England, where…...
Wolfe, Arthur
Wolfe, Arthur (1739–1803), 1st Viscount Kilwarden , politician and judge, was born 19 January 1739, the fifth surviving son of John Wolfe (1700–60), owner of Forenaughts, Co. Kildare, and his wife Mary (d. 1804), only daughter of William Philpot, a Dublin merchant. After attending…...
Wolfe, George
Wolfe, George (1859–1941), soldier, landowner, antiquarian, and politician, was born 16 December 1859 at Bishopland, Ballymore Eustace, Co. Kildare, younger son among two sons and one daughter of Theobald George Samuel Wolfe (1815–72), landowner, of Bishopland and Forenaghts, Naas…...
Wolff, Gustav Wilhelm
Wolff, Gustav Wilhelm (1834–1913), shipbuilder, businessman, and politician, was born in Hamburg, the son of Moritz Wolff and Fanny Maria Schwabe. Gustav left home at the age of fourteen to study engineering at Liverpool College, staying with his uncle Gustav Schwabe. He was…...
Wolseley, William
Wolseley, William (1640–97), soldier and politician, was the youngest of five sons (there were also six daughters) of Sir Robert Wolseley, 1st baronet, of Wolseley, Staffordshire, and his wife, Mary Wolseley (née Wroughton), daughter of Sir George Wroughton, knight, of Walcot,…...
Wood, Herbert
Wood, Herbert (1860–1955), archivist, historian, deputy keeper of the Public Record Office of Ireland, was born on 6 September 1860 at Trinity Square, Lambeth, London, a prosperous residential development for merchants and professionals. He was the sixth of eight children of William…...
Wood, Robert
Wood, Robert (1717?–1771), traveller, author, and politician, was born at Riverstown Castle near Trim, Co. Meath, eldest son of the Rev. James Wood of Summerhill, Co. Meath. He matriculated at Glasgow University in 1732 and entered the Middle Temple on 15 November 1736. In 1742–3 he…...
Woods, Philip James
Woods, Philip James (1880–1961), soldier and politician, was born in Belfast on 23 September 1880, son of Hugh Woods, clerk, of St John's, Hillsborough, Co. Down, and Emily Catherine Woods, granddaughter of Sir John Fuleston, of Flintshire, Wales. He was educated at the…...
Woods, Sir Robert Henry
Woods, Sir Robert Henry (1865–1938), surgeon and MP, was born 27 April 1865 in Tullamore, Co. Offaly, the youngest son of Christopher Woods, shopkeeper, and his wife, Dorothea (née Lowe). Educated in Dublin at Wesley College and then TCD…...
Woodward, Benjamin
Woodward, Benjamin (1816–61), architect, was born 16 November 1816 in Tullamore, King's Co. (Offaly), seventh child among five sons and four daughters of Capt. Charles Woodward (1781–1864), formerly of the Royal Meath Militia, and his wife Mary (d. 1824), daughter of Dr Edward Atkinson…...
Worth, Edward
Worth, Edward (c.1678–1733), MD and bibliophile, was the son, and only surviving child, of John Worth (1648–88), chancellor (1671–8) and dean (1678–88) of St Patrick's cathedral, Dublin, and his wife Comfort, and was the grandson of …...
Woulfe, Stephen
Woulfe, Stephen (1787–1840), judge, MP, and first catholic baron of the Irish exchequer, was born at Chaude Fontaine, near Liège (then in the Holy Roman Empire, later in Belgium), second son of Stephen Woulfe, landowner, of Tiermaclane, Ennis, Co. Clare, and his wife Honora,…...
Wright, Charles Henry Hamilton
Wright, Charles Henry Hamilton (1836–1909), Hebraist and theologian, was born 9 March 1836 in Dublin, second son among ten children of Edward Thomas Wright, Doctor of Laws (LLD), barrister, of Floraville, Donnybrook, Dublin, and his wife Charlotte (née Wright) of Beech Hill, Donnybrook…...
Wright, James Lendrew
Wright, James Lendrew (1816–93), USA labour leader, was born 6 April 1816 to a protestant family in Co. Tyrone, of whom nothing else is known except that the family emigrated first to St John, in the British colony of New Brunswick, and thence to the US, settling in Philadelphia in…...
Wright, Thomas
Wright, Thomas (1760?–1812), army surgeon, medical writer, and United Irishman, was the second son in the family of eight sons and five daughters of Thomas Wright (1728–86) and his wife Eleanor (1736–1809), youngest daughter of Dr Thomas Bell (1683–1768), an army surgeon of Athlone and…...
Wright, William (‘Billy’)
Wright, William (‘Billy’) (1960–97), loyalist paramilitary, was born in July 1960 in Wolverhampton in the west midlands of England, son of David Wright and his wife, both originally from Portadown, Co. Armagh. The Wrights had moved to England because of harassment after David…...
Wrixon, Sir Henry John
Wrixon, Sir Henry John (1839–1913), lawyer and politician, was born 18 October 1839 in Cork, son of Arthur Nicholas Wrixon, later county court judge in Victoria, Australia, and his wife Charlotte Matilda, daughter of Capt. William Bace, who fought under the duke of…...
Wyche, Sir Cyril
Wyche, Sir Cyril (c.1632–1707), chief secretary, lord justice, and forfeited estates trustee, was born in Constantinople, where his father, Sir Peter Wyche (d. 1643), was English ambassador. His mother, Jane Wyche, was a daughter of Sir William Meredith of Stansley in…...