Life
1807-1894; [freq. cited as O’Neill Daunt; pseud. ‘Denis Ignatius
Moriarty’]; b. Tullamore, Co. Offaly; converted to Catholicism, 1827;
life-long supporter of the O’Connell’s Repeal Association, but
close friend of Charles Gavan Duffy; Repeal MP Mallow, 1832; supported
Disestablishment of the Church of Ireland; salaried sec. of Home Government
Association, acting as intermediary with Paul Cullen, Archbishop of Dublin;
six novels set in Ireland incl. The Wife Hunter and Flora Douglas
(1836), Inishfoyle Abbey [pseud. DIM] (3 vols. 1840); Saints
and Sinners (1843), Hugh Talbot (1846); and Kilgarvan [q.d];
wrote Ireland under the Legislative Union (1843); Ireland and her Agitators
(1857); How the Union Robs Ireland (1873); Eighty-Five Years
of Irish History (1996), and A Life Spent for Ireland, being
selections from the Journals of the Late W. J. O’Neill Daunt, ed.
by His Daughter (1896). Personal Recollections of the late Daniel
O’Connell (1848); served as paid secretary to Home Govt. Assoc.
at salary of £400, acting as intermediary with Archb. Paul Cullen; also,
d. Kilcasan [vars. Kilashin; Kilcaskin], Co. Cork, to which he retired
in 1874. JMC DIW DIH IF MKA RAF
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Works
Fiction, The Wife Hunter and Flora Douglas (Bentley, 1836),
also issued as The Wife Hunter, by the Moriarty Family, ed. [pseud.]
Denis Ignatius Moriarty (Philadelphia 1838); The Husband Hunter
... do. (1839); Innisfoyle [var. Inishfoyle] Abbey, a
tale of modern times by D.I.M. (1840); Saints and Sinners (NY
1843); Hugh Talbot, a tale of the Irish confiscations of the 17th Century
(1846); The Gentleman in Debt (1851).
Commentary, Ireland and Her Agitators (Dublin 1845); Letter [on] the Repeal of the Union (1846); Personal Recollections of ... O’Connell (1848); Catechism of the History of Ireland (1870); Eighty-five years of Irish History (1886); Essay on Ireland (1888); A Life Spent for Ireland, Being Selections from the Journals of the late W. J. O’Neill Daunt, ed. by his dg. [Alice I. O’N. Daunt] (1896) [facs. rep. 1979; var. 1972], x+xx+420pp.; port.
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Criticism
Sean O’Faolain, The Irish (1947), p.103.
David Cairns & Shaun Richards, Writing Ireland, colonialism, nationalism and culture (Manchester 1988).
Tom Garvin, ‘O’Connell and Irish Political Culture’, in Daniel O’Connell, Political Pioneer, ed. Maurice R O’Connell (Inst. Publ. Relations 1991), pp.7-12.
D. George Boyce, Nationalism in Ireland, London: Routledge 1982), p.232.
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Notes
Justin McCarthy, ed., Irish Literature (Washington: University
of America 1904); includes extracts from Eighty Five Years of Irish
History.
Stephen Brown, Ireland in Fiction (Dublin: Maunsel 1919); The Wife Hunter and Flora Douglas (Bentley, 1836), The Husband Hunter; Innisfoyle Abbey (1840); Saints and Sinners, a controversial and satirical study of Ulster Protestants (NY 1843), Hugh Talbot [1846]; The Gentleman in Debt (1851); autobiography, A Life Spent for Ireland; convert to Catholicism and Repeal Assoc. colleague of O’Connell; Inisfoyle Abbey, novel dealing with the religious question from Catholic standpoint by ‘the author of several amusing novels’ (contemp. review); an Englishman, Howard, in Ireland whose prejudices are corrected in the light of a reality which includes the Rathcormac tithe massacre, and the restoration of the Abbey; Orange sayings and doings revealed in ludicrous and terrible light.
Brian McKenna, Irish Literature, 1800-1875: A Guide to Information Sources (Detroit: Gale Research Co. 1978), lists novels, The Wife Hunter, by the Moriarty Family, ed. [pseud.] Denis Ignatius Moriarty (Philadelphia 1838); The Husband Hunter ... do. (1839); Innisfoyle Abbey, a tale of modern times by D.I.M. (1840); Hugh Talbot, a tale of the Irish confiscations of the 17th c. (1846); The Gentleman in Debt (1851). Also A Life Spent for Ireland, Being selections from the journals of the late W. J. O’Neill Daunt, ed. by his dg. [Alice I. O’N. Daunt] (1896) [port.]
Ulster Univ. Library holds A Life Spent for Ireland DA 952; Personal Recollections [...of O’Connell] (1868 [edn.]) DA 950; dates 1807-1894.
Belfast Public Library holds Catechism of the History of Ireland (1870); Eighty-five years of Irish History (1886); Essay on Ireland (1888); Ireland and her Agitators (1845); Ireland Since the Union (1888); Letters &c (n.d.); A Life Spent for Ireland, selections from the journals (1896); Personal Recollections of ... O’Connell (1848). Belfast Linenhall Library holds Letter [on] the Repeal of the Union (1846).
‘O’Neill Daunt castigated the "anti-Irish Catholic landlord"
as a "greater scourge than the Orange proprietor, who since suffling
off his penal coil in 1829, has affected the courtier and fine gentleman
[…] (Cited in Seán de Fréine, The Great Silence:
the study of a relationship between language and nationality, Cork:
Mercier 1978, p.79.)
Michael McCarthy Nonconformist Treason (1912), quotes W. J. D. O'Neill: ‘My own experience [...] coincides with that of every Irish Protestant who has thrown himself on the Catholic people’. McCarthy comments: ‘Irish Protestants, happily, are not prepared to row in Mr MacNeill’s galley.’ (MacNeill, Times, 16 Feb. 1912; McCarthy, p. 9; see supra.)
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)