Charlotte Grace O'Brien

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Irish nationalist CGOB wrote poetry (through the later nineteenth century and into the twentieth, including many sonnets and a closet drama), a single novel about a Fenian uprising, and a number of essays, some published in periodicals and some left in manuscript, about Irish issues, particularly the terrible conditions under which people were emigrating to the USA.

Milestones

23 November 1845

CGOB was born at Cahirmoyle near the village of Ardagh, Limerick (where her father owned 5,000 acres of land), one of a family of five sons and two daughters.
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius, and Charlotte Grace O’Brien. “Introductory Memoir”. Charlotte Grace O’Brien, Maunsel, pp. 3-135.
9-10
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

November 1869

CGOB wrote the first of four sonnets, not published till after her death, on the statesman William Ewart Gladstone : her changing view of Gladstone in these poems follows the vicissitudes of his policy on Ireland.
O’Brien, Charlotte Grace. Charlotte Grace O’Brien. Editor Gwynn, Stephen Lucius, Maunsel.
171

By 2 November 1878

CGOB published, dedicated to her father , Light and Shade, her novel about the Fenian uprising of March 1867.
This abortive uprising took place in several southern Irish centres including Limerick. CGOB 's father had been a leader of the Young Ireland uprising in 1848. Stephen Gwynn mistakenly dates the uprising 1869.
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius, and Charlotte Grace O’Brien. “Introductory Memoir”. Charlotte Grace O’Brien, Maunsel, pp. 3-135.
44
Athenæum. J. Lection.
2662 (1878): 559

15 February 1908

CGOB 's specially-written account of her work for Irish emigrants was read out at the Silver Jubilee of the American Mission for the Protection of Irish Immigrant Girls .
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius, and Charlotte Grace O’Brien. “Introductory Memoir”. Charlotte Grace O’Brien, Maunsel, pp. 3-135.
55

3 June 1909

CGOB died of heart failure at her house, Ardanoir at Foynes.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius, and Charlotte Grace O’Brien. “Introductory Memoir”. Charlotte Grace O’Brien, Maunsel, pp. 3-135.
34

Biography

Birth and Family

23 November 1845

CGOB was born at Cahirmoyle near the village of Ardagh, Limerick (where her father owned 5,000 acres of land), one of a family of five sons and two daughters.
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius, and Charlotte Grace O’Brien. “Introductory Memoir”. Charlotte Grace O’Brien, Maunsel, pp. 3-135.
9-10
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.