Katherine O`Shea: her life in time

by

Pamela Kelly

Riversdale Community Collage

Class: 4B

After the defeat of the first Home Rule bill in 1886, Charles Stewart Parnell remained in control of the home rule party. However in 1887 an attempt to discredit him was made by means of the Piggott forgeries. Fortunately for Parnell, the attempt to discredit him was unsuccessful as Richard Piggott broke in court and gave a full confession of forging them in1889. Richard admitted to forging the letters which implied that Parnell approved of the Phoenix Park murders in 1882, where Lord Frederick Cavendish who was Chief Secretary at that time and Thomas Henry Burke were stabbed to death whilst walking through the park. ‘Parnell was clearly innocent and his popularity rose.’ The public now regarded him as the ‘‘Uncrowned King of Ireland’’. However very soon after this victory Parnell’s career ended in disgrace. The major contribution to his fall was his liaison with Katherine O’Shea.

Katharine was born in 1845 in Essex, England. Her father, Sir John Page Wood was a clergyman and her mother lady Emma was an artist and was regarded as a remarkable woman, very strong and dominant throughout her life.’ Katharine was the last of her thirteen children, eight of whom where alive in 1845 ‘‘. The family then moved from a damp vicarage at Cressing in Essex to a mansion at Rivenhall Place. Although they lived well, they were in fact short of money. This was illustrated in the fact that her elder sister, Maria Wood married Sir John’s uncle Benjamin who was a very wealthy man. From then on the family called Maria Aunt Ben.

‘’In many ways Katharine’s childhood was idyllic” She was educated at home which was not at all unusual in these Victorian times by her father .While she often felt neglected by her mother, as she didn’t pay Katherine very much attention, she was her fathers pet.

Katharine first met Captain William Henry O’Shea when she went to visit her brother Franks regiment accompanied by her older sister Anna. When she met O’Shea she did not their She did not appear to be impressed with him on this occasion and they did not meet again until 1867 were they then decided to get married. The marriage did not work in the end as her husband was constantly absent from home, leaving Katharine to cope with life on her own. It’s believed that Captain O’Shea went on a drinking and gambling binge which eventually led to their bankruptcy. In 1875 they separated and began to live apart. Captain O’Shea moved to a London apartment whilst Katharine remained living at their home in Eltham, Brighton

Katharine was yet to find her through love. Katherine first met Parnell when she went to the House of Commons with her sister Anna. And was quite taken by him, she describes their first encounter: ‘’He came out, a tall, gaunt figure, thin and deadly Pale. He looked straight at me, and began to smile and his curiously burning eyes looked into mine with a wonderful intentness. ” Undoubtedly it was love at first sight. One hot day in a July month in 1880 was to be the starting point in a long and intensely complicated relationship. In 1881 Katherine and Parnell began living together for short periods of time. Katherine then realized that she had finally found the type of companionship she had always longed for. At the same time Katherine gave Parnell ‘‘a genuinely passionate love, the atmosphere and comfort of home, the feeling Parnell had lacked all his life as there was no one place in the world where he could leave his work and politics behind, lower his guard, and be at peace.”

On October 13^th 1881 Parnell was arrested and sent into Kilmainham Jail. On the morning of his arrest he wrote a letter to Katherine. It read ‘‘politically it is a fortunate thing for me that I have been arrested, as the movement is breaking fast.” On a more personal view Parnell was deeply devastated about his arrest as Katherine just happened to be heavily pregnant with their first child. On February 16^th Katherine gave birth to a baby boy who was named Claude Sophie. Sadly the child died shortly after its birth. Katherine was devastated and Parnell was let out on parole to pay her a secret visit. This family tragedy made Parnell more eager to get out of prison and eventually he was released thanks to the Kilmainham Treaty. Between 1883 and 1884 Katherine successfully gave birth to two healthy baby girls and in 1886 the couple began to live together permently.

On Christmas Eve 1889, however ‘‘Captain O Shea filed a petition for divorce from his wife, citing the nationalist leader co-respondent. ”However, it was wondered why they waited so long to file the divorce. On December 30^th 1889 a statement was made in the Freeman’s Journal ‘‘Captain O` Shea was always aware that he [Parnell] was constantly there [Mrs. O `Sheas house at Eltham] in his absence from 1880 to 1886, and since 1886 he has known that Mr. Parnell resided constantly at their home in Ethlam from 1880 to 1886.” It believed that the real reason for the delay on their divorce was that Katherine was to inherit a great sum of money from her Aunt Ben at the event of her death. Katherine in the past had always relied on Aunt Ben for financial support.

On May 19^th 1889 Mrs. Woods died and put her will in such a way that Captain O`Shea was not legally entitled to a share. Which meant all Mrs. Woods fortune was left to Katherine. When other aggrieved relatives then decided to go and challenge the will, Mr. O`Shea joined along side them.” In 1881 Katherine decided to give an account of the whole affair to Henry Harrison and told him that Mr. O Shea had said to her that he would only give her a divorce if she was to give him a $20,000 settlement deal. Katherine refused to these demands with this Mr. O Shea proceed to file for divorce .On the 15^th of November 1890.Throught the trial both Katherine and Parnell decided to remain silent as they longed for her divorce to come through so they could finally marry each other. They believed that Parnell would not be found guilty in the end. However this was not to be the case. Parnell was found guilty. This did not stop their plans and the then went ahead with there marriage and on the 25^th June 1891 the couple where finally married at a registry office in Stenyning.

When the Liberals got word that Parnell was found to be the guilty party at the outcome of the trial they sent a man named Justin Mc Carthy to warn him to retire from the world of Politics would then be prosponed for a prolonged period of time.’ Parnell would not resign and insisted that he be allowed to keep his private life separate from his political life.” The Home Rule party then split in two: for and against Parnell. He then fought to continue to remain leader of the party which proved to be unsuccessful. Around this time his health also failed him. ‘‘But death was nearer than anybody thought and on 6^th of October 1891, aged only forty-five, he died at Brighton in the arms of his wife, Katherine.”

After the death of Parnell Katherine suffered a nervous breakdown and disappeared from public life. She then died in 1921 after spending the last few years of her life moving from rented house to rented house all over the south coast of England.

It’s amazing and quite had hard to believe that the relationship between Katherine and Parnell such a significant role in Irish history.

Short questions

Q1. Review One source I used for this essay was a book known as Parnell: The Politics of power. this book was edited by Mc Cartney in 1991.Although this book is of Parnell’s life it has a chapter entitled Katherine O’ Shea and C. S Parnell which was written by a novelist named Mary Rose Callaghan .this book was a good source as it told a lot about Katherine and her life previous to Captain Parnell and about her life after his death. I did find this particular book useful as it had a lot of useful material I could use in my project as it mainly consisted of the facts I needed instead of a book that carries a lot of rubbish that would not be necessary in my project.view

Q2. Bibliography

Boylan, Henery. A dictionary of Irish Biography, Gill&Macmillan,

Golden bridge Dublin 8, (1991) Parnell: The Politics of Power Published by Wolfhound Press, Dublin. (1988) Ireland since 1870, Published by C.J Fallon, Dublin.

Q3. Skills

I learned many skills whilst doing this essay and improved in many more how to go out and find information I might need in order to do this essay also my typing, reading and spelling skills improved as I had to use computers for searching on the internet then I had to type up my essay. I improved in my reading also as I had to read many books and pages I acquired relating to my topic. I improved in my spelling as there was a lot of writing to do and to have the correct spelling was much easier than to have to keep changing until I found the right one.

Q4. How the essay was completed

The first step was when I was told about the essay in class was what it meant and how much of a percent it was worth for my Leaving Cert and how much work I would have to do in order to get the marks I wanted. I was then given one week to think about my topic and to do this I visited the school’s library and the local library to find books that would help me choose the right topic for me. I then got books such as a Dictionary of Irish biography I then went on to the internet at home and in school and got information from Microsoft incarta I then read the books and got more information from the internet and was finally able to start the plan for my essay I then began to write the first draft to do this I added pieces from different books checked all dates were accurate I then proceeded in typing my essay using Microsoft word after I had finished putting in all the information I had I printed my essay made changes and corrections. When I then felt happy with my essay I re typed my essay I printed the new copy and put it up on the school website.