Famous People of Enniscorthy

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Admiral David Beatty

Admiral David Beatty (1871-1936), hero of the battles of Scapa Flow and Jutland during the 1914-18 war, grew up on the family estate of Borodale, three miles from the town of Enniscorthy.

Anna Leon - Owens

Number 34 Weafer Street also known as ‘Chantemode’ was allegedly the birthplace of Anna Leon –Owens (1831-1915), who became Governess to the King of Siam. Along with her son, Tom, she was the subject of a well known book, ‘Anna and the King of Siam’, and the film with Yul Brynner, ‘The King and I’. There are different accounts of her place of birth. In her Books based on her own reminiscences, The English Governess at the Siamese Court and The Romance of the Harem were themselves highly fictionalised versions of just a few years of her life.

Anthony Cronin

Another famous writer born in Slaney Street, Enniscorthy in 1928 is Anthony Cronin. Well known for his poetry he received the Marten Toonder Award for his contribution to Irish Literature. He is a founding member of Aosdána. He was one of the main architects of one of the most innovative and influential artistic and cultural policies and institutions in the modern Irish state. He served as Cultural and Artistic Advisor to the Irish Government when Mr. C.J. Haughey was Taoiseach.

Augustus Welby Pugin

Augustus Welby Pugin (1812-1852) shared the design of the London Houses of Parliament with Sir Charles Barry. His architectural genius is very evident and prominent in St. Aidan’s Cathedral, Enniscorthy, where Mass was first celebrated in 1846.

Colm Toibin

Colm Toibín born in Enniscorthy in 1955 is a multi award-winning novelist. He has written several novels, short stories, and a play and was a high profile journalist as one time Editor of Magill Magazine. His novel The Heather Blazing won the 1993 Encore Award. The Blackwater Lightship was shortlisted for the 1999 Booker Prize and the 2001 International Impac Dublin Literary Award. The Master won the 2006 International Impac Dublin Literary Award, was shortlisted for the 2004 Booker Prize, won The Los Angeles Times Novel of the Year, the Stonewall Book Award and the Lambda Literary Award and was listed by The New York Times as one of the ten most notable books of 2004.His latest novel Brooklyn received rave reviews and is set in Enniscorthy and Brooklyn.

Eamonn Wall

Eamonn Wall, an Enniscorthy native who has lived in the United State since 1982. He is author of five collections of poetry: A Tour of Your Country (2008), Refuge at De Soto Bend (2004), The Crosses (2000), Iron Mountain Road (1997), and Dyckman-200th Street (1994). A collection of essays From the Sin-e-Cafe to the Black Hills (2000) was awarded the Michael J. Durkan Prize by the American Conference for Irish Studies for excellence in scholarship. Eamonn Wall lives in St. Louis, Missouri, and is Smurfit-Stone Professor of Irish Studies and Professor of English at the University of Missouri

Eileen Gray

Eileen Gray Eileen Gray (1879-1976) was born at Brownswood House, near Enniscorthy, but settled in Paris to become a renowned designer and architect. In the early 1920s, she flew on the first airmail service in America from New Mexico to Acapulco. She is now regarded as one of the most important furniture designers and architects of the early 20th century and the most influential woman in those fields. Her work inspired both Modernism and Art Deco. She designed the famous house named E-1027 in 1927 near Monaco which the French Government is now restoring it as a National Treasure. In February 2009 her otherworldly “Dragons” armchair sold for a remarkable €21.9 million shattering the auction record for a 20th century decorative artwork.

Gerard Whelan

Gerard Whelan, is one more Enniscorthy born writer, is the author of several books for children and is a multiple award-winner. The Guns of Easter, his first novel, won a Bisto Merit Award and the Eilís Dillon Award for first time writers. Dream Invaders was the overall winner of the Bisto Book of the Year Award 1990, and War Children won the Reading Association of Ireland Award 2003. Other books by Gerard Whelan include Winter of Spies (sequel to Guns of Easter) and Out of Nowhere.

Guglielmo Marconi

Italian born Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937) obtained the world’s first patent in wireless telegraphy and is rightfully titled ‘the father of modern radio’. The Enniscorthy blood in this man’s veins is that of his mother, Annie Jameson, granddaughter of the founder of the Jameson whiskey distillery.

Henry Roche

When Henry Roche of Enniscorthy Castle married Miss Josephine Shriver in 1900, the bride from Baltimore, U.S.A. was destined to provide a link between Enniscorthy and the United States Presidency. Miss Shriver’s first cousin was Robert Sargent Shriver’s mother and Sargent Shriver married Miss Eunice Kennedy, sister of the late John F. Kennedy (1917-1963), 35th President of the United States.

John Holland

John Holland (1841-1914), a native of County Clare, went to America and invented the ‘Holland’ submarine. He is known as ‘the father of the modern submarine’ and while a member of the Christian Brothers he taught for a short time at a school in Enniscorthy.

Lafcadio Hearn

Every Japanese scholar is familiar with the name Lafcadio Hearn aka Koizumi Yakumo (1850-1904), the man who brought the ‘English language to Japan’. As a young boy, Hearn lived with relatives at Kiltrea, just a few miles from Enniscorthy.

Peter Murphy

Another Enniscorthy writer, Peter Murphy, in February 2009 published his debut novel ‘John the Revelator’ to rave reviews and it was shortlisted for Costa First Novel Award. Peter is a writer, journalist and is a contributing editor with Hot Press magazine. He writes about Music, Books and Films.

William Henry Grattan Flood

William Henry Grattan Flood (1859-1928) from Lismore in County Waterford was the organist at St. Aidan’s Cathedral and author of ‘History of Enniscorthy’ and ‘History of Irish Music’, which became a university text-book