John Walsingham Cooke Meredith - Background

Background

Born at Dublin, May 9, 1809, he was the eldest surviving son of John Meredith (1784–1866), an Anglo-Irish lawyer who divided his time between his work in Dublin and his country home, Fair View, near Avoca, County Wicklow. The subject's father, a brother of the Rev. Thomas Meredith, was described as 'a jolly looking, grey haired, hook nosed old gentleman... His good humoured face beaming with kindness'. Meredith's mother, Magdalene (1785–1851), was the eldest daughter of John Redmond (1737–1819) J.P., of Newtown House, Co. Wexford and Charlemont Street, Dublin, by his wife, Anne (1743–1821), daughter and co-heiress of John Walsingham Cooke of Cookestown (otherwise Sleanagrane), County Wexford. His father's family were Protestant settlers who came to Ireland in the mid 17th century, while his mother's family were of established old Irish stock, she being a descendant of the ancient Catholic family of Redmond Hall (nb. Loftus Hall) and after its confiscation, Killygowan, Co. Wexford.

On his mother's side he counted amongst his cousins John Edward Redmond (1806-1865) M.P., the first of a famous Irish political dynasty, and John Henry O'Byrne Redmond (1825–1866) of Killoughter, County Wicklow, Count of the Papal States & Chamberlain to Pope Pius IX. On his father's side his cousins included Sir James Creed Meredith, Sir William Collis Meredith and Edmund Allen Meredith. With the last two named, they headed three of the four branches of this notable family in Canada.