John O'Donovan (scholar) - Personal Genealogy

Personal Genealogy

In a letter to Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa of the 29th May, 1856 John O'Donovan gave his lineage as follows:

• From the senior branch of Clann-Cahill, descended from the elder son Donnell II O'Donovan, married Joanna MacCarthy Reagh of Castle Donovan and who died 1638
• Edmond, married Catherine de Burgo, killed 1643.
• Conor, married Rose Kavanagh.
• William, married Mary Oberlin, a Puritan, died 1749.
• Edmond, married to Mary Archdeacon, died 1798.
• Edmond, married Mary Oberlin, died 1817.
• John O'Donovan, L.L.D. married to Mary Ann Broughton, a descendant of Cromwellian settlers.
• Edmond 1840 d. 1842, John 1842, Edmond 1844 later War Correspondent died Sudan1882, William 1846, Richard 1846, Henry dead 1850, Henry 1852, Daniel 1856, Morgan Kavanaugh O'C 1859 d.1860. See Edmund O'Donovan.

An interesting feature of John O'Donovan's works is that he found himself unable to resist asserting the claims of the O'Donovan family to ancient glory, in numerous footnotes and appendices. He personalized the history of the family to such an extent as to even dispute (erroneously) the right to succession of the current chiefly line. Thankfully for Irish scholarship, this small, personal failing does not affect the overall quality of O'Donovan's pioneering research. While it has not been possible to prove the great scholar's descent specifically from the Lords of Clancahill, and not from another O'Donovan sept, it was nonetheless something in which he stoutly believed, and most have been willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. O'Donovan was also undecided and in other notes contended Edmond was a son of Donal II by his first wife Helena de Barry.