Murrough O'Brien, 1st Marquess of Thomond

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Murrough O'Brien, 1st Marquess of Thomond was born 1723.

He joined the Grenadier Guards and was an officer in Germany where he carried colours at the Battle of Laffeldt in 1747. He retired in 1756.

In 1777 he became 5th Earl of Inchiquin. On 29 December 1800 he was created 1st Marquess of Thomond in the Peerage of Ireland with a special remainder, and 1st Baron Thomond of Taplow in the Peerage of the United Kingdom on 2 October 1801). He had a close relationship with King George III. In 1783 he was one of the Founding Knights of the Order of St Patrick. He was not made a representative peer of Ireland despite supporting the Act of Union of Great Britain and Ireland.

He was a drinker and was called a six bottle man, a gambler, He had a zest for life.

His Irish seat was Rostellan, near Cork.

He was a keen farmer and oversaw enclosure of lands around Taplow and mechanisation.

He was unsympathetic to Catholic Irish, as he supported the Act of Union 1800.

He married Mary O'Brien, 3rd Countess of Orkney (d.1790) in 1753, with whom he had a daughter, Mary O'Brien, 4th Countess of Orkney (b.1755). He also is reputed to have had an illegitimate son, Thomas Carter (1768-1800), who was a popular singer in London during the 1790s. Thomas lived with Inchiquin at Taplow Court after his return from India c1788, and lent the earl all the money he earned by a benefit concert in Calcutta. In return, Inchiquin recommended Thomas to all his friends as a coal merchant (which Thomas became after his marriage to Mary Wells in 1793, to support his growing family).

Then in 1792, he married Mary Palmer, the niece and a beneficiary of Joshua Reynolds (painter). She paid his debts.

The barony of Thomond became extinct on his death. He died after a fall from his horse in Grosvenor Square, London on 10 February 1808).

(sources various, much literature)