Count of Tyrone

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The title of Count of Tyrone (or Comte de Tyrone) was created in the Spanish Netherlands in 1622 or 1623 for Patrick O'Neill, second son of Sean O'Neill. Sean was the eldest living son of Hugh O'Neill, 2nd Earl of Tyrone and claimant in exile of the Earldom of Tyrone. It was granted by the Infanta of Spain. The Counts of Tyrone were active in Ireland, throughout their exile on the Continent.

This O'Neill family was descendant from the O'Neill Mór line of Conn O'Neill, 1st Earl of Tyrone, and last king of Ulster in Ireland. The title "Count of Tyrone" was created in 1623 as a Spanish Netherlands title by the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain and the Netherlands, for Patrick O'Neill, the second son of Sean O'Neill, the 3rd Earl of O'Neill (some say 4th Earl). Sean was the son of "Red" Hugh O'Neill, famous for the Flight of the Earls who died in Rome in 1615 under the protection of the Pope.

At the time of the Irish Rebellion of 1641, Patrick, his cousin General Eoghan or Owen Roe O'Neill, and many of the other family members serving in Continental armies returned to Ireland and fought in the Irish Confederate Wars (1641-53). However Owen Roe's death in 1649 and the eventual defeat of the Irish during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland in 1649-1653, caused Patrick to leave Ireland and to take up loyalty and arms for the French king. Patrick's son James (2nd Comte de Tyrone) received lands from the Compagnie des Iles d'Amérique or (Company of the American Islands) and permanently moved his family to the island of Martinique in the early 1670s.

For roughly the next 200 years, the Counts of Tyrone lived peacefully in Martinique. The family's sons served proudly as officers in Dillon's or Walsh's Irish Regiments, in the Irish Brigade (French) Army. During the American Revolution, at least one officer of the family served with General Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, Count of Gálvez of the Spanish Army, under French approval, in his campaigns against the English in Louisiana, Georgia, and Florida.

In the late 1700s, the Comté de Tyrone was a fellow sugar plantation owner and friends with the Tascher de le Pagerie family there in Martinique. This proved eventful when Napoleon Bonaparte took as his wife, Marie Josèphe Rose Tascher de la Pagerie, born in Les Trois-Îlets, Martinique, and widow of Alexandre, Vicomte de Beauharnais. She was a daughter of Joseph-Gaspard de Tascher, chevalier, seigneur de la Pagerie, lieutenant of infantry of the navy, and his wife, the former Rose-Claire des Vergers de Sanois. When their friend Josephine became Empress of France in 1804, the fortunes of the Counts O'Neill improved as well. The second sons of the Count were given the courtesy style of Vicomte de Tyrone. Jean Laurent O'Neill and Francois Henri O'Neill were the 1st and 2nd such holders. Both were officers in Irish regiments of the French Army.

By the mid 1800s, the 7th Comte, Louis O'Neill died having had three daughters, but no sons, so the title was passed to his brother, Francois Henri- 8th Comte de Tyrone. He died without issue right around the January 1887 and the title went dormant for a lengthy period. However, the estate was left in the care of Mary Auguste Eugenia Valentine O'Neill, daughter of the 7th Comté. Mary married Herman, Baron of Bodman, a junior member of the family of Friedrich I, Grand Duke of Baden. Herman was later Prime Minister of Baden. The politics of post World War I outsted the Baden royal family and they lived a quiet life, but stayed well connected within the European royal families following the 1918 move to the Weimar Republic.

The title, by law, was thus returned to the Spanish crown in 1887, as it was their original grant. However, the right to recognize and restore noble rank is still retained by the Vatican as the font of all nobility. During the Spanish Civil War and the exile of the Spanish king, the Vatican assumed responsibility for the title. Genealogical work started in the 1930s. The claim stalled during the Second World War, but later petitions were made and after years of research and study, in 2006 the Vatican Secretariate of State "confirmamus" or confirmed the dignity of Count and gave territorial reference to a closely related line that also descends in the male from Conn Bacach O'Neill, 1st Earl of Tyrone. The present holder is now titled in Latin Comes Jacobum de Tyrone or Count James of Tyrone. This signifies the change of familial lineage of the title, but the lineage of the title remains in tact.

[edit] Counts of Tyrone (1623)

Patrick O'Neill, 1st Count of Tyrone b. 1623
James O'Neill, 2nd Count of Tyrone (b. 1660), lived in Ireland then moved to Martinique
Henry O'Neill, 3rd Comte de Tyrone
Jacques Henri, 4th Comte de Tyrone, brother was Jean Laurent, 1st Viscount Tyrone, Dillon Regt
Paul Francois Henri, 5th Comte de Tyrone (b. 1749)
Jacques, 6th Comte de Tyrone (1783–1839), brother was Francois Henri, 2nd Viscount Tyrone
Louis Jacques Tiburce, 7th Comte de Tyrone (d. 1859)
Francois Henri, 8th Comte de Tyrone (brother of Louis Jacques) (d. aft. 1887)
title dormant 1887-1937
Jaques, 9th Comte de Tyrone, claimed in 1937 and restored in 2006 by Vatican

[edit] Sources:

Government Office, MS #610, pg 29 (4A)
Burke's Peerage 1970 ed., (John/Sean)pg. 2028/2
"Irish Pedigrees", O'Hart 1892, O'Neill #5 pg. 739-40
"The Ancient and Royal Family of O'Neill", Desmond O'Neill 1996, pg. 125-130
State Papers of Ireland, Pardon Rolls of Queen Elizabeth 1599 & 1602
State Papers of Ireland, Irish Patent Rolls of King James I, 1609
"Anticipate", M. McShane, 2002 pg 35-45
Vatican Patent #11006B14
"The History of the Irish Brigades in the Service of France" Shannon 1969
"Napoleon and Josephine: An Improbable Marriage",Evangeline Bruce, 1995, ISBN 0025178105
Almanach de Gotha, John Kennedy 1999, pg. 50, ISBN 0953214214
General History of Martinique, 1650-1699 & 1750-1799
"Cromwell in Ireland", James S. Wheeler
"Gobernantes de México" Panorama Editorial, Orozco Linares, Fernando, 1985, ISBN 968-38-0260-5
"Destruction by Peace",Kerney Walsh, pages 3-4
"The Life and Times of Aodh O'Neill" James Duffy Pub. 1846