Standish O'Grady, 2nd Viscount Guillamore

Standish Darby O'Grady, 2nd Viscount Guillamore (26 Dec 1792 – 22 July 1848) from Cahir Guillamore, County Limerick, was an Anglo-Irish politician and British Army officer.

He was a lieutenant in the 7th Hussars at the Battle of Waterloo. On 17 June 1815, he had command of the troop of the 7th Hussars on the high road from Genappe to Quatre Bras. The regiment was covering the British march from Quatre Bras to Waterloo. Sir William Dörnberg left O'Grady outside the town on the Quatre Bras road to hold in check the advancing French cavalry while the main body of the regiment proceeded in file across the narrow bridge of Genappe and up the steep street of the town. O'Grady advanced at the head of his troops as soon as the French appeared, and presented so bold a front that, after a time, they retired. When they were out of sight, he crossed the bridge at the entrance of Genappe. He took his troop at a gallop through the town, rejoining Sir William Dörnberg, who had drawn up the main body of the regiment on the sloping road at the Waterloo end of Genappe. A severe cavalry combat ensued when the French lancers reached the top of the town, in which O'Grady's regiment made a gallant charge, with considerable loss.

Anonymous painting of a 7th Queen's Royal Hussar private during the Napoleonic wars.

At Waterloo. he was stationed on the ground above Hougoumont on the British right. He wrote in a letter to his father just after the battle:

The 7th had an opportunity of showing what they could do if they got fair play. We charged twelve or fourteen times, and once cut off a squadron of cuirassiers, every man of whom we killed on the spot except the two officers and one Marshal de Logis, whom I sent to the rear.

Two letters of his to Captain William Siborne, describing the movements of his regiments on 17 and 18 June 1815, are printed in Waterloo Letters, edited by Major-General H. T. Siborne (London, 1891, pp. 130–6).

He was elected in 1820 as Member of Parliament for County Limerick, and held the seat until 1826. He was re-elected in February 1830, but in May his name was struck from the electoral return and replaced with that of James Dawson. O'Grady was re-elected in August 1830, and served until 1835.

He succeeded to the peerage as Viscount Guillamore on 21 April 1840 on the death of his father, the 1st Viscount.

He married Gertrude Jane Paget (d. 1871),^[1] daughter of the Hon. Berkeley Paget and niece of Henry Paget, 1st Marquess of Anglesey. Their children were Standish, third viscount (1832–1860); Paget Standish, fourth viscount (1838–1877); Hardress Standish, fifth viscount (b. 1841); and others.

References

• Leigh Rayment's House of Commons pages
• Lundy, Darryl. "Standish Darby O'Grady, 2nd Viscount Guillamore, The Peerage". The Peerage. 

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Standish O'Grady