full rank of General in 1819. He died near Monmouth, 27th April 1833, aged 74. 7
Burke, Aedanus, an American revolutionary statesman, was born in Gal way in 1743. Educated at St. Omer's for the priesthood, he afterwards studied law, and went to America, where he entered enthusiastically into the War of Independence. In 1778 he was appointed Judge of the Supreme Court of South Carolina. When Charleston was taken by the British in 1780, he took a commission in the army; but resumed judicial office when the State was re-organized by the Americans in 1782. He opposed the Federal Constitution, through fear of consolidated power; but served as first United States Senator from South Carolina under that instrument. He wrote a pamphlet against the aristocratic features of the Society of the Cincinnati, which was subsequently translated by Mirabeau, and used by him with effect during the French Revolution. Judge Burke was noted for his wit and eccentricity, and was somewhat addicted to convivial habits. He died at Charleston, South Carolina, 30th March 1802, aged about 59. 37* 40.
Burke, John Doly, (page 50), not John Daly. 233
Butler, Lady Eleanor Charlotte, daughter of the 16th Earl of Ormond, was born in Ireland in 1739; her friend Sarah Ponsonby, in 1755. They formed a romantic attachment, and after several attempts to run away from their friends to England (in one of which Miss Ponsonby broke her leg), were in 1778 permitted to depart with a faithful maid, Betty Carroll. They settled in a cottage at Llangollen, where they passed the remainder of their lives—more than fifty years—together. They were known as "The Ladies of Llangollen," and were visited and petted by the world of fashion and literature. In 1829 the Duke of Wellington perpetrated the job of procuring them a government pension of £200 a year. In September 1823, Charles Mathews thus wrote from Oswestry to a friend: "The dear inseparable immutables. Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss Ponsonby, were in the boxes here on Friday. They came twelve miles from Llangollen, and returned, as they never sleep from home. Oh! such curiosities! I was nearly convulsed! I could scarcely get on for the first ten minutes my eye caught them! Though I had never seen them, I instantly knew them. As they are seated, there is not one point to distinguish them from men; the dressing and powdering of the hair; their well-starched neckcloths; the upper part of their habits, which they always wear, even at a dinner party, made precisely like men's coats, and regular black beaver men's hats." Afterwards he met in company "the dear antediluvian darlings, attired for dinner in the same mummified dress, with the Croix de St. Louis, and other orders, and myriads of large brooches, with stones large enough for snuff-boxes, stuck in their starched neckcloths. I have not room to describe their most fascinating persons. … They have not slept one night from home for above forty years." Betty Carroll died in 1809; Lady Butler, 2nd June 1829, aged 90; Miss Ponsonby, 9th December 1831, aged 76. The virtues of all three are celebrated in long inscriptions on one stone in the churchyard of Llangollen. A minute account of these ladies will be found in Blackburn's Illustrious Irishwomen, from which this notice is for the most part taken. 196†
Byrne, Myles, (page 65).—There is a more correct account of the battle of Vinegar Hill in the notice of General Lake, page 281. 233
Byrne, William Michael, of Park Hill, County of Wicklow, a prominent United Irishman, was one of the Leinster Directory arrested at Bond's, in Dublin, on 12th March 1798. He was brought to trial, and convicted of high treason upon the evidence of Reynolds. It is said that his life was offered to him if he would give evidence implicating Lord Edward FitzGerald, but he indignantly spurned the suggestion, declaring that he had no regret in dying but not leaving his country free. Hopes were still entertained that his life might be spared, on account of the negotiations then pending between the Government and the state prisoners; but "on the morning of the 28th" [July 1798], says Mr. Madden, "he was sitting at breakfast in Bond and Neilson's cell (the wives of the latter being then present), when the jailer appeared, and beckoned to Byrne to come to the door and speak with him. Byrne arose, a few words were whispered into his ear: he returned to the cell, and apologised to the ladies for being obliged to leave them. Bond asked him if he would not return; and his reply was, 'We will meet again.' He went forth without the slightest sign of perturbation or concern, and was led back for a few minutes to his cell, and then conducted to the scaffold. On passing the cell of Bond and Neilson, which he had just left, he stooped, that he might not be observed through the
