Margaret Magennis, Viscountess Iveagh

Margaret was born in 1673 as the eldest daughter of William Burke and his second wife Helen MacCarty. Her father was the 7th Earl of Clanricarde. The Burkes were an Old English family. Margaret's mother was her father's second wife and the eldest daughter of Donough MacCarty, 1st Earl of Clancarty. The MacCartys were a Gaelic family. Both parents were Roman Catholic. Her parents married in 1696.[1]

Her father's first wife was Lettice,[2] daughter of Henry Shirley, an English baronet,[3] and a Protestant. Margaret had half-siblings from her father's first marriage. Her mother also had been married before, but that marriage was childless.

Margaret married twice. She married first in 1689 Bryan Magennis, 5th Viscount Iveagh, from County Down in Ulster.[13] He supported King James II, was attainted and took Austrian service. He died in 1693. The marriage seems to have been childless.

She seems to have fled to Limerick at the end of the Williamite War, at least she is mentioned among the people that were allowed to leave Galway for Limerick when Lord Dillon surrendered the town to Ginkel on 26 July 1691.[14]

In 1696 she married secondly Colonel Thomas Butler of Garryricken, also known as Thomas Butler of Kilcash,[15] the grandson of Richard Butler of Kilcash.[16]

Thomas and Margaret had eight children, three sons and five daughters:

1. Richard Butler (died 1711), who died following a fall from his horse at Kilcash.[17]
2. Walter Butler, who died of smallpox at the Royal Academy at Paris.[18]
3. John Butler (died 1766), who became de jure the 15th Earl of Ormond and inherited the estates of Richard Butler, 1st Earl of Arran but died childless.[19][20]
4. Mary Butler, who married Bryan Cavanagh, of Borris, County Carlow.[21]
5. Honora Butler (died 1730), who married Valentine, Lord Kenmare, in November 1720.[22]
6. Hellen Butler, who married firstly Mr Esmond, and secondly, Richard Butler of Westcourt.[23]
7. Margaret Butler (died 1743), who married George Matthew of Thurles, afterward of Thomastown.[24] and
8. Catharine Butler, who became the third wife of James Mandeville, of Ballydine.[25]

She died on 19 July 1744 at Kilcash Castle.[16] She is buried in the Butler Mausoleum at Kilcash. She is also remembered by the nineteenth-century Irish song 'A Lament for Kilcash', which was written in her memory.[26]

• Earl of Clanricarde, for her father's title.
• Earl of Ormond (Ireland), for her son John's title.
• Magennis, the surname of her first husband.

• Boulger, Demetrius Charles (1911), The Battle of the Boyne, London: Martin Secker
• Burke, Jim (2005), A History Of Burke in Ireland - Jim Burke!
• Burke, Bernard (1869), A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire (31st ed.), London: Harrison (for Clanricarde)
• Burke, Bernard (1949), A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire (99th ed.), London: Burke's Peerage Ltd. (for Shirley under Ferrers)
• Cokayne, George Edward (1893), The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, 5 (1st ed.), London: George Bell and Sons – L to M (for Magennis)
• Cokayne, George Edward (1913), Gibbs, Vicary (ed.), The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, 3 (2nd ed.), London: St Catherine Press – Canonteign to Cutts (for Clanricarde)
• Debrett, John (1828), Peerage of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, 2 (17th ed.), London: F. C. and J. Rivington – Scotland and Ireland
• Lodge, John (1789a), The Peerage of Ireland, 1, Dublin: James Moore - Blood royal, dukes, earls (for Clanricarde)
• Lodge, John (1789b), The Peerage of Ireland, 4, Dublin: James Moore - Viscounts (for Butler, Viscount Mountgarret)
• Mangan, James Clarence (1850), The Poets and Poetry of Munster, Dublin: John O'Daly

• Genealogy of Lady Margaret Bourke on The Peerage website
• Modern edition of the text of 'Kilcash'