OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Arbuthnot, Charles George

​ARBUTHNOT, Sir CHARLES GEORGE (1824–1899), general, born on 19 May 1824, was fourth son of Alexander Arbuthnot, bishop of Killaloe, by Margaret Phœbe, daughter of George Bingham. He was a younger brother of Sir Alexander John Arbuthnot, K.C.S.I. He was educated at Rugby, and in spite of his small size distinguished himself at football there. After passing through the Royal Military Academy he was commissioned as second lieutenant in the royal artillery on 17 June 1843. He was promoted lieutenant on 4 Feb. 1846, second captain on 4 April 1851, and first captain on 8 March 1855. In May he landed in the Crimea, and served during the remainder of the siege of Sebastopol. He was conspicuous for coolness and daring, and was twice wounded. He was mentioned in despatches (London Gazette, 2 Nov. 1855), and was given a brevet majority. He also received the medal with clasp, the Turkish medal, and the Medjidie (5th class).
He commanded K troop of horse artillery from 1857 to 1864, when he became regimental lieutenant-colonel (19 Dec.) He went to India in 1868, where he commanded A brigade of horse artillery till 1872, and was deputy adjutant-general of artillery from 1873 to 1877. From 1 Oct. 1877 to 31 July 1880 he was inspector-general of artillery in India, except while actively employed in the Afghan campaigns. In the first Afghan campaign he had command of the artillery in the Kandahar field force, with the rank of brigadier-general; in the second he commanded the second brigade of the Khyber division, under Sir Robert Bright. He was mentioned in despatches (ib. 4 May 1880), received the medal, and was made K.C.B. on 24 May 1881, having already obtained the C.B. on 20 May 1871. He had become regimental colonel on 1 July 1874, and was promoted major-general on 16 July 1881. On his return to England in 1880, he was deputy adjutant-general of artillery at headquarters from 1 Sept, 1880 to 31 Aug. 1883, during which time the territorial system was first applied to the regiment. His firmness and strict sense of justice made him an excellent administrator, He was then made inspector-general of artillery, and on 1 May 1885 he became president of the ordnance committee, receiving at the same time a distinguished service pension. He returned to India in 1886, being appointed to the command of the Bombay army on 16 Feb., and transferred to Madras on 9 Dec. He succeeded Lord Roberts in Burma in 1887, and completed the pacification of that country. His services were acknowledged by the Indian government (ib. 2 Sept. 1887), and he received the medal with clasp.
He became lieutenant-general on 1 April 1886, and general on 31 July 1890. His command of the Madras army came to an end on 19 May 1891, when he was placed on the retired list. Finally settling in England, he became colonel commandant on 13 Aug. 1893, and received the G.C.B. on 26 May 1894. He died at Richmond, Surrey, on 14 April 1899. In 1868 he had married Caroline Charlotte, daughter of William Clarke, M.D., of Barbados; she survived him.
[Proc. of Royal Artillery Institution, vol. xxvi.; Times, 18 April 1899.]
E. M. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Ansdell, Richard

​ANSDELL, RICHARD (1815–1885), animal painter, a native of Liverpool, was born on 11 May 1815, and baptised at St. Peter’s Church in that city. His grandfather had salt works in the neighbourhood of Northwich. He was educated at the Bluecoat school, Liverpool, and, although attracted by art in youth, did not devote himself to it with a view to making it his profession till he was twenty-one. While in Liverpool he studied animal life in the country-side. His first appearance in London was in 1840, when two of his pictures, ‘Grouse Shooting’ and ‘Galloway Farm,’ were exhibited at the Royal Academy. There followed in 1842 an important historical picture, ‘The Death of Sir William Lambton;’ but here, as in most of his pictures, the subject is not the main thing, and was selected for representation because the scene was on Marston Moor, and the agonies of a wounded horse could be well portrayed there. His paintings from this time forward were very numerous. His success made it possible for him to travel, and between 1857 and 1860 his subjects were found in Spain. His earlier paintings show traces of Landseer’s influence, and there are works of that period produced by Ansdell and Creswick together, the latter supplying the landscape, in which be excelled. His other collaborators were Mr. W. P. Frith, with whom he painted ‘The Keeper’s Daughter,’ and John Phillip, who helped with the Spanish pictures.
Ansdell was honoured no less than three times with the Haywood medal, a gift awarded to the best pictures shown at the exhibitions in Manchester. In 1855 he received a gold medal at the Great Exhibition in Paris, the pictures which won it being ‘The Wolf Slayer’ and ‘Taming the Drove.’ He was elected A.R.A, in 1861, and R.A. in 1870. He exhibited in London galleries, mostly at the Royal Academy, as many as 181 works. The average price of his pictures between 1861 and 1884 was as nearly as possible 750l. A view of St. Michael’s Mount, Cornwall, was purchased by Baron Albert Grant, and realised, at the baron’s sale in April 1877, 1,410l. 10s.
In the print room of the British Museum are a few indifferent etchings by Ansdell. Engravings after his works are numerous enough to prove that copies of his works are much in request.
In his later years Ansdell lived at Lytham House, Kensington, whence he removed to Collingwood Tower, Farnborough. There he died on 20 April 1885. He was buried at Brookwood cemetery on the 23rd. He married in St. Peter’s Church, Liverpool, on 14 June 1841, Maria Romer, also of Liverpool. There were eleven children of the ​marriage, and six sons and two daughters survived the artist.
[Sanders’s Celebrities of the Century; Cyclopædia of Painters and Paintings, 1886; Painters and their Works, 1896; Dict. of British Artists, 1895; W. P. Frith’s Autobiography (1889); Times, 21, 22, 24 April 1885; Liverpool Daily Post, 21 April 1885; Art Journal, 1860; private information.]
E. R.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Neill, Flaithbheartach

Flaithbertach Ua Néill in the ODNB.
​O'NEILL, FLAITHBHEARTACH (d. 1036), king of Ailech, son of Muircheanach (d. 943) [q. v.], and grandson of Niall (810?–919) [q. v.], is sometimes called Flaithbheartach an trostain, i.e. of the pilgrim's staff—a name given to him because he went on a pilgrimage to Rome. He first appears in the chronicles in 1004, when he ravaged the district of Lethchathail, now Locale, co. Down, and then part of the kingdom of Lesser Ulster or Ulidia. He slew the king of Lethchathail, and in a second battle overthrew the ​Ulidians and killed the heir of the chief of the Ui Eathach, their allies. In 1005 he plundered Conaille Murtheimhne, a level district of Louth, but was attacked and defeated with great loss by Maelseachlainn II [q. v.], king of Ireland; but next year he again invaded Ulidia, and slew another lord of Lethchathail, Cuuladh Mac Aenghasa, taking home seven hostages. In 1008 he plundered the rich idain called Magh Breagh in the south of Sleath, and in 1010 in alliance with Munstermen under Murchadh, son of Brian (926-1014) [q. v.], king of Ireland, and with some of the southern O'Neills from Meath, he attacked Cinel Luighdheach, now the barony of Kilmacrenan, co. Donegal, then the patrimony of the O'Donnells, and carried off three hundred cows. Later in the year he demolished Dun Eathach, a fortress in Ulidia. lie invaded the Cinel Conaill as far as Moy, co. Donegal, in 1012, and later marched right through it to Drumcliff, co. Sligo. In his absence, Maelseachlainn invaded Tyrone, but retired, and Flaithbheartach attacked the Ards, co. Down, and again obtained a great spoil from the Ulidians. In 1013 he attacked Meath by way of Maighin attaed, a place not hitherto identified, but which is clearly Moynalty, Co. Meath, since the chronicle adds, 'i ttaobh Ceanannsa' (near Kells), a phrase which, by a misprint in O'Donovan's translation of the 'Annals of the Four Masters,' is rendered 'by the son of Cenanus.' The pass by which the Ulstermen came down may still be traced in the hills on the right bank of the river Borora, which here divides Cavan from Meath. He slew Muireadhach Ua Duibheoin, chief of Ui Micuaisbreagh in Meath, in 1017, and in 1018 was at war with Maelseachlainn, the king of Ireland. Next Year he again ravaged O'Donnell's country. He was defeated by the people of Magh Breagh in 1025, but again invaded Meath in 1025. In 1030 he went on a pilgrimage to Rome, and came back in 1031. It was a year of plenty, and he was able to lead a force into Inishowen. In 1036 he died, iar ndeighbheathaidh agus iar bpennain' ('after a good life and penance'), says the chronicle. He had two sons: Domhnall, who died in 1027; and Muireadhach, who was slain by the Ui Labhradha, a sept of the Ulidians, in 1039.
[Annala Riogbuchta Eireann, ed. O'Donovan, vol. ii.; Annals of Ulster (Rolls Ser.), ed. Hennessy and MacCarthy; Annals of Loch Cé (Rolls Ser.), ed. Hennessy.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Neill, Henry (1800-1880)

​O'NEILL, HENRY (1800–1880), Irish archæologist, born at Dundalk in 1800, issued two works which are held in high estimation by Irish antiquaries. The first of these, entitled ‘The Most Interesting of the sculptured Crosses of Ancient Ireland, drawn to scale and lithographed by H. O'Neill,’ an imperial folio, containing thirty-six fine tinted lithographs with descriptive letterpress and an essay on ancient Irish art, was published by the author, London, 1857. It was followed by ‘The Fine Arts and Civilisation of ​Ancient Ireland, illustrated with chromo and other lithographs, and several woodcuts,' London, 1863. This ambitious work attempts to prove the existence of advanced civilisation in Ireland at a prehistoric period, and to refute the conclusions of Dr. George Petrie [q. v.] in his 'Ecclesiastical Architecture of Ireland' (1845). O'Neill maintained that the round towers were of pagan origin, but this view is now discredited ; nor have his other contentions borne the test of criticism as well as those which he attacked. He also wrote in 1808 a brochure claiming 'Ireland for the Irish 'and attacking 'landlordism.' His last production was a lithograph, with a careful description of the twelfth-century metal cross known as the 'Cross of Cong.' O'Neill died at 109 Lower Gardiner Street, Dublin, on 21 Dec. 1880, in the same year as his namesake the artist, Henry Nelson O'Neil [q. v.], leaving a family in straitened circumstances.
[Irish Times, 24 Dec. 1880; Athenæum, 1881, i. 27 (where, and also in the Academy. O'Neill is wrongly credited with a separate work on the Round Towers); Brit. Mus. Cat.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Neill, Hugh (1784-1824)

​O'NEILL, HUGH (1784–1824), architectural draughtsman, son of an architect who designed a portion of Portland Place, was born in Bloomsbury on 20 April 1784. He spent the early part of his life at Oxford, where he taught drawing, and afterwards resided in Bath, Edinburgh, and Bristol. Of Bristol alone he made over five hundred drawings. The originals he usually worked up and retained, disposing only of copies. Six sketches by him of the ruins of the fire at Christ Church, Oxford (3 March 1809), were engraved by W. Crotch, and published, with descriptive letterpress, at Oxford in 1809. Five drawings of Oxford and its vicinity were engraved by Skelton for his ‘Oxonia Antiqua Restaurata’ (vol. ii. plates 109, 110, 116, 117, 119). Drawings of St. Peter's Church and of Balliol, Magdalen, Exeter, and All Souls Colleges (engraved by Basire and Storer) were published in the ‘Oxford Almanacks’ for 1809, 1810, 1812, 1813, and 1828. Several of his drawings were engraved by Skelton for his ‘Antiquities of Bristol’ (Oxford, 1820, 1826). In the print-room of the British Museum are fifteen of O'Neill's drawings in pencil and water-colour, and in the South Kensington Museum there are three. A lithograph by him of a large manor-house, with wings, is in vol. ii. of ‘Polyautography vel Lythography’ in the print-room, British Museum. He was possibly the H. Neill who exhibited drawings in the Royal Academy in 1800, 1802, 1803, and 1804. He made a fair collection of fossils, minerals, and other curiosities.
O'Neill died in poverty, in Princes Street, Bristol, on 7 April 1824.
[Redgrave's Dict. of Artists; Bryan's Dict. of Painters and Engravers (Graves); Cat. of the Library of the Royal Institute of British Architects; Gent. Mag. 1824, pt. i. p. 381; Farley's Bristol Journal, 10 April 1824.]
B. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Neill, Henry (d.1392)

Éinrí Ó Néill in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
​O'NEILL, HENRY (d. 1392), Irish chief, called by Irish writers Enrí aimhreidh or the Contentious, was son of Niall mór O'Neill, chief of the Cinel Eoghain, son of Aedh reamhar or the Fat, also chief, who died in 1364, and was descended from Brian O'Neill, who was slain at the battle of Down in 1260, and was twelfth in descent from Muircheartach (d. 943) [q. v.], son of Niall (870?-919) [q. v.] These points of descent explain several references to him in poetry. Some verses by Brian ruadh Mac Conmidhe [q. v.] in the poem 'Temair gach baile i mbi ri' ('Any demesne whatever in which there is a king may justly be held to be Tara'), addressed to Henry O'Neill (d. 1489) [q. v.], great-nephew of Enrí aimhreidh, suggest that the Irish Enrí is not Henricus, but énri, sole king. Enrí aimhreidh is the earliest O'Neill of the name. The 'Annals of Loch Cé' state that he was called the Contentious by antiphrasis because he was so peace-loving. His descendants were among the most turbulent of the Ulstermen. He lived at Ardsratha, now called Ardstraw, co. Tyrone, not far from Strabane, where a gateway, flanked by towers and other fragments of his castle, is still to be seen, at the foot of Slieve Truim, a mountain often marked on maps as Bessy Bell. He never became chief of Cinel Eoghain, as he died in 1392, before his elder brother, Niall óg, whose son, Owen Eoghan, is noticed separately. Enrí married his cousin Aiffric, daughter of Aedh O'Neill. She died in 1389, having borne him six sons: Domhnall, Brian, Niall, Huaidhri, Seaan, and Enrí. The six sons, their followers, and descendants formed a sept known as Clann Enrí, and afterwards as Sliocht Enrí aimhreidh, most of whose lands at the plantation of Ulster became the property of the Earl of Abercorn. Domhnall was taken by the English in 1399, and sent a prisoner to England, but was ransomed in 1401, and in 1403 became chief of Cinel Eoghain. He was slain at Keenaght, Co. Derry, by Domhnall and Aibhne O'Cahan in 1432. Brian made an expedition into Donegal in 1401. He was met by the Cinel Conaill under Toirdhealbhach, son of Niall garbh O'Donnell, and hard pressed while driving off his spoil of cattle. At last he was surrounded, and after killing Enrí O'Gairmleaghaidh with one stroke of his sword, was himself killed by Toirdhealbhach O'Donnell.
[Annala Ricghachta Ui Eireann, ed. O'Donovan, vols. iii. and iv.; Bishop William Reeves's Acts of Archbishop Colton, Dublin, 1850; Annals of Loch Cé, ed. Hennessy, vol. ii. (Rolls Ser.); Fitzgerald's Statistical Account of Ardstraw; Lewis's Topographical Dict. of Ireland, vol. i.; Egerton MS. 111 (Brit. Mus.),fol. 38 b.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Shore, William Thomas

Thomas William Shore in the ODNB.
​SHORE, WILLIAM THOMAS (1840–1905), geologist and antiquary, born on 5 April 1840 at Wantage, was son of William Shore, architect, by his wife Susannah Carter. Brought up at Wantage, he became (about 1864) organising secretary to the East Lancashire Union of Institutions at Burnley. In 1867 he was sent (with others) by the science and art department at South Kensington to the Paris Exhibition to report on scientific and technical education, and gave evidence on the subject before a select committee of the House of Commons in 1868. In 1873 he was appointed secretary to the Hartley Institution (now the Hartley University College) at Southampton and curator of the museum, and later became executive officer of the institution. Shore was the founder of the Hampshire Field Club and Archaeological Society, and remained its honorary secretary until his death. He contributed many papers to the society's 'Transactions,' including 'Ancient Hampshire Forests' (1888), 'The Clays of Hampshire and their Economic Uses' (1890), and 'Hampshire Valleys and Waterways' (1895). In 1882 he was secretary of the geological section of the Southampton meeting of the British Association. He was elected fellow of the Geological Society on 3 April 1878. Both as a geologist and an antiquary he was an authority of high repute upon Hampshire. In 1896 Shore moved to London and founded the Balham Antiquarian Society. Shortly before 1901 he became joint honorary secretary of the London and Middlesex Archæological Society, and contributed to its 'Transactions' a series of papers on 'Anglo-Saxon London and Middlesex.' He died suddenly at his residence, 157 Bedford Hill, Balham, on 15 Jan. 1905, and was buried at the cemetery of St. Mary Extra, Woolston, Southampton.
On 24 Jan. 1861 he married Amelia Lewis of Gloucester, who died on 31 May 1891; by her he had two sons, William Shore, M.D., dean of the medical school of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and Lewis Erle Shore, lecturer on physiology at Cambridge, and three daughters.
Shore published: 1. 'Guide to Southampton and Neighbourhood,' 1882. 2. Letter-press description to 'Vestiges of Old Southampton,' by Frank McFadden, 1891. 3. 'A History of Hampshire, including the Isle of Wight' (Popular County Histories), 1892. At his death he was engaged on 'Origin of the Anglo-Saxon Race,' which was edited posthumously by his sons. A 'Shore Memorial Volume' (pt. i. 1908, ed. G. W. Minns), undertaken by the Hampshire Field Club and Archaeological Society, contains his contributions to the society and other papers.
[Quarterly Journal Geol. Soc. 61, lviii-lix; private information.]
C. W.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Overton, Constantine

​OVERTON, CONSTANTINE (d. 1687), quaker, was a freeman of Shrewsbury, and was one of the first to join the quaker society in Shropshire. As early as April 1657 he wrote from Shrewsbury gaol an expostulation called ‘The Priest's Wickednesse and Cruelty, laid open, and made manifest. By Priest Smith of Cressedge, persecuting the Servants of the Lord, whose outward Dwellings is in and about Shrewsbury. As also the Proceedings of Judge Nicholas, and the Court of Justice, so called, against them so persecuted by the Priest, at the last generall Assizes holden at Bridgenorth for the County of Salop. Together with some Queries to the Priests,’ London, 1657. In 1662 Constantine and his brother Humphrey were in prison for not paying tithes. On 26 Feb. 1663 the former was seized at a meeting at Shrewsbury, and sent to prison; and in 1665 he was disfranchised, as freeman of Shrewsbury, because he refused to take oaths, and held meetings in his house. At the close of the same year he and his brother Humphrey, with their two men-servants, were committed to gaol for keeping their shops open on Christmas day. Constantine Overton issued a token with the shoemakers' arms in 1663. In May 1670 the mayor and officers came to his house in Shrewsbury, and took down the names of all present at a meeting, sent four to prison, and fined the rest, Constantine, Humphrey, and Thomas Overton being the heaviest sufferers. The meeting being resumed the following week, they were again heavily fined, and later also for the offence of keeping open shop on Christmas day. At the general proclamation, March 1672, Thomas Overton was released from Shropshire county gaol, having spent seven years in prison, and part of the time in London. Constantine married, on 5 March 1668, Mary Turner (d. 23 Oct. 1687), and died on 7 Oct. 1687.
[Besse's Sufferings, i. 750, 751, 753, 754, 755; The Humble Appeale and Petition of Mary Overton, prisoner in Bridewell [1646]; Janney's Hist. of Friends, iii. 222; MacClintock and Strong's Dict. of Biogr. vii. 492; Gough's Hist. of Quakers, iv. 311–14; Owen and Blakeway's Hist. of Shrewsbury, i. 490; Registers at Devonshire House.]
C. F. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Overton, John (1640-1708?)

​OVERTON, JOHN (1640–1708?), printseller, was the principal vendor of mezzotints of his day. Noble thinks he was connected with Robert Scot, the bookseller, of Little Britain. His shop was at ‘the White Horse without Newgate,’ London, where he succeeded Peter Stent and an elder John Overton, and where he was followed by Henry Overton, probably his son, who published many mezzotint portraits, some with E. Cooper. Towards the end of his life Henry Overton was in partnership with I. Hoole. Another member of the family was Philip Overton, who brought out mezzotint portraits down to a period subsequent to 1750 at the Golden Buck, near St. Dunstan's Church, opposite Fetter Lane, in Fleet Street, London, where he was succeeded by M. Overton, and afterwards by Robert Sayer. Both Henry and Philip Overton were benefactors to William Bowyer on the occasion of the fire at his printing-office, on 30 Jan. 1712 (Nichols, Lit. Anecd. i. 62).
A portrait of John Overton, in wig and bands, ‘ætatis suæ 68, A.D. 1708,’ is described by J. Chaloner Smith, who states that his address ‘is to be found on many works of the times of Charles II, James II, and William III, some being after states of the line engravings by the elder Faithorne’ (British Mezzotinto Portraits, 1884, iv. 1699–1700).
[Notes and Queries, 6th ser. ii. 347, 414, 498; Noble's Biographical History of England, 1806, iii. 428–30; Gay's Trivia, ii. 488–9; North's Life of John North, 1826, iii. 290–3.]
H. R. T.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Owain Brogyntyn

​OWAIN BROGYNTYN (fl. 1180), Welsh chieftain, was a natural son of Madog ap Maredudd [q. v.] His mother is said to have been a daughter of the 'Black Reeve' of Rug in Edeyrnion. He took his name from the fortress of Porkington, near Oswestry, which was in Madog's hands during the troubles of the reign of Stephen, and was then known to the Welsh as Brogyntyn. The nature of his connection with the place is uncertain ; if at any time he held it, he did not transmit it to his descendants. Owain succeeded to two of the districts ruled over by his father — viz. Dinmael and Edeyrnion. From a manuscript in the Sebright collection, quoted in the 'Archæologia Cambrensis' (1st ser. i. 105), he appears to have borne rule for a time in Penllyn also. The 'Wenhewm' which he gave to the monks of Basingwerk (see David's confirmation of the grant, dated 1240, in Dugdale, Monast. Angl. v. 263) may have been Gwern hefin, near Bala. Owain married : 1. Sioned, daughter of Hywel ap Madog ap Idnerth, by whom he had no issue; 2. Marred, daughter of Einion ab Seisyll of Mathafarn, by whom he had three sons, Gruffydd, Bleddyn (for whom see Rymer, Fœdera, i. 76, ed. 1839), and Iorwerth. His posterity long had rights of lordship in Dinmael and Edeyrnion.
[Dwnn's Heraldic Visitations of Wales, ii. 109 ; A. N. Palmer in Cymmrodor. x. 38-42 ; Powel's Historic of Cambria, reprint of 1811, p. 153.]
J. E. L.