OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mackenzie, Robert (1823-1881)

​MACKENZIE, ROBERT (1823–1881), miscellaneous writer, born in 1823 at Barry, Forfarshire, where his father was parish schoolmaster, was educated by his father and at a school at St. Andrews. The family moved to Dundee, and Mackenzie was apprenticed as a clerk in a merchant's office, He served in various situations, but about 1843 became reporter to the 'Northern Warder,' which he afterwards sub-edited. He quitted journalism for commerce, and became partner in the firm of Mackenzie, Ramsay & Co., which failed after the crisis of 1857. He then returned to journalism, frequently visited America, and wrote a few books. Just before his death he was actively engaged as agent for the Westinghouse Brake Company. He died at his house in Magdalen Yard Road, Dundee, on 2 Feb. 1881. He had married, first, a daughter of John Home Scott, and secondly a daughter of William Cunningham (1805-1861) [q. v.], and left four children.
His chief works were: 1. 'The United States of America. A History,' London, 1870, 8vo. 2. 'The Nineteenth Century. A History,' London, 1880, 8vo; abridged in 1881 as 'The Reign of Queen Victoria,' 3. 'America. A History,' London, 1882, 8vo. He also edited with notes in 1883 an incomplete edition of 'Gulliver's Travels.'
[Dundee Advertiser, 8 Feb. 1881; Northern Warder, 4 Feb. 1881; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
W. A. J. A.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mackenzie, James (1680?-1761)

1904 Errata appended.
​MACKENZIE, JAMES (1680?–1761), physician, born about 1680, was educated at Edinburgh University, was entered at the university of Leyden 15 March 1700 (Leyden Students, p. 64), and was subsequently elected a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians at Edinburgh. He practised for many years in Worcester 'with nigh reputation and success,' and he gained many learned and influential friends, including L. M. da Costa [q. v.] and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu . In 1 745 he was consulted, together with Philip Doddrige [q. v.l by Isaac Maddox [q. v.], then bishop of Worcester, respecting the foundation of Worcester Infirmary, and he was attending physician at that institution from its establishment until his retirement from practice in 1751, when he settled in Kidderminster. The bishop wrote him an affectionate letter as a stimulus 'to usefulness, even in retirement,' and in 1758 he responded by producing 'The History of Health and the Art of Preserving it,' Edinburgh, 8vo, dedicated to the bishop, commencing with a succinct account of man's food before the fall, and containing summaries of the general rules of health laid down by eminent physicians from Moses onwards. There are some curious notes on British writers on health, including Sir Thomas Elyot, Thomas Morgan (CoganP), Edmund Hollyngs, William Vaughan, Thomas Venner, Edward Maynwaring, Phayer, Bulleyn, and lastly, Arbuthnot and Mead. A third edition appeared also at Edinburgh in 1760, bearing fruits of Mackenzie's friendship with the Wortley Montagus in the shape of an appendix, containing 'A Short and Clear Account of the Commencement, Progress, Utility, and Proper Management of Inoculating the Small Pox as a valuable branch of Prophylaxis.' A French translation had appeared at the Hague in 1759. Mackenzie also wrote 'Essays and Meditations on Various ​Subjects,' a pious volume published posthumously at Edinburgh in 1762, and he contributed 'History of a Complete Luxation of the Thigh' to 'Essays and Observations, Physical and Literary' (1756, ii. 817). Mackenzie died at Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire, on 7 Aug. 1761.
[Chambers's Worcestershire Biography, pp. 849-50; Gent. Mag. 1761, p. 382; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. ii. 308; Watt's Bibl. Brit. ii. 630; Wood's Athenæ, ed. Bliss, ii. 19; Mackenzie's book in Brit. Mus.]
T. S.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.189 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mackenzie, John (1806-1848)

​MACKENZIE, JOHN (1806–1848), Gaelic scholar, was born on 17 July 1806 in the parish of Gairloch, Ross-shire. His father, Alexander Mackenzie, held some lands on the north side of Lochewe, and claimed kinship with the lairds of Gairloch. The family had been in comfortable circumstances, but misfortune had overtaken it. Mackenzie left the parish school of Gairloch at an early age, and was apprenticed to an itinerant carpenter and joiner of the district. During his wanderings Mackenzie began to write down the popular songs and airs which he heard sung. An accident met with while at work compelled him to return to Gairloch, and there he collected the poems of William Ross [q. v.], which were then only preserved orally. The volume was published in Inverness in 1830, and contained a prefatory memoir by Mackenzie. With a view to publishing other of the poems which he had collected, he went to Glasgow in 1833, and he published a second edition of Ross's poems there in 1834. In 1836 he was appointed a book-keeper in the Glasgow University printing-office, and sold his collection of Gaelic poetry to a publisher. The book appeared in 1841, under the title of 'The Beauties of Gaelic Poetry,' and it occupies a position in Gaelic literature second only to the collections that have been made of Ossian. It contained biographies in English of thirty-six of the better-known authors, and an introduction, also in ​English, on the history and poetry of the Celts, contributed by James Logan [q. v.], author of 'The Scottish Gael.' Mackenzie afterwards prepared a Gaelic history of Prince Charles, and edited a collection of Gaelic Jacobite songs, both volumes appearing in 1844. Entering the service of Messrs. Maclachlan & Stewart, an Edinburgh firm of publishers, he translated several theological works (infra) into Gaelic, edited the last edition of Duncan MacIntyre's [q. v.] poems, compiled the English-Gaelic part of MacAlpine's 'Gaelic Dictionary,' and assisted with the editing of the Gaelic magazine 'Cuaitear nan Gleann.' In 1847 he issued a prospectus of an enlarged edition of 'The Beauties of Gaelic Poetry,' but died at Poolewe on 19 Aug. 1848, before the project was carried out. His materials seem to have disappeared. A monument was erected by public subscription over his grave in 1878 (cf. Celtic Mag. 1877).
Mackenzie's original work is insignificant, and he included only one song of his own in the 'Cuaitear.' He translated or edited about thirty different Gaelic works, including, besides those mentioned, Baxter's 'Call to the Unconverted,' Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress,' 'World to Come,' &c, Dyer's 'Christ's Famous Titles,' and Dr. Guthrie's 'Christian's Great Interest.' Mackenzie's English-Gaelic part of MacAlpine's 'Dictionary' is published separately.
[An account of Mackenzie, written from information supplied by his brother, appeared in the Celtic Mag. vol. ii.]
J. R. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mackenzie, John Kenneth

​MACKENZIE, JOHN KENNETH (1850–1888), medical missionary, born at Yarmouth, Norfolk, on 25 Aug. 1860, was younger son of Alexander Mackenzie, a native of Ross-shire, by his wife Margaret, a member of a Breconshire family. His parents soon removed to Bristol. After being educated at a private school there, he entered a merchant's office as clerk in 1865. He supplied the defects of his education by private study, and devoted all his leisure time to evangelical work among the poorer classes in Bristol. Soon abandoning commercial life, he studied medicine with the intention of becoming a medical missionary. In October 1870 he entered the Bristol Medical School, and in 1874 obtained medical diplomas from London and Edinburgh. For a time he attended the Royal Ophthalmic Hospital in London. In 1875 the London Missionary Society appointed him superintendent of a newly founded medical station at Hankow, China, where he arrived on 8 June after an adventurous voyage. A mission had been established there in 1861, and a hospital was founded in 1867, connected with the new medical station. He threw himself with ardour into the work, making excursions into the surrounding district, and gaining the confidence of the natives by his skill as a doctor. The unhealthy climate forced him to seek another place of residence, and in March 1879 he was removed to Tien-tsin, where a hospital had been established ten years before. Here, as at Hankow, he speedily gained a high reputation among the Chinese, and he obtained funds for the erection of a new hospital, which was opened on 2 Dec. 1880. One of his most important works in Tien-tsin was the founding of a medical school for native students. Owing to the illness of his wife he returned to London in February 1883, but arrived at Tien-tsin again on 25 Sept. 1883. He died there 1 April 1888 of small-pox, contracted while attending a native patient.
[Mrs. Bryson's John Kenneth Mackenzie, Medical Missionary in China, 1891, compiled from his diary.]
A. H. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Braein, Tighearnach

Tigernach Ua Braín in the ODNB.
​O'BRAEIN, TIGHEARNACH (d. 1088), Irish annalist, belonged to a Connaught family which produced before him an abbot of Clonmacnoise, Donnchadh, who died in 987, and after him Dermot, coarb of St. Comman (d. 1170); Gilla Isa, prior of Ui Maine (d. 1187); Stephen, erenach of Mayo (d. 1231); Tipraide, coarb of St. Comman (d. 1232); and Gillananaemh, erenach of Roscommon (d. 1234); but which does not seem to have been a literary clan. He became abbot of Clonmacnoise, and is therefore called comharba Chiarain, coarb or successor of St. Ciaran (516–549) [q. v.], and was also abbot of Roscommon or coarb of St. Comman. Clonmacnoise, of which considerable ruins remain, stands on flat ground close to the left bank of the Shannon, and had produced several learned men before his time. He there wrote annals in which Irish events are synchronised with those of Europe from the earliest times to his own day. These were afterwards continued by Augustin MacGradoigh [q. v.] There is a copy of these annals, written in the time of the contemporaries of the original author, in the Bodleian Library, which also contains an ancient fragment. Three copies exist in the Royal Irish Academy, and one in Trinity College, Dublin. The British Museum has two inferior copies. The annals are in Latin, and the critical discernment of the author has often been praised, because he dates accurate history in Ireland from the founding of Emhain Macha, co. Armagh, in B.C. 289. He quotes Bæda, as well as Josephus, Eusebius, and Orosius, and gives in Irish part of a poem by Maelmura [q. v.] He died in 1088, and was buried at Clonmacnoise. Dr. O'Conor printed a text of Tighearnach in his ‘Rerum Hibernicarum Scriptores,’ but the inaccuracies are so numerous that in quoting Tighearnach a reference to one of the manuscripts is necessary.
[Annala Rioghachta Eireann, ed. O'Donovan, vol. ii. Dublin, 1851; O'Conor's Rerum Hibernicarum Scriptores; Manuscripts in Bodleian Library, Rawlinson, Nos. 488, 502; O'Curry's Lectures on Manuscript Materials of Ancient Irish History, Dublin, 1873; Facsimiles of National MS. of Ireland, vol. i.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Brien, Donat Henchy

​O'BRIEN, DONAT HENCHY (1785–1857), rear-admiral, was born in Ireland in March 1785, and entered the navy in 1796, on board the Overyssel of 64 guns, in which, notwithstanding his extreme youth, he was actively employed on boat service, and in 1799 was put in command of a hoy laden with stone, to be sunk at the entrance of Goree harbour so as to block in three of the enemy's line-of-battle ships. In a sudden squall the hoy sank in the wrong place at the wrong time, and O'Brien and his few men were with difficulty rescued. He passed his examination in February 1803, and a year later was master's mate of the Hussar frigate, when she was wrecked on the Saints (Ile de Sein), 8 Feb. 1804. O'Brien was sent as a prisoner of war to Verdun, where he remained for three years. He then commenced a series of attempts to escape. Two of these ended in failure, after he had sustained the most severe hardships from cold, wet, and hunger. A third attempt proved successful, and in November 1808 he, with two companions, reached Trieste, and finally got on board the Amphion, from which he was sent to Malta. There he joined the Ocean, the flagship of Lord Collingwood. The latter promoted ​him, 29 March 1809, to be lieutenant of the Warrior, in which he assisted at the reduction of the Ionian Islands. In March 1810 he was appointed to the Amphion, and was still in her in the action off Lissa on 13 March 1811 [see Hoste, Sir William]. In November 1811 he followed Hoste to the Bacchante, and, after repeatedly distinguishing himself in the arduous and dashing service of the frigates or their boats, was promoted to be commander, 22 Jan. 1813. From 1818 to 1821 he commanded the Slaney on the South-American station, which then included the West Coast. On 5 March 1821 he was promoted to post rank, though the news did not reach him for some months. In October he was relieved in the Slaney, and returned to England. He had no further service, but was promoted to be rear-admiral on the reserved list on 8 March 1852. He died on 13 May 1857. He had married in 1825 Hannah, youngest daughter of John Walmsley of Castle Mere in Lancashire, and by her had a large family.
In 1814 O'Brien published ‘The Narrative of Captain O'Brien, R.N., containing an Account of his Shipwreck, Captivity, and Escape from France;’ and, in 1839, ‘My Adventures during the late War, comprising a Narrative of Shipwreck, Captivity, Escapes from French Prisons, &c., from 1804 to 1827,’ 2 vols. 8vo, with an engraved portrait, which can scarcely have been flattering. In conjunction, to some extent, with the similar narratives by Edward Boys (1785–1866) [q. v.] and Henry Ashworth (1785–1811) [q. v.], it formed the groundwork of the celebrated episode in Marryat's ‘Peter Simple.’
[Marshall's Roy. Nav. Biogr. viii. (Suppl. pt. iv.) 231; O'Byrne's Nav. Biogr. Dict.; Gent. Mag. 1857, ii. 742.]
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Brien, Brian Ruadh

​O'BRIEN, BRIAN RUADH (d. 1276), king of Thomond, was second son of Conchobhar O'Brien [q. v.] On his father's death in 1267 he was inaugurated chief of the Dal Cais, or king of Thomond, on Magh Adhair; and when Sioda MacNeill MacConmara proclaimed his title, not one of the assembled chiefs of the septs spoke in opposition. He demolished Castle Connell on the Shannon in 1261. He went to war with the English in 1270, and captured the castle of Clare, co. Clare, and in 1272 slew one of the lords justices. In 1275 Sioda MacConmara, who had proclaimed him king, rose against him in the interest of Turlough O'Brien, son of Tadhg of Caoluisce O'Brien, and in alliance with the O'Deas, by whom Turlough had been fostered. They marched to Clonroad in such force that Brian Ruadh, with his sons and household, fled across the Shannon to the cantred of Omullod. There he raised his subordinate chiefs, and, with his son Donogh, entered into alliance with the English of Munster under De Clare. He agreed to give De Clare all the lands between Athsollus and Limerick in return for his alliance. The trysting-place was Limerick, and thence Brian Ruadh, with the men of Cuanach and of Omullod and De Clare, with the Geraldines and the Butlers, marched by night, reaching Clonroad before sunrise, but failed to capture Turlough, as he was absent on a visit to Tadhg Buidh and Ruaidhri MacMathghamhna in Corcovaskin. Brian Ruadh occupied Clonroad, which his father had fortified, and thither came to support him Mathghamhain MacDomhnaill Connachtach O'Brien, with his sons and fighting men, and the O'Gradys and O'Heichirs. Brian attacked the O'Deas and O'Griobhthas, and then marched to Quin, co. Clare, to attack Clancullen and MacConmara, who retired into the woods of Echtghe. De Clare had meantime built the castle, of which the ruins remain, at Bunratty, co. Clare, while Turlough O'Brien collected an army. Brian Ruadh O'Brien and De Clare marched to meet him at Moygressan, but were defeated by Turlough after a long and obstinate battle, and retreated in disorder to Bunratty. Patrick Fitzmaurice, De Clare's brother-in-law, was slain, and De Clare's wife incited her husband against Brian as the cause of this loss. Her father, Fitzmaurice of Kerry, was in the castle, and, by way of satisfaction to them, De Clare, mortified and enraged by his defeat, hanged Brian Ruadh O'Brien there and then (Caithreim). He was succeeded as chief of the Dal Cais and king of Thomond by his nephew, Turlough O'Brien (d. 1306), son of Tadhg of Caoluisce, grandson of Conchobhar O'Brien; the history of Turlough's wars with De Clare is related in the ‘Caithreim Thoirdhealbhaigh’ of Magrath. That work was doubtless composed contempora​neously with the war, as has been shown for the first time by S. H. O'Grady in the edition of the ‘Caithreim’ which has been published by the Cambridge University press.
[Annala Rioghachta Eireann, ed. O'Donovan, vol. iii.; Caithreim Thoirdhealbhaigh of Magrath, ed. S. H. O'Grady, kindly lent by the editor.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Brien, Domhnall

Domnall Mór Ua Briain in the ODNB.
​O'BRIEN, DOMHNALL (d. 1194), king of Munster, son of Turlogh O'Brien (1009–1086) [q. v.], first appears in the chronicles in 1163, when he slew Maelruanaidh O'Cearbhaill, a chief whose territory was in the present county of Tipperary. He became king of Munster in 1168. He put out the eyes of his kinsman Brian O'Brien of Slieve Bloom in 1169, and made war on Roderic O'Connor [q. v.] In 1174 he met the Normans in battle at Thurles, co. Tipperary, and defeated them, and in 1175 strengthened his power at home by putting out the eyes of Dermot O'Brien and of Mathghamhain O'Brien at Caislen Ui Chonaing, now Castle Connell, co. Limerick, but was nevertheless driven out of Thomond by Roderic O'Connor in the same year. In 1176 he drove the English out of Limerick, and in 1185, when John was in Ireland, again defeated them, when they made an expedition from Ardfinnan on the Suir to plunder Thomond. In 1188 he aided the Connaughtmen under Conchobhar Moenmhoighe O'Connor in the defeat of John de Courcy in the Curlew mountains. In 1193 the English invaded Clare, and he in return ravaged their possessions in Ossory. Though often fighting against the English, he submitted to Henry II at Cashel in 1171, and part of his territory was granted during his life to Philip de Braose. He died in 1194; and the chroniclers, who elsewhere only describe his wars, blindings, and plunderings, commemorate him as ‘a beaming lamp in peace and war, and the brilliant star of the hospitality and valour of the Munstermen.’ His son Donogh Cairbrech [q. v.] is separately noticed.
[Annala Rioghachta Eireann, ed. O'Donovan, vols. ii. and iii. Dublin, 1851; Annals of Ulster, ed. MacCarthy, vol. ii., Annals of Loch Cé, ed. Hennessy, vol. i., Giraldus Cambrensis, vol. v. (all in the Rolls Ser.).]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/O'Brien, Conchobhar

​O'BRIEN, CONCHOBAR (d. 1267), king of Thomond, called ‘na siudaine,’ from the name of the wood near Belaclugga, co. Clare, where he was slain (Magrath, Caithreim), was son of Donogh Cairbrech O'Brien [q. v.], and succeeded his father in 1242. In 1257 he had some successes against the English, and in 1258 sent his son Tadhg to Caoluisce on Lough Erne to treat with Brian O'Neill. In the ‘Annals of Clonmacnoise’ and in the ‘Annals of Ulster’ it is stated that the result was that it was agreed that Brian O'Neill should be king of Ireland, and that the O'Briens, O'Connors, and O'Kellys gave him hostages. In the ‘Caithreim Thoirdhealbhaigh,’ however, a better account is given of this meeting, and the date is fixed six years earlier. Tadhg O'Brien, says the author of the ‘Caithreim,’ sent a hundred horses to O'Neill as a present and sign of his father Conchobhar's supremacy. O'Neill ​sent them back, with two hundred others, with grand trappings, in token of his own supremacy, and so the meeting broke up. After the death of his son Tadhg in 1248 O'Brien seldom appeared in public, and attended no feasts. His subjects refused to pay his royal rents and dues. He then made a muster of Clancullen under Sioda MacNeill MacConmara, and of Cinel Domhnaill under Aneslis O'Grady, and they, with his son Brian Ruadh, marched into the cantred of O'Blood and carried off captives and spoil from Birr, King's County, to Knockany, co. Limerick, and from the Eoghanacht of Cashel, co. Tipperary, to Killaloe, co. Clare. These they brought to Conchobhar at Clonroad, where he had made a permanent camp with earthworks. Conchobhar himself, with the O'Deas and O'Cuinns, under Donnchadh O'Dea, and O'Haichir with his force, marched to O'Lochlainn's country, co. Clare. Conchobhar Carrach O'Lochlainn met this army at Belaclugga, and defeated and slew Conchobhar O'Brien. This was in 1267. He was buried in the monastery of East Burren, now the abbey of Corcomroe (O'Grady's translation of Caithreim). His tomb and full-length effigy wearing a crown are still to be seen in the abbey. O'Brien married Mór, daughter of MacConmara, and had three sons: Tadhg, who died in 1248; Brian Ruadh [q. v.], king of Thomond; and Seoinin. His son Seoinin and his daughter, who was married to Ruaidhri O'Grady, were killed by Murtough O'Brien; but Murtough was soon after killed, and Brian Ruadh became lord of Thomond and chief of the Dal Cais.
[Annala Rioghachta Eireann, ed. O'Donovan, vol. iii.; Annals of Ulster, ed. MacCarthy (Rolls Ser.); Annals of Loch Cé, ed. Hennessy; manuscript text of Caithreim Thoirdhealbhaigh, with translation and notes, and extract from Historical Book of the O'Mulconry's MS. kept to 1608, kindly lent by S. H. O'Grady, esq.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pennycuick, John Farrell

In later editions the first name is given as James.
​PENNYCUICK, JOHN FARRELL (1829–1888), general, eldest son of Brigadier John Pennycuick [q. v.], was born on 10 Aug. 1829, and, after spending three and a half years at the Royal Military Academy, entered the royal artillery as second lieutenant on 2 May 1847. He became first lieutenant on 30 June 1848, and second captain on 21 Sept. 1854. He served in the Crimea, and took part in the battle of Inkerman, his being one of the two 9-pounder batteries attached to the second division, which were the first to engage the much more powerful artillery of the Russians. He received the brevet rank of major, and the fifth class of the Medjidieh. During the Indian mutiny he was engaged in the second relief of the Lucknow residency, the battle of Cawnpore (6 Dec. 1857), and the siege and capture of Lucknow. He served in the expedition to China in 1860, including the capture of the Taku forts, and was made brevet lieutenant-colonel (15 Feb. 1861) and C.B. He became a regimental lieutenant-colonel on 10 July 1871, regimental colonel on 1 May 1880, and on 8 Nov. of that year major-general. On 1 July 1885 he became lieutenant-general, and on 4 Jan. 1886 general. He died on 6 July 1888. He had married a daughter of W. Rutledge, esq., of Victoria, Australia, and left sons and daughters.
E. M. L.