Richard St George Mansergh - St George Colonel Richard St George Mansergh ( born 1757 ) , ( the name of ' St George ' following ' Mansergh ' was assumed on inheriting his maternal uncle ' s property , Richard St George Mansergh - St George ) was a British Army officer and magistrate of County Cork , Ireland . Family . His grandfather was Sir Richard St George . His father was Sir George St George of Carrickdrumrusk and was ancestor of the Barons St George . His two brothers were Oliver and George . Richard was ancestor of the St Georges of Woodsgift in County Kilkenny . The St Georges were orinally from Cambridgeshire who were granted lands in the Headford area by the Cromwellian Commissioners in 1666 , much of it formerly held by the Catholic Skerrett family . Their ownership of lands was extensive in the counties of Galway , Roscommon , Limerick and Queen ' s county ( county Laois ) confirmed by a patent dated 26 October 1666 . The family bore a coat of arms blazoned Argent a Chief Azure overall a Lion rampant Gules crowned Or . Gallowshill in Carrick - on - Shannon , Hatley Manor and Holywell are the ancestral family manor houses . Education . He was educated at Westminster School before entering Middle Temple in 1769 . Admitted to Trinity College , Cambridge in 1771 , he graduated BA in 1775 . He was friends with the painter Henry Fuseli and the poet Anna Seward . He has been reputed to have been a very accomplished artist , lampooning the political figures and events of the day in sketches and watercolors . In 1771 , he inherited his uncle ' s estate and added ' St . George ' to the end of his surname . Early military career . He began his military career in late 1775 by purchasing a cornet ' s commission in the 8th ( The King ' s Royal Irish ) Regiment of ( Light ) Dragoons . After serving three months , he retired , but had signed up again by obtaining a position as an Ensign in the 4th Regiment of Foot at the outbreak of the American War for Independence . His regiment joined General William Howe in the Battle of Long Island in 1776 , and at Fort Washington . He eventually purchased a lieutenancy in the 52nd Regiment of Foot in December 1776 . The following year , after lay - waying in Nova Scotia in early 1777 , he participated in the Philadelphia campaign of 1777 , seeing action at the Battle of Brandywine and the Battle of Germantown where he was shot in the head . He was trepanned ( a portion of his skull was removed ) and fitted with a silver plate to cover the hole , requiring St . George to perpetually wear a black silken cap . Xavier della Gatta ’ s painting of the Battle of Germantown depicts a fellow private carrying the wounded St . George on his back from the battle . He returned to New York in June 1778 . He was eventually promoted to captain in the 44th Regiment of Foot in 1778 . By the end of the war he was serving as an aid to Sir Henry Clinton . He exchanged that commission for the same rank in the 100th Regiment of Foot on 4 May 1785 , only to finally retire from the regulars on 18 May . Return to Ireland after American war . After being mustered out in May 1785 , he returned to Ireland from America and married Anne Stepney of Durrow , County Laois ( then Queen ' s County ) in 1788 , and within three years they had two sons , Richard James and Stepney St George . Mansergh St George was an active , local magistrate appalled by the poverty that he found on his estates in County Cork and County Galway . His response to this was an " Account of the State of Affairs in and About Headford , County Galway " , which laments the condition of the Irish peasantry , and whilst considering establishing a linen industry to improve matters , doubts the willingness or the ability of his tenants to make the enterprise work . Mansergh St George ' s wife had died in 1791 , leaving her husband a widower with two infant children , and he wished to have a portrait painted of himself ( see illustration at right below ) as a monument to his grief for her . The eventual result of the commission is the full - length portrait by Hugh Douglas Hamilton now in the National Gallery of Ireland , in which Mansergh St George , in his Irish Light Horse Militia uniform , leans in an attitude of grief against a classical tomb inscribed " Non Immemor " . Irish rebellion of 1798 . By the late 1780s , the vast mountainous tract of land between Cork and Tipperary was overseen by the only active magistrate , which was Col St George himself . The local peasants had been indiscriminately cutting down trees for pike handles on the estates , as the gentry looked on in terror for fear of insurrection by their own tenants . The Colonel had written a confidential letter to the Castle describing " a gentleman about a quarter of a mile from this passively observed the people cutting down fifty of his trees in Daylight in view of his house . " St George had been dining with the Earl of Mountcashel ' s at Moor Park , and freely expressing his views about his detestation of treason and rebellion . It is plausible that a servant may have reported these discussions to the assassins , so as they may have been ready and laying in wait for the Colonel . On 12 February 1798 , at the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion of 1798 thirty republicans from North Cork and South Tipperary attacked the house of Jasper Uniacke , Esq , the Colonel ' s tenant and administrator , and according to the Hibernian Chronicle " demanded that St . George Mansergh , who was then in the house , should be sent out to them ; this being refused , they rushed in to seize him , on which he shot one of them dead , which so exasperated the rest , that with pitchforks , and other weapons , " was " barbarously murdered " along with his servant with a rusty scythe . The newspaper article continues to describe the murder : " And to add to their inhumanity , they wounded Mrs . Uniacke , while in the act of saving her husband , so that she lies dangerously ill . " She identified some of the assassins before expiring . Trinity College ( Dublin , Ireland ) . Library . MS 1749 / 1 , 2 .