The Mansfields of Co. Kildare

A Franco-Irish Catholic elite family and their networks, 1870-1915

Fergus Murphy

While dominated by Protestants, the nineteenth-century landed gentry of Ireland also included a minority of Catholics. Social and marriage networks of this latter group have received little scholarly attention, and this volume helps to fill that gap. It looks at the social networks for one Catholic elite family, how important religion was to that family, what the impact was on their marriage choices and the connection between their networks and education choices. With Catholicism as a common denominator for most French and Irish people during that period, the study is based on the Franco-Irish Mansfield family in Co. Kildare. It leans largely on family and estate papers and includes a quantitative analysis of a French-language diary kept by Alice Mansfield (née De Férussac) between 1877 and 1887. The diary was transcribed, translated and analysed to provide a view of the family’s social network in Ireland and France.

Fergus Murphy holds a Bachelors degree in Electronic Engineering from Trinity College Dublin and currently works as a Product Marketing Director. He received a Masters degree in History of the Family from University of Limerick in 2019 and is also a graduate of the Genealogy and Family History program in University College Dublin. Previous publications include an article titled ‘The D’Oliers of Dublin City’ in The Huguenot Society Journal (2018).