Meet A Suitable Wife’s Fred Simpson
Frederick (Fred) Simpson was born in December 1849 at number 1 Ely Place Upper, Dublin, Ireland, the only son of Duncan Simpson, a renowned surgeon, and his wife, Maria. Duncan Simpson and Dr Will...
View ArticleMeet A Suitable Wife’s John Fitzgerald
Will Fitzgerald’s father, John, was born at number 67 Merrion Square, Dublin, Ireland in 1814, the eldest son of Dr Edward Fitzgerald and his wife Mary Jane neé Maquay. John’s younger brother Thomas...
View ArticleMeet A Suitable Wife’s Sarah Fitzgerald
Sarah Fitzgerald, née Crawford, was born in 1824 in York Street, Dublin, Ireland the second of three daughters. Sarah’s father, William, was the son of a draper from Parliament Street and became a...
View ArticleThe Fitzgeralds of Dublin Series
As I publish each book in The Fitzgeralds of Dublin Series – a gritty family saga set in 1880s Ireland – I’ll be adding blog posts with character profiles, location histories and general background...
View ArticleA Discarded Son: The Fitzgeralds of Dublin Book Three is Out Now!
Dublin, Ireland, 1881. Isobel Fitzgerald’s mother, Martha, marries solicitor James Ellison but an unexpected guest overshadows their wedding day. Martha’s father is dying and he is determined to clear...
View ArticleSt Patrick’s Hospital, Dublin, Ireland
St Patrick’s Hospital was the first psychiatric hospital to be built in Ireland and one of the very first in the world. Its foundation was brought about by the will of Jonathan Swift, satirist,...
View ArticleMeet A Discarded Son’s Lewis and Tilda Greene
Lewis Greene is eighty-one years old and is landlord of the Greene Hall estate near Westport in Co Mayo, Ireland. His wife, Matilda (Tilda) Greene, nee Walker, is seventy-five years old. They married...
View ArticleMeet A Discarded Son’s Alfie Stevens
Alfred (Alfie) Stevens was born in 1856 at Ballybeg Glebe House, Co Galway, Ireland son of the Reverend Edmund Stevens and his wife Martha. His sister, Isobel, was born the following year. Theirs was...
View ArticleMeet A Discarded Son’s Martha Ellison
Isobel Fitzgerald’s mother, Martha, was born in 1835 and is the only daughter of Lewis and Matilda (Tilda) Greene of Greene Hall, near Westport in Co Mayo, Ireland. She grew up an only child, believing...
View ArticleMeet A Discarded Son’s Miles Greene
Miles Walker Greene was born in 1835, the only son of Lewis Greene and his wife Matilda (Tilda) and is a twin brother to Isobel Fitzgerald’s mother, Martha. Tilda had not known she was carrying twins...
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Dublin’s Coal Holes and Coal Cellars
Coal cellars are a common feature of Georgian and Victorian era houses. They were built with a brick vaulted roof under the footpath and accessible via the servants’ hall in the basement of the house...
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The Westmoreland Lock Hospital
Dublin’s Westmoreland Lock Hospital was established in 1755 by George Doyle for the treatment of venereal diseases. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, many hospitals would not admit...
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Laudanum: The Aspirin of the Nineteenth Century
In an era before aspirin, anti-depressants or effective sleeping pills, narcotic drugs played a huge part in Victorian life. Called the ‘aspirin of the nineteenth century’, laudanum was a popular...
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Meet A Forlorn Hope’s James Ellison
Please note this post contains SPOILERS for The Fitzgeralds of Dublin Series books one to three. If you haven’t read them yet, click/tap on the banner to catch up! Fifty-eight year-old James Ellison...
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Meet A Forlorn Hope’s David Powell
Please note this post contains SPOILERS for books one to three. If you haven’t read them yet, click on the banner below to catch up! David Powell was born in Co Kildare, Ireland the only child of the...
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A Cruel Mischief: The Fitzgeralds of Dublin Book Five
RELEASE DAY! Can Will and Isobel prevent events of the past from influencing the present and future? Dublin, Ireland, October 1885. The fragile peace within the Fitzgerald family is threatened when Dr...
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Rutland Square
Bartholomew Mosse Rutland Square (now Parnell Square) is the oldest Georgian square in Dublin. In 1748, Surgeon Bartholemew Mosse leased a four-acre and one rood plot described as ‘a piece of waste...
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The Four Courts Marshalsea Debtors Prison
The Main Courtyard of the Four Courts Marshalsea (Debtors) Prison, Thomas Street, Dublin in 1860. About one-third of the prison population in early nineteenth-century Ireland was made up of persons...
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The Dublin Artisans Dwellings Company
Corner of Pimlico and The Coombe. Photograph by William Murphy The Dublin Artisans Dwellings Company was established in 1876 by a group of investors as a semi-philanthropic private venture to provide...
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Meet A Cruel Mischief’s Gordon Higginson
Gordon Higginson is a forty-six-year-old barrister with chambers on Henrietta Street on the north side of Dublin. He was born and grew up on Mountjoy Square, studied law at Trinity College and now...
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