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1836 Petty Session Courts, West Cork Returns

This had been abstracted from the Irish annual return. In between details of the court returns is a sampling of some of the local Magistrates who sat.  Since the mid 17th century the Magistrates of West Cork were overwhelmingly Protestant bar a bried period around 1680 and the first Catholic to be appointed was 

Daniel O’Sullivan, Cameatringen, Berehaven, Co. Cork, 1814, Died On Passage from Bristol Where he Had Been for the Recovery of His Health, D. O’Sullivan, Cameatringen, Berehaven, Co. Cork, First Catholic Appointed Magistrate since Reign of Queen Anne, Captain of Berehaven Loyal Infantry, Descended From One of The Princely Branches of O’Sullivan Beare.  O’Sullivan, Daniel (1758/61?–1814), middleman and magistrate, was second son of Daniel O’Sullivan and his wife Honora, daughter of Morgan O’Connell (1739–1809) of Carhen, Cahirciveen, Co. Kerry, and therefore first cousin to Daniel O’Connell (qv). On his father’s side he was grandnephew to Morty (Murtagh) Óg O’Sullivan, a smuggler shot at Eyries, Co. Kerry, while resisting arrest for homicide in 1754. The family resided in Caretringane House, Castletownbere, Co. Kerry, and leased a sizeable property in the Coulagh area on the Eyre estate. Their uncle’s fate did not deter the family from the smuggling tradition, though the French traveller Coquebert de Montbret commented on the social pretensions of the family in 1791. Following the death (c.1796) of his elder brother, John, Daniel was vested with administration of the estate until his nephew, Morty O’Sullivan (d. 1825), should come of age. In December 1796, when French vessels belonging to the expeditionary force under Gen. Lazare Hoche (1766–97) were observed anchored off Bere Island, O’Sullivan with great alacrity initiated a state of emergency in the district, ordering his tenants to drive cattle inland and to conceal provisions in the event of a French landing. Having posted a large number of tenants to watch the coast for the next eleven days, he took prisoner the crew of a French longboat reconnoitring the beaches and rushed them for interrogation to the nearest British garrison in Bantry.   O’Sullivan was applauded for his loyalty, made captain of the Berehaven loyal infantry corps of yeomanry, and presented with the freedom of Cork city – the first catholic to receive the honour since the early 1700s. Recommended to the commission of the peace by the county governors, he was the first catholic to be made a magistrate in Co. Cork since the early 1700s.

In recognition of his part at the time of the attempted French Invasion at Bantry Bay in 1796.

The Magistrates were drawn from the ranks of the Landlords or their agents.   Many had a well deserved reputation of being sectarian and partisan so slowly the British administration introduced Resident Magistrates initial former RIC inspectors to retired British army officers.  Edith Somervill ‘The Irish RM probably accurately depicts the.   None of the Magistrates had any legal training, a situation that still pertains in England. The situation improved towards the end of the 19th century as many of th RM were either barristers or solicitors.

This was part of the radical overhaul of the Irish Justice system post Independence ebay the Free State Government.

They abolished the Magistrates who still sit in Northern Ireland,  This was praised by the former Lord Chancellor Ignatious O’Brien, (Baron Shandon 1857-1930).

When the lord chancellor, Redmond John Barry, retired in 1913 O’Brien was appointed to the vacant post. While he was a hard worker he was neither diplomatic nor forceful enough to be truly effective, and was notorious for his long-winded and self-important judgments. His judicial philosophy favoured sweeping aside precedent and technicalities in favour of substantive justice as he saw it; hence he was on good terms with Peter O’Brien (qv), though he disapproved of his politics, and at odds with Christopher Palles (qv), though he acknowledged Palles’s eminence as a jurist. He greatly enjoyed the social side of his office and the ceremonies and amusements of the viceregal court.

O’Brien was nearly ousted as lord chancellor in 1915 in favour of James Campbell (qv) by the first coalition government – his removal was also sought by T. M. Healy and William O’Brien (qv) (1852–1928) – but was retained after a public outcry orchestrated by the Redmondites, which threatened to affect American public opinion.
He expressed guarded optimism for the future of the Irish Free State, and admired the government of W. T. Cosgrave (qv), praising such decisions as the replacement of JPs by paid district justices and the creation of an unarmed police force. He emerges from its pages as a sensitive and somewhat neurotic m