Michael Doheny

Born on 22 May 1805 at Brookhill near Fethard, County Tipperary, Michael Doheny grew up in a farming family and was largely self-educated before studying law. He was called to the bar in the late 1830s, but public life soon pulled him toward politics and the growing movement for Irish self-government.

Doheny became an important figure in Young Ireland, the nationalist circle that broke with Daniel O'Connell's more cautious approach. He was deeply involved in the events surrounding the failed rising of 1848, after which he escaped Ireland and eventually settled in the United States.

In exile, he remained active in Irish nationalist circles and later helped found what became the Irish Republican Brotherhood tradition. He also wrote extensively, and is especially remembered for The Felon's Track, a lively and personal account of the Young Ireland generation, as well as for other historical and political writing. He died in New York on 1 April 1862.