Condon
The
North-eastern division of Co. Cork, close to the adjoining counties
of Limerick and Tipperary, is called the barony of Condons.
This was named after the family of Condon which was in possession
of much of that area, their principal stronghold being the Castle
of Cloghleagh near Kilworth, which however actually lies outside
the boundary of the said barony. They may indeed be described
as a sept rather than as a family. They are not, it is true,
of native Gaelic stock, having come to Ireland at the time of
the Anglo-Norman invasion, but they always counted themselves
as a sept, and as late as 1605, we find David Condon, in a letter
to the Secretary of State, describing himself as "Chief of his
Sept". Nevertheless, though often fighting side by side with
the McCarthys and other native septs, they did not become thoroughly
gaelicized like many of the Norman families, but were proud
of their English descent, and this claim stood them in good
stead at least up to the beginning of the seventeenth century.
In 1641, however, they were as Irish as any. No less than 21
Condons were attainted at the time and several more suffered
for their adhesion to James II in 1690. it was during this period
that the Gaelic poet David Condon lived. Historical and religious
causes and intermarriage with Gaelic Irish families have, of
course, now made the Condons completely Irish. One of them was
a well-known Fenian, Edward O'Meagher Condon (1835-1915), an
emigrant who had become an American citizen - a fact which saved
him from the gallows, as he was condemned to death in 1867 for
his part in the Manchester raid. He was from Co. Cork. That
county and south Tipperary are, as might be expected, the homeland
of the great majority of Condons to-day. There was formerly
an Ulster family called O Condubhain whose name was anglicized
Condon, but this is now very rare if not extinct
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