Мурро О'Брайен: Ирландиялық саяхатшы, әскербасы және саясаткер

Irish peer, soldier and politician

Sir Murrough O'Brien, 5th Baron O'Brien of Burren, 1st Baron Thomond of Taplow, 10th Baron & 5th Earl of Inchiquin, 1st Marquess of Thomond KP, PC (Ire) (1726 – 10 February 1808), known from 1777 to 1800 as the 5th Earl of Inchiquin, was an Irish peer, soldier, politician, and Chief of Clan O'Brien.

Murrough O'Brien was born in 1726 to the Hon. James O' Brien and Mary Jephson in Drogheda. James' brother (and Murrough's uncle) was Henry O'Brien, 8th Earl of Thomond, whose heir was Percy Wyndham O'Brien, 1st Earl of Thomond (c. 1713 – 1774), brother of Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont (1710–1763) of Petworth House. He joined the Grenadier Guards and was an officer in Germany, where he carried colours at the Battle of Lauffeld in 1747. He retired in 1756 and entered the Irish House of Commons for County Clare in the following year. He represented the constituency until 1761 and sat then as Member of Parliament (MP) for Harristown until 1768. Because of his support for the Act of Union of Great Britain and Ireland, on 29 December 1800 he was created Marquess of Thomond in the Peerage of Ireland, with a special remainder to his younger brother, and Baron Thomond, of Taplow Court in the County of Buckingham in the Peerage of the United Kingdom on 2 October 1801 (which title allowed him to sit in the United Kingdom House of Lords), but this time with no special remainder. He had a close relationship with King George III. In 1783 he was one of the Founding Knights of the Order of St Patrick. His Irish seat was at Rostellan, near Cork city. He was a drinker, called a "'six bottle man", and a gambler. He was a keen farmer and oversaw the enclosure of lands around Taplow and mechanisation.

He died after a fall from his horse in Grosvenor Square, London on 10 February 1808. The title of Marquess of Thomond passed to his nephew William O'Brien, 2nd Marquess of Thomond. The barony of Thomond became extinct.