Daly's Club
 Daly's Club, 1-5 Dame Street, Dublin 2 from an illustration in 1790 | |
| Formation | 1750 |
|---|---|
| Founder | Various members |
| Founded at | Daly's Coffee House |
| Type | Social club |
| Legal status | defunct |
| Headquarters | Daly's Club House |
| Location |
|
| Coordinates | 53°20′40″N6°15′41″W/ 53.344490°N 6.261450°W |
| Daly's Club House | |
|---|---|
| General information | |
| Type | Club house |
| Architectural style | Neoclassical Georgian |
| Country | Ireland |
| Construction started | 1789 |
| Estimated completion | 1790 |
| Renovated | 2 additional floors added to replace top floor in the early 1900s |
| Demolished | Western wing (1878), Eastern wing (1866) |
| Technical details | |
| Material | granite |
| Floor count | 4 over basement |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect(s) | Francis Johnston |
Daly's Club,with premises known asDaly's Club House,was agentlemen's clubinDublin,Ireland, a centre of social and political life between its origins in about 1750 and its end in 1823.
History
[edit]Daly's had its origins in a Chocolate House, established in about 1750 at numbers 1–3Dame Street,Dublin, later described as "the only society, in the nature of club, then existing in the Irish metropolis".[1]The establishment was much frequented by members of theParliament of Ireland.In the 1760s, a group of gentlemen who met there constituted themselves as a club,[2]which was said to be named afterHenry Grattan's friendDenis Daly(1748–1791). In some ways this came to resembleWhite'sinSt James's Street,London, both in importance and exclusivity.[3]
In 1787, theblackballingofWilliam Burton Conynghamfrom political motives led to an exodus of members from Daly's, who in the shape of theKildare Street Clubformed a new club which soon rivalled Daly's as a fashionable haunt.[4]
New Clubhouse
[edit]
In 1790 a number of members of Daly's who were also members of the Irish Parliament paid for a new clubhouse at number 3,College Green,close to theIrish Houses of Parliament.[3]The new premises, designed byFrancis Johnston,stretched from Anglesea Street to Foster Place and were opened with a grand dinner on 16 February 1791. With marblechimneypieces,white and gold chairs and sofas covered with aurora silk, the new clubhouse was superbly furnished.[5]
Daly's Club reached the height of its notability after its arrival at College Green.[3]It was one of the venues for meetings of theIrish Hell Fire Club,which met variously at Montpelier Lodge onMontpelier Hill,at the Eagle Tavern on Cork Hill nearDublin Castle,or at Daly's on College Green.[6]
In 1794,The European Magazine and London Reviewdeclared:
The God of Cards and Dice has a Temple, called Daly's, dedicated to his honour in Dublin, much more magnificent than any Temple to be found in that city dedicated to the God of the Universe.[7]
However, after theUnionwithGreat Britainof 1800 put an end to the Irish Parliament by creating theUnited Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland,the Club fell into a decline and was eclipsed by the Kildare Street Club.[3]
Daly was followed as manager of the Club by Peter Depoe, who continued in office until 1823,[5]when the Club was closed.[8]By 1841, the Club was described in theEdinburgh magazineas "the once-celebrated, and still well-remembered," Daly's Club "".[1]
After the Club's demise, the novels ofCharles Lever,such asCharles O'Malley: The Irish DragoonandThe Knight of Gwynne: a Tale of the Time of the Union,gave it a reputation for melodramatic romance.[3]
InCharles O'Malley,Lever gives an impression of the impact of the Club's closure:
To describe the consternation the intelligence caused on every side is impossible; nothing in history equals it – except, perhaps, the entrance of theFrench armyinto Moscow,deserted and forsakenby its former inhabitants.[9]
In 1866,Charles Dickensalluded to the fate of the Club in hisAll the Year Round:
Even now, next to the oldParliament Housestands a stately building, cut up into half-a-dozen houses of business. This was once "Daly's Club-house," where all thenoblemenandgentlemenofboth Houseswould adjourn to dine and drink; where were seenMr. Grattan,andMr. Floodwith "his broken beak," andMr. Curran,and those brilliant but guerilla debaters, whose encounters both of wit and logic make our modern parliamentary contests sound tame and languid.[10]
Later replacements
[edit]
The buildings were later occupied by various businesses mostly concerned with stock and insurance broking.
The Eastern wing of the clubhouse at 1 College Green was replaced in 1867 with the offices of theLiverpool and London Globe InsuranceCompany to a design byThomas Newenham Deane.
Later the Western wing at 5 College Green was replaced around 1878-80 also to a design by Deane for theRoyal Exchange Assurance Corporation.It remained in the building until the company merged with theGuardian Assurance Companyin 1968 and a new dedicated premises at St Stephen's Green was constructed byG&T Crampton.[11][12][13]
The building at 3-4 Foster Place was sold to the Hibernian United Services Club around 1813 and then subsequently sold on to theRoyal Bank of Irelandaround 1846. The successor bank, AIB only vacated the premises in 2001 when the building was sold to Trinity College Dublin.
The remains of the main building at 2-4 College Green were occupied by the National Assurance Company of Ireland when it was acquired byYorkshire Insurance Companyin 1907. It was the venue in which a meeting was held on the 1st June 1885 establishing the Insurance Institute of Ireland.
As of 2023 the remains of the original building at 2-4 College Green are occupied by a coffee shop and offices.[14]
Notable members
[edit]- John Philpot Curran[3]
- Henry Flood[3]
- Charles Kendal Bushe[3]
- William Conyngham Plunket, 1st Baron Plunket[3]
- Henry Grattan[3]
- Sir Hercules Langrishe, 1st Baronet[3]
- George Ponsonby[3]
See also
[edit]
Notes
[edit]- ^abTait, William; Johnstone, Christian Isobel (1841).Tait's Edinburgh Magazine.W. Tait.
- ^Fergus J. M. Campbell,The Irish establishment, 1879–1914(2009), p. 32: "Early in George III's reign, a group of gentlemen who met in Daly's coffee house constituted themselves Daly's club..."
- ^abcdefghijklEscott, T. H. S. (Thomas Hay Sweet) (1914).Club makers and club members.Cornell University Library. London: T.F. Unwin.
- ^The Irish Quarterly Review.W. B. Kelly. 1853.
- ^abGilbert, John Thomas (1859).A History of the City of Dublin.Jam. Mac.
- ^Geoffrey Ashe,The Hell-Fire Clubs: Sex, Rakes and Libertines(London: Sutton Publishing, 2nd edition, 2005), p. 63;ISBN0-7509-3835-8
- ^The European magazine, and London review,vol. 25 (Philological Society, 1794), p. 442
- ^Don Gifford, Robert J. Seidman,Ulysses annotated: notes for James Joyce's Ulysses(2008), p. 274: "Gaming at Daly's – Daly's Club was located on what is now College Green, just southeast of the centre of modern Dublin. It was founded in 1750, magnificently housed in 1790, and closed, thanks to competition from the Kildare Street Club, in 1823."
- ^Charles Lever,O'Malley, the Irish Dragoon,vol. 1 (2008 edition),p. 8
- ^Charles Dickens,All the year round,vol. 15 (1866), p. 496
- ^"1867 – Liverpool, London & Globe Insurance Co., College Green, Dublin | Archiseek - Irish Architecture".11 March 2013.Retrieved9 August2023.
- ^"CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, COLLEGE GREEN, NO. 001 (LIVERPOOL & LONDON & GLOBE INSURANCE CO.) Dictionary of Irish Architects -".dia.ie.Retrieved9 August2023.
- ^"CO. DUBLIN, DUBLIN, COLLEGE GREEN, NO. 005 (ROYAL EXCHANGE ASSURANCE CORP) Dictionary of Irish Architects -".dia.ie.Retrieved9 August2023.
- ^"Costa, 2 - 4 College Green, Dublin 2, DUBLIN".Buildings of Ireland.Retrieved17 June2021.
Bibliography
[edit]- R. E. Brooke,Daly's Club and Kildare Street Club(Dublin: 1930)