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Edward Henry Kenelm Digby, 12th Baron Digby was born 24 July 1924. He is a British peer, and retired British Army (Coldstream Guards). He is the son of Edward Kenelm Digby, 11th Baron Digby of Geashill and Hon. Constance Pamela Alice Bruce. He was educated at Eton College, Windsor, Trinity College, Dublin, and Oxford University. He also studied at Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Berkshire. He fought in the Second World War and in the Malayan Emergency between 1948 and 1950. He was Aide-de-Camp to the Commander-in-Chief, Far East Land Forces between 1950 and 1951 and Aide-de-Camp to the Commander-in-Chief, British Army of the Rhine between 1951 and 1952. He held the office of Deputy Lieutenant of Dorset between 1957 and 1965. He held the office of Justice of the Peace for Dorset in 1959. He succeeded to the titles of 12th Baron Digby of Geashill, King's County, and 6th Baron Digby of Sherborne on 29 January 1964. He was invested as a Knight, Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem (K.St.J.) in 1985. He was invested as a Knight Commander, Royal Victorian Order (K.C.V.O.) in 1998. He married Dione Marian Sherbrooke, daughter of Rear-Admiral Robert St. Vincent Sherbrooke, V.C. and Rosemary Neville Buckley, on 18 December 1952, with whom he had three children. He died on 1 April 2018.

Charles William Francis inherited Charleville Estate on the death of his father, the 3rd earl in 1859. He was a minor on inheriting the title, being just seven years old at the time. He never married and died on Staten Island, New York in 1874 at the age of 22. His coming of age the previous year was a grand affair in Tullamore with much celebrations and festivities in the town. As the 4th earl died with no male heirs, the earldom passed to his uncle Alfred, who had been his guardian in his minority.

Born in 1846, the eldest son of 9th Lord Digby, he was educated at Harrow and then joined the Coldstream Guards, where he made his career, rising to the rank of Colonel and serving in the Sudan from 1885 to 1889. He also served as M.P. for Dorset from 1876-1885. On the death of his father in 1889, he resigned his commission and came home to Minterne. In 1893 he married Emily Beryl, daughter of Col. the Hon. Albert Hood and they had three sons and three daughters.

He became involved in local affairs, accepting the appointment as Chairman of the Board of Herrison Hospital, Charminster and serving as a J.P. and local magistrate, Chairman of the Dorchester Agricultural Society and honorary Colonel in the Dorset Regiment. He planted the rhododendron gardens at Minterne and sponsored plant expeditions to China and the Himalayas, breeding his own varieties in his glass houses and becoming a member of the Royal Horticultural Society.

The house at Minterne suffered from damp and dry rot, and in 1906 he fulfilled his promise to his wife to build a new house. He employed the architect Leonard Stokes, who had built Post Offices and was famously difficult to get on with. However, Lord Digby’s friendly and practical approach charmed him and he produced a marvellous design for his only country house which is still comfortable to live in.

He took an active interest in his estate at Geashill, and was saddened when the Irish Land Act of 1903 resulted in the end of the link with a number of his tenants, some of whom had been on the Digby estate for generations.

Sheila Beddington was born in 1906 in Hampshire, eldest daughter of Claude Beddington and Frances Ethel Beddington (née Homan Mulock). She married on 28 August 1932, Major the Hon. Mervyn Patrick Wingfield, (1905-1973), great-grandson of the Earl of Leicester and Chief Commissioner for Scouts in Eire. Succeeded his father as 9th Baron Powerscourt, of Powerscourt, Co. Wicklow, and Baron Wingfield, of Wingfield, Co. Wexford. The Baroness was created Chief Commissioner of the Irish Girl Guides. Sheila inherited the estate at Bellair, Offaly from her aunt Hester Nina (Enid) Homan Mulock and sold it in 1963.

Eldest daughter of Francis Berry Homan Mulock, of Ballycumber, King’s County who on 16th October 1900 married Captain Claude Beddington (1868-1940), of South Street, Park Lane, London. Captain later Lieutenant-Colonel Beddington was, at this time serving with the Westmoreland and Cumberland Imperial Yeomanry. Elected a Fellow of the Royal Philharmonic Society of London. In 1929, as Mrs Claude Beddington she published 'Book of reminiscences, All that I have Met'. In later life she resided at 11 Welbeck House, Welbeck Street, London. She died on 19th December 1963. Of the marriage there was issue, two sons and a daughter Guy (1902-25), Sheila (1906) and Niall (1912).

Sir Mathew de Renzi was born in Cologne, Germany and was a cloth merchant in Antwerp. In 1604, he moved to London, but shortly became bankrupt and fled via Scotland to Ireland where he arrived in Dublin in 1606, penniless. He immediately set about becoming a landowner and made important establishment contacts in Dublin such as Sir Arthur Chichester, then Lord Deputy. A polyglot (fluent in Latin, Italian, English, German, French and Spanish), he also learned colloquial and classical Irish from the Old Irish family of MacBruideadh from the Thomond area of Limerick. This was a strategic move on De Renzi’s part, so intent was he on acquiring land in a Gaelic lordship. Having travelled around Ireland to the port towns of Galway, Limerick and Waterford, he arrived in West Offaly sometime in 1612. The area, known as Delvin MacCoghlan, roughly equating to the barony of Garrycastle, comprised the modern day towns of Ferbane, Banagher, Cloghan and Shannonbridge. He acquired around 100 acres in Clonony, living in Clonony Castle, and in direct opposition to Sir John (Seán Óg) MacCoghlan, the hereditary chieftain of the area. He had many disputes with Seán Óg and dispatched letters to the Lords Deputy in Dublin outlining his various grievances.

De Renzi’s 100 acres in the midlands grew to over 1000 in the following years. He also had properties in Westmeath, Wexford and Dublin. In around 1620, he sold his interest in Clonony, became a government administrator in Dublin and was knighted in 1627. Not much is known of his marriage, but that he had two sons, Mathew (d.1712) and Francis DeRenzy. In 1630, he purchased lands in the vicinity of Tinnycross, County Offaly on behalf of his eldest son. Mathew Jr subsequently sold his interest in these lands in 1704 and title passed to the Cox family of Ferns. Sir Mathew died in 1634 at the age of 57. Mathew Jr commissioned a memorial to him in St Mary’s Church Athlone in 1635. When the church was rebuilt in 1820, this memorial was re-inserted at the rear of the church where it can still be seen today.

Mathew DeRenzy married Mary Howse of Cloghbemon, County Wexford, daughter of Richard Howse. He settled in Wexford and from 1699 on, he used the lands in Tinnycross to raise revenues by way of mortgages and leases. His father-in-law, Richard Howse is named as a party in many of these deeds and his wife, Mary is a co-signee. DeRenzy eventually sold his interest in the lands in 1704 to Reverend James Cox, Archdeacon of Ferns, thus ending the DeRenzy family’s interests in Offaly.

(Given the span of time, it is also possible that this could be Sir Mathew de Renzi's grandson, son of Mathew DeRenzy. This is not clear from records.)

Laurence Parsons, 4th Earl of Rosse, Baron of Oxmantown, 7th Baronet of Birr Castle, was born 17 November 1840 to William Parsons, 3rd Earl of Rosse, and Mary Field. Like his father, he pursued astronomy and is known for his attempt to design a truly flat mirror to use in a telescope. Lord Rosse succeeded his father as the 4th Earl of Rosse in 1867. In the same year he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. From the year of 1867-68, Lord Rosse served as a Justice of the Peace for King’s County, and was appointed High Sheriff of King’s County. On 1 September 1870, he married Lady Frances Cassandra Hawke, daughter of Lord Edward Harvey-Hawke, 4th Baron of Hawke, and Lady Frances Fetherstonhaugh. From 1881-87 Lord Rosse was the Vice-President of the Royal Society. From 1885 to 1908 he serves as the 18th Chancellor of Trinity College, Dublin. He also was the Lord Lieutenant of King’s County, and Custos Rotulorum of King’s County from 1892 until 1908. In 1896 he was elected President of the Royal Irish Academy. In 1902 he received the honorary degree of Legum Doctor from the University of Wales, sharing the ceremony of the instalment of the Prince of Wales as Chancellor of the University of Wales. The 4th Earl of Rosse died on 29 August 1908, and was succeeded by his son, William Parsons, 5th Earl of Rosse.

Sir William Parsons, 2nd Baronet of Bellamont, was the only son of Sir Richard Parsons, and his first wife Lettice Loftus. He married Catherine, the eldest daughter of Lord Arthur, Viscount of Ranelagh. Sir William became the 2nd Baronet of Bellamont when his grandfather, Sir William Parsons, died in 1650. His son, Sir Richard Parsons, succeeded him as 3rd Baronet of Bellamont upon his death in 1658.