Percy Fitzgerald

Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald was born in 1834 in Ireland at Fane Valley, County Louth. He was educated at Stonyhurst College, Lancashire, and subsequently at Trinity College, Dublin. He was called to the Irish Bar and became a crown prosecutor on the northeastern circuit.

Having moved to London, Fitzgerald embarked on a career as a writer, beginning by writing fiction but quickly building himself a reputation as an author of works of history and philosophy. A personal friend of Charles Dickens, he became a contributor to Dickens’ magazine, Household Words, and later dramatic critic for The Observer and the Whitehall Review. He was also an accomplished sculptor and artist.

Fitzgerald died in 1925 and, following a requiem in Westminster Cathedral, is buried in Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin.