History

Thomas Francis Meagher was born in what is now The Granville Hotel in 1823; then the family home of his mother Alicia Quan and father Thomas Meagher, a union of two of the most porminent merchant families in Waterford. His father traded between Waterford and Newfoundland, Canada.

Thomas Francis grew up in an atmosphere of wealth and priviledge. On becoming disillusioned by constitutional politics, he followed the course of rebillion with the Young Ireland Movement. He was sent to congratulate and seek help from the French Revolutionaries but returned with no weapons or money. He did however return with a flag modelled on the French tricolour comprising of three vertical bands. Green sybolising the South of Ireland, orange for the North and white for the peace between the two traditionally warring factions. The flag was first flown in March of 1848 from what is now known as 33 The Mall, and later in Dublin during the Easter Rising of 1916 before becoming the flag of the republic of Ireland in 1937.

After failure of the rebellion in Ireland in 1848, Meagher was sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered and was sent to Tasmania. He escaped to New York in 1852. In 1861 with the outbreak of the American Civil War he joined the 69th Regiment and fused together five regiments of Irish-Americans to form the Irish brigade and he became Brigadier General. Following the war he was appointed by the President Abraham Lincoln as Secretary and acting Governer of Montana. He was later a pall bearer at Abraham Lincoln's funeral. 

Revolutionary, convict, military leaser - Thomas Francie Meagher was too dramatic and inspiring a figure to die of old age. He simply disappeared in July of 1867.