James O'Hara, 2nd Baron Tyrawley

James O'Hara, 2nd Baron Tyrawley ( right ) with John Montagu, 2nd Duke of Montagu ( left ); unknown painter, around 1712

James O'Hara, 2nd Baron Tyrawley, 1st Baron Kilmaine (* 1681/1682 - † July 14, 1773 in Twickenham ) was a British officer and diplomat of Irish descent. He attained the rank of field marshal and became governor of Menorca , Gibraltar and Portsmouth .

Life

James O'Hara was born the only son of Charles O'Hara, 1st Baron Tyrawley, who later became Lieutenant General and Commander-in-Chief in Ireland . He joined the Royal Fusiliers Regiment on March 15, 1703 as a lieutenant , whose owner was his father. With this he took part in the War of the Spanish Succession , for example in 1706 in the siege of Barcelona and the battle of Almansa in the following year. After that, O'Hara was transferred to northwestern Europe, where he served under the Duke of Marlborough . In the battle of Malplaquet he was wounded, as before at Almansa. With the Royal Fusiliers, whose Colonel he had become on January 29, 1713, he finally moved to Menorca as an occupying force .

After the war he devoted himself more to politics. On January 8, 1722, he received Irish peerage and the title of Baron Kilmaine . In 1724 he also inherited the title of Baron Tyrawley from his father and was appointed to King George I's Privy Council on June 24 of the same year . Little is known about what activities Tyrawley pursued in these years before he was appointed ambassador to the court of Lisbon by King George II on January 20, 1728 . Here, due to his language skills and experience on the Iberian Peninsula, he played an important role in British foreign policy (→ Spanish-Portuguese War (1735–1737) ) and so he stayed at this post for 13 years. He returned to England in 1741 with a few mistresses and illegitimate children. During the Austrian War of Succession he was used as a diplomat in Saint Petersburg from November 1743 to February 1745 .

Tyrawley had never officially retired from the military and had been promoted continuously in the years of his absence, so that he was already lieutenant-general on his return from Russia . He was also the owner of various regiments , most recently from 1755 the Coldstream Guards . He had already gone back to Portugal as diplomatic representative in 1752, where he remained until 1756 and at the same time served as governor of Menorca. When the Seven Years' War broke out , he moved with some troops to Gibraltar , which he briefly administered as governor (1756/57) before returning to England. Here he was in 1760 chairman of the military tribunal, which should decide on the behavior of Lord George Sackville in the battle of Minden . This was politically explosive and sensational, as Sackville had tried two years earlier to summon Tyrawley to parliament about his spending policy on securing Gibraltar. The trial against Sackville resulted in a guilty verdict. Tyrawley was promoted to general in 1761. When Spain entered the war the following year and threatened to invade Portugal, it made sense to send Tyrawley there as special envoy and commander of the British troops. However, the supreme command went to Count Wilhelm zu Schaumburg-Lippe , which Tyrawley felt as a reset. Appointed Field Marshal on June 10, 1763 , he returned to England. Although he belonged again to the Privy Council since November 17, 1762, but apart from his post as Governor of Portsmouth , he had no more important offices.

Tyrawley retired to his country estate at Blackheath and finally died on July 14, 1773 in Twickenham . He was buried in Chelsea Hospital . With him the line of the Tyrawleys and Kilmaine became extinct, because he left behind only illegitimate sons, like the later known Charles O'Hara .

literature

• Stuart Handley: O'Hara, James, second Baron Tyrawley and Baron Kilmaine (1681 / 2–1773). In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . Volume 41, London 2004, p. 628f ( online version )

predecessor	Office	successor
New title created	Baron Kilmaine 1722-1774	Title expired
Charles O'Hara	Baron Tyrawley 1724-1774	Title expired