Author: Taaffe, John
Biography:
TAAFFE, John (1788-1862: Cline)
He was the eldest son of John Taaffe, a wealthy Catholic landowner, and his second wife and cousin, Catherine Taaffe, and was baptised on 17 Feb. 1788 at Smarmore, Co. Louth, Ireland. The family lived at Smarmore Castle. He was educated locally, then in England at the Jesuit college, Stonyhurst, and finally at Ulverstone, near Preston. He returned to Swarmore in 1807 and spent three years there in private study and country pursuits. He then went to Edinburgh where he contracted a marriage “by cohabitation and repute” with a widow, Mrs. Belinda Edwards Colebrooke. The relationship ended acrimoniously and he returned to Ireland but lost his inheritance and was sent abroad where he travelled though Portugal, Spain, and North Africa in 1812. This experience resulted in his first book, Padilla, A Tale of Palestine (1816). In 1815 he went to Italy, settling in Pisa where he spent much time in the company of the painter Artemisia Castellini Regny, who introduced him into Pisan society and painted his portrait. He married Catherine Fitzgerald, an Irishwoman and the daughter of General Andrew Fitzgerald, on a vessel off the coast of Leghorn in 1816 or 1817. They had a daughter and a son. She died in childbirth in 1819. In Nov. 1820 he met Shelley (q.v.) and was a frequent visitor until the end of Mar. 1822. In 1822 he published at Pisa a short (8-page) elegy on the Duke of Saxony. Both Shelley and Byron (q.v.) admired his Comment on the Divine Comedy (1822) but he became estranged from the circle after a riding incident involving a fracas with Italian soldiers. He later published a historical poem, Adelais (1852), begun in 1821 and completed 1841-8; also a history of the Knights Templars (1852). He married the Marchese Gabuccini in 1836. She died on 19 Apr. 1860. He died at Fano, Italy, on 28 Aug. 1862. (findmypast.com 26 May 2024; C. L. Cline, Byron, Shelley and their Pisan Circle [1952], 16-25 et passim; Belfast News-Letter 30 Sept. 1862; Adelais Ms , Pforzheimer, NYPL; Typescript of MS Autobiographical Notes [1845] Claremont Colleges Library, California) AA
Other Names:
- J. Taafe