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Count George Noble Plunkett was a scholar and revolutionary, born in December 1851 at Aungier Street, Dublin.The Plunketts were catholic and
claimed collateral descent from Archbishop Oliver Plunkett.
Plunkett was educated in France and in Dublin, and was called to the bar in 1886. He was the sole nationalist candidate for Dublin in the 1895 general
election. Plunkett was involved in seeking German aid and a papal blessing for the Easter Rising, which led to him being sacked as Director of the
National Museum of Ireland and deported with the countess to Oxford. His sons Joseph, George and Jack were all sentenced to death following the
Easter Rising, but George and Jack had their sentences changed to 10 years in jail, although both were released in 1917. His son Joseph was executed
by firing squad for his involvement, which only served to strengthen Count Plunkett’s Republican views.
He initiated a Republican Liberty League, which morphed into the new Sinn Féin, and he and Arthur Griffith became the new party’s vice-presi-
dents, under Éamon de Valera. He was integral to the planning of the Dáil Eireann and was made foreign affairs minister, however he opposed the
Anglo-Irish treaty and left his ministry in January 1922. In the civil war the treatyites interned him and the republicans appointed him to their council
of state. When de Valera formed Fianna Fáil in 1926, Plunkett stayed with Sinn Féin and lost his deposit in the June 1927 general election. On 8th
December 1938, with the other six surviving abstentionist second dáil TDs, he transferred republican sovereignty to the IRA army council.
A pleasant and courteous man, he was always theoretically and practically more scholar
than politician and in his lifetime published various memoirs,
artistic studies and collections of poetry. He died at the age of 96 and his portrait is on display at the RSAI.
€1,000 - 2,000
153 Estella Frances Solomons HRHA (1882-1968)
George Noble, Count Plunkett
Oil on Canvas, 46 x 35.5cm (18 x 14”)
Provenance: From the Artist’s studio
Exhibited: “Estella Solomons” Exhibition, Crawford Gal-
lery, Cork, May/June 1986, Cat. No. 32