Robert Day was an Irish politician, barrister and judge, who was a highly respected public figure throughout his very long life. Even Daniel O'Connell, who thought him a poor lawyer and an equally poor judge, had a personal regard for him.
Early life
He was born in County Kerry, a younger son of the Reverend John Day of Lohercannon, Tralee, Chancellor of Ardfert Cathedral, and his wife Lucy, daughter of Maurice FitzGerald, 14th Knight of Kerry and Elizabeth Crosbie. The Day family had come to Ireland from East Anglia, in the seventeenth century. Robert's grandfather Edward Day was a prosperous merchant: he married Ellen Quarry of Cork city. Among Robert's brothers and sisters was Edward Day, Archdeacon of Ardfert. Robert and Edward were close all their lives, and Edward's death in 1808 was a great blow to Robert. A third brother John was Lord Mayor of Cork in 1807. Robert went to school in Tralee. He entered the University of Dublin 1n 1761, became a Scholar in 1764 and graduated Bachelor of Arts in 1766. He entered the Middle Temple in 1769 and spent several years in London, often in the company of his lifelong friend Henry Grattan. He was a lively young man and not apparently much interested in learning the law, preferring to see the sights of London, attend debates in the British House of Commons and make frequent trips to the Continent. He patronised the well-known Grecian Coffee House in Devereux Court off the Strand, where he is said to have enjoyed the friendship of Oliver Goldsmith. Despite his love of pleasure, his kindly nature is shown by his organising a charitable subscription for the relief of a poor family found starving near the Temple. His obvious enjoyment of life came at a cost in his neglect of his legal studies-despite his rise to the top of the legal profession his ignorance of the law was proverbial.
Legal practice and politics
He returned to Ireland after five years in England and settled into a more sedate way of life, having married Mary Potts, daughter of Samuel Potts of London, in 1774. He was called to the Irish Bar the same year. He became King's Counsel in 1790, and was a commissioner for revenue appeals and an advocate of the Irish Admiralty Court. Despite his early neglect of his legal studies and his reputed ignorance of the criminal law he became Chairman of the Dublin Quarter Sessions in 1790. His success as a lawyer puzzled his colleagues, who, though most of them liked him, had no regard for his legal learning. Daniel O'Connell, a good friend, said that "my poor friend Day is quite innocent of the law", and John Philpot Curran had a similarly low opinion of Day's legal ability. He entered politics, sitting in the Irish House of Commons as member for Tuam and later for Ardfert. He remained a close friend and political ally of Grattan and like him was a member of the popular drinking club called the Monks of the Screw. He was a convinced supporter of Catholic Emancipation, and of other measures, such as the abolition of tithes, and the discouragement of absentee landlords, which would benefit the Catholic peasantry. However he supported the Act of Union 1800, which delayed Emancipation for a generation, something he is said to have regretted in later life. He retained considerable political influence nfluence in Kerry even after he went on the Bench. In 1807 he effectively sold the Parliamentary borough of Tralee to the future Duke of Wellington. Wellington later complained about the expense involved in getting himself elected.
Judge
He was appointed a justice of the Court of King's Bench in 1798, and almost immediately was appointed to the Special Commission to deal with the aftermath of the Irish Rebellion of 1798. He was also the junior judge at the trial of the Sheares brothers, Henry and John, who were hanged in July 1798 for their part in the Rebellion. He visited England in 1807, where he fell seriously ill, and was unable to perform his judicial duties for almost a year. In 1814 he was one of the judges who sat at the trial of the publisher John Magee for seditious libel, where despite their close friendship he clashed bitterly with Daniel O'Connell, who was defence counsel. In 1816 he presided at the much publicised quo warranto case, Rex v. O'Grady. In the same year he presided at and celebrated trial for murder of the Kerry attorney, Rowan Cashel. Cashel had killed Henry Arthur O'Connor in a duel, but was acquitted, as was usual at the time in an affair of honour. As a judge Day was praised for integrity but not ability. Daniel O'Connell said that one could always win a case in front of Day by insisting on making the closing argument, since Day, by his own admission, generally agreed with whoever spoke last. During the Napoleonic Wars he became preoccupied with the danger of revolution and his addresses to grand juries often consisted of a political harangue on the evils of sedition. J.P Kenyon notes that in England it was a long-standing tradition for the justice of the peace to address a grand jury in a similar fashion. His personal friendship with O'Connell even survived O'Connell's fatal duel with John D'Esterre in January 1815. When Dublin was rife with news of the impending duel, Day was sent to arrest O'Connell, with the aim of preventing it. O'Connell insisted that he was not the aggressor in the matter, and Day, seemingly satisfied, merely bound him over to keep the peace, this making the duel inevitable. "Was there ever such a scene?" O'Connell asked later. He retired from the Bench in 1818. He lived at Merrion Square in Dublin city, at Loughlinstown House in south County Dublin, and at Day Place, Tralee. He kept an interesting diary for many years. An extract covering the years 1808-1813 was published in 2002, and the full diaries, together with his grand jury addresses, were published in 2004.
Marriages and children
He died in at Loughlinstown House in 1841, aged almost ninety-five. By his first wife Mary Potts, who died in 1823, he had a daughter Elizabeth who married Sir Edward Denny, 3rd Baronet, and had six children including Sir Edward Denny, 4th Baronet. Although Day's first marriage was apparently happy, there is no doubt that he had two sons, John and Edward, by Mary Fitzgerald, daughter of Bartholomew Fitzgerald, physician, of Bandon, County Cork, who became his second wife in 1824. The boys were born in the late 1790s during his first wife's lifetime. He made provision for both sons in his will, and they adopted the surname Day. Mary, who was a Roman Catholic, had lived with the family for many years as companion and later nurse to Polly. She died in 1849. John, their elder son, followed the family traddition of entering the Church. He inherited from the senior branch of the family their property at Beaufort, County Kerry. He was the grandfather of Charles Towry-Law, 4th Baron Ellenborough.
Character
Ball, writing in the mid 1920s, describes Day as a man who was estimable in every way. Whether Ball was aware of his unconventional domestic life is unclear. Nonetheless there is ample evidence of his kindly and charitable nature, and of his great gift for friendship. Kenny adds that the descriptions we have his pleasure-filled youth in London gives an attractive picture of a lively and fun-loving young man.
