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Redmond Conyngham
Biography
1781 -
1846
Redmond Conyngham was born in Philadelphia on September, 19, 1781. He inherited an estate in the county Donegal, Ireland, from his grandfather, yielding £2,000 a year, and subsequently spent some time in Ireland. During his stay abroad he became intimate with Curran, Grattan, and other prominent Irishmen, including his cousin, William Conyngham Plunket, afterward lord-chancellor of Ireland. On his return to the United States he settled in Sugarloaf, Luzerne County, graduated from Princeton, and in 1815, served in the state House of Representatives; then, from 1820-1824, the state Senate. After legislative service, Conyngham moved to Lancaster county, where he ran a print shop and devoted much of his time to antiquarian research; producing papers of historical interest to the American Philosophical Society and to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. He made a specialty of the early history of Pennsylvania and of Lancaster County in particular. Redmond Conyngham died in Lancaster County on June 16, 1846. His wife was Elizabeth Yeates, a daughter of Supreme Court Judge Jaspar Yeates.
Biographical information available in Appleton Encyclopedia; also: Book of Prominent Pennsylvanians (Pittsburgh: Leader Publishing, Inc.); Note: a Portrait of Conyngham by Jacob Eichholtz existed into the twentieth century; unfortunately its location is no longer known, if it exists at all.