Sir, – I read with interest the Irishman’s Diary of August 5th. The Diary gives details of Gustav Holst’s paternal ancestry but perhaps readers of The Irish Times are unaware of his connection with Ireland on his distaff side.
As Frank McNally noted, Gustav Holst’s home in Cheltenham is now a museum where there are paintings of two children, painted in Dublin in the late 18th century. The children were the son and daughter of English actress Caroline Ambrose who lived for a time in Ireland and performed at the Smock Alley Theatre. Their father is described in the museum as an Irish politician named John De Blaquiere.
John De Blaquiere was in fact an Englishman of Huguenot extraction but spent most of his adult life in Dublin involved in the Wide Streets Commission and became Chief Secretary of Ireland from 1772 to 1777.
De Blaquiere never acknowledged the children but did support them. The daughter, Henrietta, eventually settled in Gloucestershire. She was to become Gustav Holst’s great-grandmother.
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Coincidentally, there is a bridge in Phibsborough named De Blaquiere named in his honour.
De Blaquiere died in Ireland in 1812 and is buried in Bray, Co Wicklow. So, if he was not Irish by birth he is, perhaps, Irish in death! – Yours, etc,
DEIRDRE BURKE,
Killiney,
Co Dublin.