Born: 30 June 1818, Ireland
Died: 21 June 1880
Country most active: Ireland
Also known as: NA
This biography is republished from The Dictionary of Irish Biography and was written by Frances Clarke. Shared by permission in line with Creative Commons ‘Attribution’ (CC BY) licencing.
Osborne, Catherine Isabella (1818–80), artist and patron, was born 30 June 1818, at her father’s residence of Newtown Anner, near Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, the second child and only daughter of Sir Thomas Osborne (1757–1821), a prominent landowner in south Tipperary and Waterford, and MP for Carysfort, Co. Wicklow (1776–97), and his wife, Catherine Rebecca Osborne (née Smith) (d. 1856). Her mother, a deeply religious woman, was of English birth and appears to have come originally from Kent. Following the death of her only brother, William, in May 1824, Catherine became the sole heir to the Osborne estate, the baronetcy passing to her uncle. She met her future husband Ralph Bernal at the home of Lady Sydney Morgan in London in 1844 and, after a brief acquaintance, they became engaged. Before their marriage in August 1844 Bernal assumed the name Osborne, and was known for the remainder to his life as Bernal Osborne. The marriage seems to have been an unhappy one, and while he spent much of his time in London, cultivating his political career at Westminster, she remained in Ireland overseeing the education of their two daughters, Edith, later Lady Blake, and Grace, who married William de Vere, duke of St Albans.
Catherine kept a lively and cultivated household, entertaining artists such as Thomas Shorter Boys (1803–74), who exhibited his only known Irish watercolour, painted at Newtown Anner, in 1865, and the celebrated Swiss landscape painter Alexander Calame (1810–64). She was among Calame’s earliest patrons and may have employed him to instruct her daughters. She also took an interest in photography, and provided support for William Despard Hemphill, the local surgeon and photographic enthusiast, who dedicated his published collection of photographs of Clonmel (1860) to her. She was herself a talented artist and, during her visits to country houses in both Ireland and England, produced a series of sketchbooks, now in the family home of her daughter at Myrtle Grove, near Youghal. In 1870 she edited and published a two-volume collection of her mother’s letters, entitled Memorials of the life and character of Lady Osborne. She died 21 June 1880 at her home, and was buried in the family vault at Killaloan church.