Life
1814-1880; b. Dublin, 9 May [var. 19]; ed. TCD, Medicine; moved to St.
Peter’s Hospital, London, 1830; appeared successfully at Tottenham
Street Theatre, 1830; managed Lyceum, 1842-60; involved in law suit with
Boucicault over London Assurance; opened Brougham’s Lyceum,
Broadway, NY, 15 Oct. 1850; visits London, 1860-65; played The O’Grady
in both the original and the London productions of Boucicault’s Arrah
na Pogue (1864); author of more than 70 plays including the libretti
for Blanche de Nevers, The Demon Lovers, and Bride
of Venice; said to be model for Lever’s Harry Lorrequer;
verse, prose and fairy tales were published in new York as A Basket
of Chips (1855), of which ‘The Bunsby Papers’ were issued
separately two years later; Home Rule was his last play and Felix
O’Reilly in Boucicault’s Rescued at Booth’s Theatre,
his last role; d. 7 June, New York. ODNB JMC GBI DIW RAF OCIL
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Works
The Demon Gift, or Visions of the Future (1840); Life in the
Clouds, or Olympus in an Uproar (1840); Love’s Livery (1840); The Hunter’s Bride, or the Rose of Altenheim (1841); The
Enthusiast (1842); Romance and Reality, or Silence Gives Consent [Dicks Plays 730] (1847); Jane Eyre, or the Secrets of Thornfield
Manor House [NY: French, 32pp.] (1848); Irish plays post-1850 The
Irish Emigrant [pub. Lacy]; The Irish Yankee [pub. French]; A Recollection of O’Flannagan and the Fairies [pub. Lacy].
Also A Basket of Chips (NY: Bunce & Bros. 1855), 408pp., incl.
‘The Bunsby Papers’, pp.229-408; The Bunsby Papers: Irish
Echoes (NY: Derby & Jackson 1857), viii, 9, 298pp; William Winter,
ed., Life, Stories and Poems of John Brougham (Boston: J. R. Osgood
& Co. 1881), vii, 15, 461pp. [Sect. I: ‘Autobiography’,
15-92pp.; Sect. II: ‘A Supplementary Memoir’, 97-144pp.; Sect.
III: ‘Sketch of his Club Life’, 144-54pp.; Sect. IV: ‘Selections
from his Miscellaneous Writings’ (156-461pp.). [See Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in English: The Romantic Period, 1789-1850
(Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1980), Vol. 2.]
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References
D. J. O’Donoghue, Poets of Ireland (Dublin: Hodges
Figgis 1912) gives three-line bio-notice; Irish Literature, gen.
ed. Justin McCarthy (Washington: Catholic Univ. of America 1904), selects
‘Ned Geraghty’s Luck,’ in extract; Stephen Brown, S.J., Guide to Books on Ireland (Dublin: Talbot 1912), gives listing
of his Irish-subject plays; Brian Cleeve & Ann Brady, A Dictionary
of Irish Writers (Dublin: Lilliput 1985) copies notice in O’Donoghue
(op. cit.)
British Library holds Life, Stories and Poems of John Brougham (Boston 1880).
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