The title of Earl was conferred on the Vere family by King Stephen in 1150. Robert Vere [9th Earl] was created Duke of Ireland by Richard II in 1386. The male line died out in England in 1702. The Irish branch was founded by Aubrey Vere (b.1555), 2nd son of the 15th Earl and grandfather of the 20th.

His daughter Jane m. a Mr. Henry Hunt of Gosfield, Essex and their grandson Vere Hunt, a Cromwellian officer, obtained the estate of Curragh near the Shannon estuary in 1647, later settling at Glangoole, Co. Tipperary, in 1657.

Vere Hunt was then succeeded by his son John Hunt (b.1633) and by his grandson, Rev. Vere Hunt (d.1759). The eldest son of the latter was known as Vere Hunt of Currah and Glangoole his son, Vere Hunt (1818), was appointed Baronet of Currah and served as MP for the County of Limerick.

His son Aubrey, who inherited in 1818, changed the family name to de Vere by Royal licence and was a writer of some renown. In 1807 Aubrey married Mary Spring Rice, dg. of Stephen Edward Rice of Mount Trenchard, nr. Foynes, Co. Limerick, and sister of the first Lord Monteagle. With her he had 8 children among whom Vere (3rd Barnonet), Stephen (4th Baronet), and the poet Aubrey 1788-1846).

Aubrey married Ellen, dg. of Robert O’Brien and brother of William Smith O’Brien. Their son Aubrey (b.1816) converted to Catholicism under influence of Cardinal Newman in 1851 and helped Newman in setting up the Catholic University (Dublin) in 1852, being appt. Professor of Political and Social Studies and author of Essays Chiefly Liberal and Ethical (1889) based on his lectures.

With his brother Stephen, Aubrey responded to the Famine by travelling on to Canada with Irish migrants on the so-called coffin ships. He later wrote "Inisfail", a longer poem chronicling Irish history from the Norman conquest to the Repeal of the Penal Laws, which includes national ballads on Athlone, Kinsale, and Sarsfield. He died on 21 Jan. 1902 and was buried in Church St. Cemetery, Askeaton.

Aubrey and his brother Sir Stephen Vere Hunt, both unmarried, conveyed their respective estates by will to their eldest nephew, Major Aubrey Vere O’Brien despite a proviso in their father’s will to the effect that his property should go to a son of a daughter rather than a daughter of a son.

The male line of the Irish Vere/de Vere family expired with the death of Sir Stephen in 1904 when Curragh Chase passed to Robert Stephen O’Brien, who assumed the name of the de Vere’s by Royal licence in 1899 in advance of that inheritance, thus becoming Robert Stephen Vere de Vere. Robert died in 1936 and his widow survived until 1959 - some years after the accidently destruction of Curragh Chase by fire on Christmas Eve in 1941. The surrounding estate was purchased by the Irish Government in 1957 and ultimately became a Forest Park Centre.