Fennell

Colonel John Fennell (1626 – 1706), an officer in Cromwell’s army  was awarded a small estate on the banks of the River Suir outside Cahir, Co. Tipperary. His estate at Kilcommonbeg lay adjacent to the present day Swiss Cottage, erected in 1810 by the Regency architect John Nash. John Fennell was born in the winter of 1626 in Steeple Ashton in the West England county of Wiltshire. It seems likely that his father Robert Fennell was involved with the woollen industry, the economic staple of Wiltshire since Norman times. On 22nd November 1649, John married Mary Davies of Cardiff, in which city the first six of their nine children were born. Presumably Mary and the children also moved to Tipperary in the lead up to the Restoration. The Fennells of Burtown House, Athy, Co. Kildare are the Colonel’s direct descendents. (1)

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