Daniel Florence O'Leary

Daniel Florence O'Leary
Native name	Dónall Fínín Ó Laoghaire
Born	1801 Cork, Ireland
Died	1854 Santa Fe de Bogota, Colombia
Allegiance	Venezuelan republicans
Rank	Brigadier general
Battles/wars	Spanish American wars of independence Battle of Pantano de Vargas Battle of Boyacá Battle of Pichincha Battle of Portete de Tarqui

Daniel Florence O'Leary (Irish: Dónall Fínín Ó Laoghaire; 1801–1854) was a military general and aide-de-camp under Simón Bolívar.

Life

He was born in Cork, Ireland; his father was Jeremiah O'Leary, a butter merchant. In 1817, he emigrated to South America.

File:General Daniel Florence O'Leary 1801-1854, bust.JPG

Bust of General O'Leary, Fitzgerald Park, Cork

Unlike many of the Irish who fought for Simon Bolívar in his many campaigns to win South American independence, O'Leary had not served in the Napoleonic Wars.

In 1827 he married Soledad Soublette, the younger sister of General Carlos Soublette, with whom he had nine children.

After Bolívar's death in 1830, O'Leary disobeyed orders to burn the general's personal documents. He spent much of the rest of his life organizing them, along with writing his own very extensive memoirs (spanning thirty-four volumes) of his time fighting in the revolutionary wars with Bolívar. He died in Bogotá, Colombia. He is buried in the National Pantheon of Venezuela.

A bust and plaque honouring O'Leary were presented by the Venezuelan Government to the people of Cork and unveiled on 12 May 2010 by the Venezuelan Ambassador to Ireland, Dr. Samuel Moncada.

File:General Daniel Florence O'Leary 1801-1854, plaque.JPG

Plaque below the bust of General Daniel O'Leary

See also

• Irish military diaspora
• Irish regiments

External links

• Short biography on O'Leary from the Society for Irish Latin American Studies
• Biography from Journal 2001 of the historical society Ballingeary Cumann Staire
• Moisés Enrique Rodríguez "Under Three Flags The Diplomatic Career of Daniel Florence O'Leary", in Irish Migration Studies in Latin America 7:1 (March 2009), pp. 85–92