was succeeded in his seigneurie and in his secretaryship by his son, Edouard Olier. This Seigneur married Catherine de Malon in 1639; he was raised to the rank of Marquis de Nointel (or in French phraseology, the land and seigneurie of Nointel was erected into a marquisate for himself and his heirs male and female), 3d September 1654. Me died in 1683, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Charles Francois Olier, second Marquis dc Nointel, celebrated as the French Ambassador to Constantinople, and collector of the Grecian Marbles in the Bibliotheque Royale. The second Marquis died unmarried on 31st March 1685, and the marquisate disappeared. The last named dark and cloudy year suggests much. But we must go twenty years back. The last Marquis had three brothers whom the pedigree names in this order — Pierre, Ferdinand, and Paul. Paul, styled “Paul Olier de Nointel.” was installed as a Knight of Malta, 22nd May 1C63. Ferdinand, styled “Seigneur de Gicourt,” last appears as a Lieutenant in the Guards. Pierre was designed to be a Knight of Malta, but he became a Protestant, and took to himself a wife in the year 1665. At this date his father was alive, and lived eighteen years longer, and his elder brother lived till 1685. Probably he was disowned by the family, and retired to the south as “Pierre Olier, ecuyer” (so he is styled in the pedigree); and he enjoyed the status of a younger son only. His wife was Genevieve, daughter of Philippe Genaud, Seigneur de Guiberville, by Genevieve Le Brun, his wife. Their union was only of three years’ duration, as she died, 24th November 1668. She left a son, Isaac. At what date Pierre died, we are not informed. He seems to have settled at Montauban,[1] and Isaac, if the year 1664 was the date of his birth, was twenty-one at the Revocation epoch. The sufferings of his family we have not the means of recording. It is well known that the cruel and cowardly dragonnades began in 1681, but were confined to the Province of Poitou. In 1682 Montauban was threatened, but was spared on a hint from Paris that “they should not put too much fuel on the fire at one time.” The respite was short, and year after year, the desolation of churches, the pillage of houses, and the torturing of individual Protestants raged all around. Isaac Olier suffered very severely both in person and in property, but escaped with his life, and found a refuge in Holland along with thousands of his fellow-sufferers. We meet with him in Amsterdam in 1686, and there, as already explained, he varied the spelling of his family name. The Dutch Government, like the English, had, in 1681, given facilities for the naturalization of French Protestant refugees. And in terms of the regulations of that year, Isaac D’Olier, of Montauban, merchant, was admitted a burgess of Amsterdam on 21st May 1686, gratis. The expedition of 1688 led him to follow the Prince of Orange into England, and to go over to Ireland. There was little inclination for secular business in the following years of campaigning, combined with anxieties as to the Williamite throne and the designs of France. But in 1697 (October 21), Isaac D’Olier, merchant, was admitted a burgess of the City of Dublin. Mr. D’Olier married Martha, daughter of Richard Pilkington, Esq., of Tore, County Westmeath, by whom he had a son, Isaac, ancestor of the D’Olier family, and two daughters, Martha and Joanna. He assumed armorial bearings different from his French coat-of-arms, as a thankful commemoration of his firmness under persecution and of peace and prosperity in the land of his adoption. In the year 1794, some affidavits concerning his grandson were made before the Mayor of Dublin, and one of the matters involved was the identity of the venerated refugee. Two aged gentlemen, Richard and Brathwait Homan, deposed —
That they knew very well and had also been intimately associated with Isaac D’Olier, late merchant in Dublin; that they have often heard and do firmly believe that he was born in France, and that he came to Ireland near the time that William III., King of England, landed there; that that was a thing generally accepted as notorious by all his friends and relations and associates; that he married Martha, daughter of Richard Pilkington of Tore, in the County of Westmeath, who was their aunt; that he spoke English imperfectly, and with a French accent; that he died in Dublin about fifty years ago [i.e., about 1744].
The following is Sir William Betham’s grant or attestation:—
- ↑ This is said to be not the famous university seat, but another town in Dauphine.
