Richard Daly
Irish actor
Richard Daly (1758–1813) was an Irish actor and theatrical manager who, between 1786 and 1797, held the Royal patent for staging dramatic productions in Dublin and became such a dominant figure in Irish theatre that he was referred to as "King Daly".
Birth and family background
Richard Daly was born in County Westmeath in 1758, the third son of Joseph and Frances (née Fetherston) Daly of Castle Daly, Kilcleagh, near Athlone. His family were descendants of Bryan O’Dailaigh who, at the time of his death in 1619, possessed the castle and demesne of Kilcleagh. Ownership of that property (later called Castle Daly) was confirmed to the family at the Restoration, and they converted to Protestantism during the Williamite confiscations. By the 19th century their estate exceeded 3,000 acres.
Trinity College and the Middle Temple
Daly entered Trinity College, Dublin, at the age of fifteen and was a turbulent student. The playwright John O'Keeffe remembered him as "so given to riot and commotion that he was the terror of all public places". O'Keeffe was present when, at the head of a party of undergraduates, Daly forced his way through the stage-door of the Smock Alley Theatre, assaulted the doorkeepers, and rushed into the green room, causing the actress Jane Pope to be "greatly terrified".
The judge Sir Jonah Barrington, his contemporary at Trinity College, later recalled Daly's appetite for single combat. Before the pair had even spoken to one another, Daly sent Barrington a written challenge to a duel.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Richard Daly” is irish actor. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Richard, Daly and Irish, not as a finished interpretation.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 10, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7325082. VIAF identifies the subject as 169860104. The Library of Congress control number is no2011039383. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1758, 1813, 1786 and 1797.
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This entry incorporates text from “Richard Daly” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.