Donegall

Donegall, title of the Chichesters, by the late 18th century the largest landowners in Ireland. The foundations of this fortune lay in the estates disreputably amassed in Antrim and Donegal by the Elizabethan adventurer Sir Arthur Chichester. However, Chichester never had the capital to match his rapid acquisitions, and tenants were hard to attract to the underdeveloped Ulster of the early 17th century. The family's position weakened after Chichester's death in 1625, and the wars of the 1640s brought further losses. Edward, 1st Viscount Chichester (d. 1648), fought with the royalists in the Confederate War, and his son Arthur Chichester (1606–75) was created 1st earl of Donegall by Ormond in 1647. On Arthur's death, however, the title passed to his nephew Arthur, 2nd earl of Donegall (d. 1678), the estate to his daughters. A legal judgment in 1692 reunited title and property under the 3rd earl (1666–1706), who held military commands from William III and was killed in action in Spain.

Following a fire in 1708 which destroyed the family residence in Belfast Castle and killed three of the 4th earl's sisters, the family moved to England, becoming noted absentees. Arthur, the 4th earl (1695–1757), was feeble‐minded. His son Arthur (1739–99), created 1st marquis of Donegall in 1791, built an elaborate Palladian mansion at Fisherwick Park, Staffordshire, financed by attempts to increase the yields of his Antrim estates that helped provoke the Steelboy revolt. George Augustus, the 2nd marquis (1769–1844), a hopelessly undisciplined spendthrift, returned to Belfast in 1802 to escape his creditors. However, the family's renewed local influence was decisively undermined by a settlement negotiated in 1822, under which the greater part of the estate was signed away, for immediate cash payments, under perpetually renewable leases. The proceeds were intended to settle the marquis's debts, but instead were secretly appropriated to finance continuing extravagance. The 3rd marquis, George Hamilton (1797–1883), was left to dispose of the bulk of the property through the Encumbered Estates Court.