Richard Crosbie, Ireland’s first aeronaut

Michael Keane

Crosbie’s first balloon flight

Balloon flight, initially unmanned but soon carrying human adventurers, commenced in France and quickly spread to England in the 1780’s. The spectacle of man leaving terra firma created enormous interest and it was claimed that an early manned balloon flight from the Tuileries gardens in Paris in December 1783 was attended by almost half of the total population of the city. Richard Crosbie, from a Wicklow landed gentry family, was interested in all things mechanical from an early age. While he was a resident student in Trinity College, Dublin, he apparently paid little attention to his studies but instead filled his room with all kinds of mechanical objects. The huge international interest in balloon flight at the time became something of an obsession and ultimately led to his first pioneering flight in 1795.

Given the cost of materials and the complexity of construction, hot air balloon flight required both the support of wealthy patrons as well as returns from the sale of tickets to the public. From the outset Crosbie had the support of some of the wealthiest and most influential families in Dublin including the Lord Lieutenant (the Duke of Rutland), the Duke of Leinster and both the Provost and the first Professor of Astronomy of Trinity College. His extensive Trinity College connections were obviously helpful in this regard. Following a couple of earlier postponements which disappointed the public, the date for Crosbie’s first Irish manned balloon launch was fixed for January 19th 1785. A vast crowd assembled from early morning for the planned flight from Ranelagh Gardens, Dublin which was initially scheduled as a morning launch. However, continuing technical problems delayed the ascent until at 2.35pm lift-off with Crosbie on board was finally achieved. The great excitement of the occasion was well captured at the time by the Freeman’s Journal newspaper.

 The report of the cannon roused the whole town; company of the first fashion speedily rattled away to Ranelagh in their carriages and indescribable crowds of horse and foot, gentry, citizens, etc. hastened to the curious and awful (awe-inspiring) scene. By 11 o’clock the garden was immensely thronged with gentlemen and ladies and the surrounding fields with tens of thousands of spectators ... At twenty-five minutes before three, a most beautiful solemn and wonderful sight took place. The balloon ascended with its courageous master, perpendicular and majestic, but soon increasing its velocity, rose above the clouds and was out of sight in three minutes and a half. Repeated shouts of applause were sent to the sky to cheer the brave adventurer who kept waving a speaking trumpet he had in his hand as long as he remained in sight. When lost to the view of the many thousands of spectators, effusions of prayer and exclamations of good wishes for his safety were heard around ... No man ever showed greater courage than did Mr. Crosbie yesterday in order to gratify the public curiosity. His only fear seemed to be that of disappointing the expectations of the myriads of people who attended to see his exhibition. Distress for this reason pained his countenance till his balloon was liberated, but when he found himself ascending, a spring of ecstatic joy appeared to animate his whole frame, and the MAN shone forth in all the pride of intrepidity. Yet did he seem perfectly collected, exhibiting a noble and shining picture of a real philosopher and a real hero.

The balloon carrying Crosbie drifted north, carrying him high over Poolbeg lighthouse. Then, by opening a valve, he was able to manage a descent and landed safely at the North Strand. Crosbie was treated as a conquering hero and was carried shoulder high to the home of a leading patron Lord Charlemont in Rutland (now Parnell) Square.

Fig 1: Richard Crosbie, Ireland’s first aeronaut, courtesy NLI

 
Fig 2: Monument to Richard Crosbie, Dublin

Further balloon flights

Following the success of the initial manned flight Crosbie now set his sights on a crossing of the Irish Sea. The initial date was appropriately set for Ascension Thursday 1785, however the attempted flight had to be delayed to the following week. As a second planned flight also failed, Crosbie in desperation reportedly then said that he would ‘either ascend or die’ on May 12th 1785. Despite repeated attempts over the course of the morning, the balloon with Crosbie on board failed to ascend. It was suggested that, instead of a heavyweight such as Crosbie, who was a well-built six feet three inches man, someone of slight stature would have better prospects. As a result, a 20-year-old student, Richard McGuire, took Crosbie’s place and, with much excitement, the balloon ascended and proceeded to drift out over the Irish Sea. McGuire, undoubtedly worried for his personal safety, eventually managed to puncture the balloon and it landed in the sea about nine miles east-north-east of Howth. Having been picked up at sea by some boatmen McGuire, as with Crosbie previously, also returned to a hero’s welcome in Dublin. Gradually the general public in Dublin, as in England and France, were beginning to grow tired of the novelty of balloon flight and had also become aware that, as a flight could be observed throughout the city without having to travel to the particular site where the balloon was located, the expense of both travel and ticket purchase could be avoided. Thus, despite Crosbie’s flamboyant personality which at all times helped to contribute to the generation of funding, it became increasingly difficult to raise sufficient money for further balloon flights.

Crosbie made one final flight in Dublin in July 1785, with the ascent occurring from Leinster Lawn which was provided for the event by the Duke of Leinster. His avowed goal was to cross the Irish Sea and, while he drifted a long distance towards Wales, difficult squally weather conditions eventually caused him to descend into the sea. Despite the failure to achieve the sea crossing he was given a fine welcome when returned by boat to Dublin. With waning public interest, subsequent attempts by Crosbie to fund a sea crossing proved in vain. It took a further thirty-two years before an Irish Sea crossing was finally achieved, the successful balloonist being Windham Sadler of England.

Fig 3: Crosbie’s Leinster Lawn flight, courtesy NLI

Final Crosbie flight from Limerick

As no further balloon flights from Dublin proved viable, Crosbie next turned his attention to rural Ireland and achieved one final remarkable success, departing from Limerick and flying out over the Shannon Estuary and across Co. Kerry before eventually landing in Co. Clare. The flight from Limerick proceeded on April 27th 1786. The balloon drifted west over the Shannon estuary and then south over Co. Kerry. The following is a quote from Crosbie as published at the time in the local Limerick newspaper The Chronicle.

I observed the course I was now taking was almost due west, exactly over the Shannon and could perceive a rapid approach towards the Western Ocean ... I got a current from NNE by which I was conveyed over Tarbert and part of the county of Kerry ... I could plainly see the Lake of Killarney but those sonorous hills which surround it were levelled with the surface.

Having hovered over Kerry, changing winds caused the balloon to drift back across the river Shannon towards Clare before eventually landing in a field near Newmarket-on-Fergus. Crosbie’s description of his flight also included reference to hovering over a particular green field for an extended period and availing of the opportunity thus provided to partake of liberal quantities of food and wine. While Crosbie was received back into Limerick to great acclaim, this was to be his last Irish balloon flight as, despite his best endeavours, funding for further attempts was not forthcoming.

In overall terms Richard Crosbie, as Ireland’s first successful balloonist, achieved his own place in Irish history, a position which would be mostly unacknowledged but for the recent publication of an excellent book by Bryan MacMahon, ‘Ascend or die – Richard Crosbie, Pioneer of Balloon Flight’ 2010. MacMahon’s research also unearthed a post balloonist dimension to the life of Richard Crosbie who, prior to book publication, had according to most accounts seemingly disappeared from public life and was assumed to have died largely anonymously in the year 1800. Far from dying in Ireland, MacMahon discovered that Crosbie was alive and well in New York in 1800 where ‘he was once again entertaining the public with a balloon experiment’. He reasonably concludes that Crosbie probably left for America on a flight of a different kind as he had amassed a mountain of debt. Representing himself in America as Sir Richard Crosby, he became an actor while also organising occasional balloon flights. Despite severing contact with Ireland for many years, eventual rediscovery of Crosbie’s famous Irish past led to financial support being provided by friends which enabled him to make a final return to Ireland in 1820. MacMahon has uncovered evidence that Crosbie was warmly received on his return, ‘receiving the welcome of a prodigal son’. Quoting from a further account from the period; ‘he lived two or three years after his return and then calmly passed away surrounded by his kindred and friends’. Richard Crosbie, pioneer of Ireland’s first successful manned balloon flight, was aged about sixty-eight when he died in 1824.

Richard Crosbie’s family history

Richard Crosbie’s immediate family background was that of the landed gentry, his home being Crosbie Park, Co Wicklow. He was not the only family member to feature prominently in Irish life at the time as his older brother Sir Edward Crosbie also made the headlines in dramatically different circumstances. In the early 1790’s Sir Edward had moved from Wicklow to another landed estate, Viewmount House, Co. Carlow located very close to Carlow town. When the United Irishmen rebellion erupted in 1798, one of the major conflicts involved the ‘Battle of Carlow’ in which around 2,000 rebels marched on the town. However, English forces, with the assistance of local spies, were well prepared. It is estimated that around 500 native Irish were slaughtered, as commemorated in a fine monument in Graiguecullen, Co Laois, close to Carlow town. As some of the leaders of the rebellion worked on Crosbie’s estate, Sir Edward immediately came under suspicion as a sympathiser. He was soon arrested and tried. Despite the lack of evidence, he was soon found guilty and immediately executed. His head remained on a spike on the wall of Carlow jail for many months.

In an extended family history context, the Crosbie family have had a long and complex relationship with the major historic events of Ireland through the centuries. Briefly, their story originates with the MacCrossans, bards to the O’Moores of Laois and O’Connors of Offaly from very ancient times. In the late 1500s two young MacCrossan brothers, having been fostered by the recently arrived English Cosbies of Stradbally Hall of Laois, changed their name to Crosbie. Both achieved prominence with the elder brother Patrick becoming a large estate owner in Laois and Kerry while his younger brother John became Protestant Bishop of Ardfert (Kerry) from 1601 to 1621. Sir Pierce Crosbie, heir to Patrick, became a member of the royal court in London during the reigns of James I and Charles I, However, being Catholic in religion, he later played a significant role in the Irish Catholic Confederacy uprising and finally died in an Irish jail. His first cousin David Crosbie, son of the Protestant Bishop John Crosbie, opposed the confederacy and was personally rewarded with ownership of Crosbie’s Kerry estates by Cromwell himself. While the Leinster Crosbies lost their estates in Laois due to their involvement in the Catholic Confederacy, they later managed to re-establish themselves in Wicklow, leading to the exploits of a later generation as discussed above. Meanwhile the Kerry Crosbies, despite their support for King James II against William of Orange at the Battle of the Boyne, managed to retain their estates through the centuries and became part of the new ascendancy in Kerry. They proceeded to play prominent roles in parliament in both Dublin and Westminster and were rewarded with an Earldom. While controversial landlords in Kerry during the Great Famine years, some of the later generations supported the Gaelic League and Home Rule, with one Kerry Crosbie becoming a candidate for the Irish Parliamentary Party in the 1918 general election. They finally lost their Kerry estates following the War of Independence and the Civil War during which their two Kerry mansions, Ballyheigue Castle and Ardfert House, were burned down. Finally, in modern times the Crosbies of Examiner newspapers of Cork trace their roots to a young Thomas Crosbie who arrived from North Kerry in 1842.

Like many large extended families of their time, the Crosbie family history through the generations also contained occasional elements of notoriety and scandal. However, their overall story provides an insight into the complexities of the many conflicts and political intrigues in Ireland over the centuries to the present time, as recorded in a recent book by the author, ‘The Crosbies of Cork, Kerry, Laois and Leinster’ 2021.