Oliver Bond

Oliver Bond (circa 1760–1798) was an Irish merchant and a member of the Leinster directorate of the Society of United Irishmen. He died in prison following the Irish Rebellion of 1798.

Life Born around 1760 into an Ulster-Scots family in St. Johnston, a village in the Laggan district in the east of County Donegal in Ulster, in the north of the Kingdom of Ireland, he was the son of a dissenting minister, and was connected with several respectable families. In his early years, he worked as an apprentice haberdasher in nearby Derry, before relocating to Dublin.

In the capital, he was in business as a merchant in the woollen trade, and became wealthy. Initially, he was based in Pill Lane (now Chancery Street), before moving to 9 Lower Bridge Street in 1786. In 1791, he married Eleanor 'Lucy' Jackson, daughter of the iron founder Henry Jackson, who like Bond was to become a leading United Irishman.

Bond was an early member in the movement planning for a union in Ireland across religious lines to press for reform of the Irish Parliament and for an accountable government independent of the British Privy Council and cabinet. When, following the Belfast example, the Society of United Irishmen formed in Dublin in November 1791, Bond became a member.

Bond was secretary of the meeting, with the barrister Simon Butler presiding, when in February 1793 the society passed resolutions which, in addition to the call for Catholic Emancipation and parliamentary reform, condemned as unconstitutional the repressive measures of the government, and deplored war against the new French Republic. A result was a summons to appear before the bar of the House of Lords in Dublin where, in consequence of their defiant performance, Bond and Butler were charged and convicted of libel, fined and confined for six months in Newgate Prison. The insurrection went forward in their absence to defeat in the early summer. Following the suppression of the rebellion, Bond went to trial. The efforts of his defence counsel, John Philpot Curran, to discredit Reynold's testimony were unavailing. On 27 July 1798, Bond was convicted of treason and sentenced to hang.