JAMES O'DRISCOLL:FROM BOWL-PLAYING in his boyhood days along the roads around Kilcrea Abbey, a dozen miles west of Cork city, James (Jim) O'Driscoll SC, who has died aged 68, went on to become a senior barrister and one of the most popular members of the legal profession.
In a career that spanned 45 years, he always had a great interest in people and was regarded by friends and colleagues alike as an unstinting source of sound personal advice.
In his legal capacity, his name was mentioned in one of the most controversial academic and media debates of recent times, namely as a signatory to an affidavit relating to the Kilmichael Ambush of 1920.
Called to the bar in 1964, he first practised as a junior counsel on the Cork Circuit before moving to Dublin where he was appointed a senior counsel in 1979. As the longest-serving member of the bar in Munster, he was a much respected and much liked Father of the Munster Circuit. In 1994 he was elected as a Bencher at King's Inns.
His personal qualities were reflected in tributes led by Judge Patrick J Moran in Cork Circuit Court who observed that they had lost "a particularly good friend and the Munster Circuit has lost a great friend". Judge Moran described him as "a man to whom they all went for help and advice which is the hallmark of a good barrister".
From his early days in Kilcrea in mid-Cork, O'Driscoll had a lifelong love of sport. Living near Ovens, he had a long association with Éire Óg with whom he played hurling well into his 40s. As a law student at UCD, he played on the Cork senior team with Christy Ring in a challenge match at Croke Park.
Of stocky build, in his youth he was the winner of many scores of bowling, a Cork sub-culture sport played at weekends on winding county roads. He also played rugby with Dolphin. And in his days at UCC, he was a champion heavyweight boxer.
As a keen art collector, he had a good eye for modern art and encouraged many young artists in his time.
Coupled with the common touch and a gentle sense of humour that was always non-malicious, he could be appropriately witty in the course of a case, a valuable attribute in general practice where he was known as a first-class advocate.
His name was mentioned last year in a critique of the controversial book The IRA and its Enemiesby Newfoundland historian Peter Hart. Though it won the Ewart-Biggs prize, the book was widely criticised as depicting the War of Independence as a sectarian conflict involving ethnic cleansing. Included in the book was a purported interview with Ned Young, known as the last of "the boys of Kilmichael", the sole surviving veteran of the Kilmichael Ambush in November 1920. However, in an affidavit signed in 2007 by O'Driscoll, Ned's son, John Young, stated that his father had suffered a debilitating stroke affecting speech and mobility prior to the claimed interview. He also stated that Hart did not interview his father.
Referring to O'Driscoll's natural brand of wit, a close friend and fellow barrister, Donal McCarthy, tells of being opposite him in a case and feeling he was making good progress in the cross-examination of a medical witness when O'Driscoll passed him a sheet of paper. Taking this as a sign he had done enough to get a settlement offer from the other side, McCarthy turned over the sheet of paper to read the message: "Did you know your late father courted this man's mother?" - as indeed he had.
O'Driscoll attended Farranferris secondary school where he was a classmate of Bishop John Buckley of Cork and Ross who celebrated the Requiem Mass at Ballydehob.
Though born in Kilcrea, his heart was in west Cork, the traditional home of the O'Driscoll clan and he is buried at Schull, a graveyard with splendid views of Carbery's Hundred Isles.
He is survived by his wife Marion, sons Jack and Niall, daughter Regan, brothers John and Michael and sisters Kitty, Margaret, Mary Nancy, Aileen and Noelle.
...
James O'Driscoll: born August 27th, 1940; died March 3rd, 2009