Thomas Pleasants

Alfred Webb

A Compendium of Irish Biography

1878

Pleasants, Thomas, a Dublin philanthropist, was born in Ireland in 1728. Amongst other acts of benevolence he, in 1815, built, at a cost of £14,000, the Stove Tenter House, in Dublin, to enable weavers to dry their cloth in damp weather. This building is now the St. Joseph's Night Refuge. He gave £6,000 to the Meath Hospital to build an operating room and other offices — operations having previously been performed in the general wards, within sight and hearing of the patients. He made large contributions of books and paintings to the Royal Dublin Society; and erected the lodges at the Glasnevin Botanic Gardens. He republished and circulated gratuitously a large edition of Dr. Samuel Madden's Reflections. Thomas Pleasants died in Dublin, 1st March 1818, aged 89, leaving large bequests to Dublin institutions. He is said to have given away altogether some £100,000.

Sources

6. Annual Biography. London, 1817-'27.

146. Gentleman's Magazine. London, 1731-1868.
Gilbert, John T., see Nos. 110, 335.

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