Patrick David Lance Ussher - 24 April 1944 to 5 June 2026.

It is with deep sadness that we inform the Bishops and OD Community of the sad passing of Patrick David Lance Ussher.

Patrick earned distinctions in Latin & History at Bishops.  He was a Corporal in the Cadet Corps.  He won the Prize for Photography in his Matric year.   

The following obituary was written and sent by Richard Lomberg (1967G) but with the following note:

My fellow OD, Patrick Ussher sadly passed away recently.  Patrick lived close to me in South West France and we saw quite a bit of each other with yarns and reminiscences of Bishops a favourite topic of conversation.  I offered to let the OD Union know and write an obituary, which is attached (see below).  In clearing it with his family, his son, Patrick (Jr) suggested that his daughter Kitty and Peter Knox-Shaw might like to add some more detail, which they have done.  The result is that the co-authors are Peter, Kitty, Harvey, Patrick (Jr) and me (1967G).

Born in Durban, Patrick’s early years were spent on a farm called Fairholme in Elgin [1], along with his brother Harvey (1958W) and, from his father’s first marriage, his elder sister Anne. Having first attended Monterey, where he was head boy in his final year, Patrick went on to be a pupil at Bishops. Both he and his brother were in White House.

His childhood friend from that time and fellow OD Peter Knox-Shaw (1961W) writes: [KU1] “School came as an unwelcome disruption to the Arcadian childhood that Patrick and I enjoyed in the Elgin valley, especially as the House to which we were assigned seemed modelled on Sparta with the substitution of a row of gleaming trophies for the pantheon.  Patrick soon became the leader of a small but vigorous Athenian cult. Aesthetics, cigarettes, and political argument were the lifeblood of this group, and Patrick led the way in inventing nicknames for the prefects, encouraging laughter, and introducing new variations on the two cross-country routes. I remember a long discussion of socialism conducted in the deep shade of a stone pine on Rondebosch common. We were blessed in having the sympathy of many wonderful teachers, particularly of the Reverend S. H. Clarke (Snoz) who remained an active mentor when we got to Cambridge.”

After leaving school Patrick went up to Trinity College, Cambridge to read law, making lifelong friends and meeting his first wife, Susan Bottomley. They had three daughters and Patrick became a barrister at Lincoln’s Inn for a number of years before moving to Trinity College, Dublin as a lecturer in law. Here, he often lectured in the Ussher lecture theatre [KU2] named after an ancestor, the scholar Archbishop James Ussher, one of the university’s first students, and also wrote the definitive book Company Law in Ireland – a mighty tome almost 10 cm thick for which Trinity later awarded him a Doctor of Laws degree.

In 1985 he married Mary Redmond, who specialised in employment law. They had a son and Patrick and Mary worked together on many of her very high-powered legal cases. He also co-edited Doing Business in Ireland, an essential and comprehensive guide to the overall legal, taxation and regulatory environment of the country. Over the coming decades, he wrote some far lighter works, giving vent to his deeply ingrained sense of humour and fun. These included a book imagining Enid Blyton’s Famous Five as adults (Five Fall Apart Together) as well as a magical tale about a boy who could become different animals simply by thinking (Tom Drinkwater & The Red Castle).

In the early 2000s, Mary and Patrick bought a fine holiday property in SW France, which later would become his home for the rest of his life.  It had enough land to allow him to indulge his passion for gardening and small-scale farming.  It is close to where we live and we enjoyed swapping tales of life at Bishops and in the Cape.

In 2009, twenty-four years after they married, Mary developed cancer, which she fought valiantly for six years with Patrick in full support mode.  During this period, Mary wrote about thriving with cancer in her book, The Pink Ribbon Path. Three years after her death, Mary’s son, also Patrick, worked on a new edition of the book, Following the Pink Ribbon Path, to which Patrick senior contributed his own loving reflections on his wife.  In the 1980s, early in their marriage, Patrick had also worked tirelessly at Mary’s side in helping her with setting up The Irish Hospice Foundation (IHF), a charity that is still going strong today and which advocates for best practice at end-of-life care. The IHF ran their own obituary of Patrick here: https://hospicefoundation.ie/other/patrick-ussher-rip/

Patrick is deeply missed by his children, Kitty, Charlotte, Felicity and Patrick, his brother Harvey, wider family and by his many good friends.  May he rest in the peace he deserves. Condolences can be written to his son: patrickussher@icloud.com

The ODU and the Bishops community send their deepest condolences to Kitty, Charlotte, Felicity, Patrick and Harvey.

Requiescat in Pace.  

[1] ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: Fairholme - now owned by fellow OD Duncan Henderson (1964F).

 [KU1] Please do not edit Peter’s paragraphs – he is expecting them to be used verbatim. I have checked with him that he is ok to be quoted.

 [KU2] Note – this no longer exists (there is a James Ussher library instead) but it did at the time.