Smith-Barry entered Parliament as one of two representatives for County Cork in 1867, a seat he held until 1874. Smith-Barry remained out of the House of Commons for the next twelve years but returned in 1886 when he was elected for Huntingdon, and represented this constituency until 1900. He was also High Sheriff of County Cork in 1886 and was tasked by Arthur Balfour to organise landlord resistance to the tenant Plan of Campaign movement of the late 1880s. He was sworn of the Privy Council of Ireland in 1896. It was announced in the 1902 Coronation Honours list that he would be created a peer,[1] and the Barrymore title held by his ancestors was partially revived when he was raised to the peerage as Baron Barrymore, of Barrymore in the County of Cork, on 24 July 1902.[2] He took his seat in the House of Lords a couple of days later.[3]
Geraldine Smith-Barry, born 9 Jun 1869 at 26 Chesham Place in London, died 23 Dec 1957
James Hugh Smith-Barry, born 22 Oct 1870 on Fota Island, died 18 May 1871
After his wife's death on 11 Sep 1884 (in Bex, Switzerland). He then married Elizabeth, daughter of U.S. General James S. Wadsworth and widow of Arthur Post, on 28 Feb 1889. They had one child together:
Lord Barrymore died in London in February 1925, aged 82, and was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium.[5] His only son James had died as an infant in 1871 and consequently the barony became extinct on Barrymore's death. Lady Barrymore died on 9 May 1930 in London.
On the death of Arthur Hugh Smith Barry in 1925, the estate, which was entailed, passed to his brother, James Hugh Smith Barry. On his death, it passed to James Hugh's son, Robert Raymond Smith-Barry. In 1939, the estate of Fota Island and the ground rents of areas was acquired by Arthur Hugh's daughter (from her cousin), Mrs. Dorothy Bell, for the sum of £31,000. On her death, in 1975, it passed to her daughter, Mrs. Rosemary Villiers, and Fota House is now the property of The Irish Heritage Trust.
Arms
Coat of arms of Arthur Smith-Barry, 1st Baron Barrymore
On a wreath of the colours a castle Argent issuant from the battlements thereof a wolf's head Sable charged on the beck with a cross pattee fitchee Or for difference.
Escutcheon
Quarterly first and fourth Argent three bars gemelle Gules (Barry) second and third grandquarterly 1st & 4th Gules on a chevron Or between three bezants as many crosses pattee fitchee Sable (Smith) 2nd & 3rd Azure a fess Argent between three porcupines Or (Heiry) the whole within a bordure compony Ermine and Gules.