| AdminHistory | The family of Hardy came from La Rochelle. Henry Hardy senior (born 1698) left France for Holland in 1717 and proceeded to England in 1719, became employed by his uncle François Beteilhe, and married Beteilhe's daughter Marthe Susanne in 1720 at the Eglise des Grecs in London. Beteilhe having failed in business through speculating in the South Sea Bubble, Henry Hardy became a mercer in Ludgate Hill, but by 1729 had moved to Dublin. There he traded as a provision merchant, and supplied the French Government with Irish produce through his brother-in-law Pierre Richard in La Rochelle. After his death in 1748/9 his son Henry Bartholomew became in 1753 book-keeper to a merchant in Cork, where he died in 1783. |