Background
Bourke was born in Gosforth, Northumbria. His father was the Honorable Bryan Longley Bourke, the 3rd son of Walter Longley Bourke, 8th Earl of Mayo.
Bourke was born in Gosforth, Northumbria. His father was the Honorable Bryan Longley Bourke, the 3rd son of Walter Longley Bourke, 8th Earl of Mayo.
Bourke was educated at Saint Aubyns Preparatory School in Rottingdean before attending the Dartmouth Royal Naval College as a cadet.
He was a pilot in the Fleet Air Arm, ran a printing company, attempted to be elected as an Member of Parliament in England, ran a marble quarrying company, and finally bred deer in south-west France. He joined the Fleet Air Arm, and flew Sea Hawks in the Suez Crisis in 1956. He then flew aerobatics with Number.
703 Naval Air Squadron.
He left the Royal Navy on medical grounds in 1959. He set up a printing company in Gosport in Hampshire, and became active in local politics, serving as a Conservative councillor from 1961 to 1964.
However, his Irish peerages (Earl of Mayo, Viscount Mayo of Monycrower and Lord Naas) only entitled him to sit in the Irish House of Lords, which was abolished under the Acting of Union 1800. He stood for Parliament as a Liberal candidate in South Dorset in the 1964 general election, but lost heavily to the Conservative candidate.
In 1965, he moved to County Galway in the Republic of Ireland, where he became managing director of the Irish Marble Company, which quarries Connemara marble.
He also founded the Galway flying club (leading to the creation of Galway airport). He was first married to Margaret Jane Robinson Harrison in 1952. They had three sons, but were divorced in 1987.
He was remarried to Sally Anne Matthews, in 1987.
Lord Mayo was buried at Mondebat in the French département of Gers.