SMYTH, Patrick G. The Wild Rose of Lough Gill. A Tale of the Irish War of the Seventeenth Century.

Dublin: M.H. Gill and Son Ltd., n.d. Crown octavo. pp. xi, [1], 306. Original quarter green cloth, on green papered boards, title in gilt on spine. With the original pictorial dust jacket, decorated in black and yellow, depicting a seated woman and a clerical figure beneath a tree by the lakeshore. Dedication leaf to Timothy D. Sullivan, M.P. for Westminster. A fine, bright copy with the rare jacket.
Patrick Grehan Smyth Mayo’s first G. A. A. President and the first editor of The Western People newspaper was born in Ballina, Co. Mayo during 1867. He emigrated to Chicago with his brothers Thomas and James Pemberton Smyth and worked alongside them at his uncle’s John M. Smyth’s furniture store. Patrick Smyth married Katherine Doris, daughter of William Doris, M.P. for West Mayo also co-owner of the Mayo News with his brother Patrick in Westport, Co. Mayo, on August 15th 1891. Patrick was married a the second time to Theresa Winifred (Tessie) Ryan (1865-1982) on 25th February 1900. His most famous publication was The Wild Rose of Lough Gill, a romanticised historical tale of the Confederate Wars, set around Lough Gill in County Sligo and Galway city, that features Eoghan Rua O’Neill and Miles the Slasher O’Reilly. He also wrote The Duchess of Innisfail, and King and Viking. Published by the long-established Catholic press of M.H. Gill & Son in Dublin, the novel is dedicated to Timothy Daniel Sullivan (1827-1914), nationalist politician, journalist, balladeer, and member of parliament, whose advocacy of Irish self-government and cultural revival earned him wide esteem. Sullivan’s reputation as the author of nationalist songs such as God Save Ireland gave him a symbolic resonance which Smyth sought to honour in this dedicatory gesture.
He also produced verse for numerous Dublin periodicals, including The Irishman, The Shamrock, Young Irelander and The Weekly News.

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