Pat Lynch, a life full lived

It is a thing that if you have a very long life, at the end it may only be family who still know you, writes Brian Byrne. But that certainly has not been the case with Pat Lynch, the First Citizen of Logstown, who has passed away in his 99th year. Pat achieved almost legendary status a long time ago, along with the deserved epithet of 'true gentleman', and it was only the pandemic restrictions that slightly slowed his non-stop involvement in the community of Kilcullen that he loved. And which loved him in return.

With the Rags in the 1950s, Steve Schwer, Timmy Lynch, Pat Lynch, Seamie Aspell and Martin Kennedy.

Pat Lynch’s engagement in the sporting life of Kilcullen was broad-based. He played with Kilcullen GAA from an early age, and in the 1950s was one of a formidable Senior squad of ‘Rags’ players along with Timmy Lynch, Seamie Aspell and George Mitchell among other stalwarts of their time. He had also started boxing at the age of ten when Jim ‘The Brad’ Berney’s mother presented them with a pair of boxing gloves and they decided to put on a tournament in Dan Brennan’s loft with their friends. 

Pat with Jim Berney at the demolition of Dan Brennan's loft in 2006.

A lifelong connection with the club that developed from that saw him move from being a fighter to a trainer whom Billy Schwer Snr credits with helping him become Senior Irish Featherweight Champion in 1961. Also during the 1960s, Pat was a key part of the team that developed the John F Kennedy Hall which was to be the Kilcullen Boxing Club’s home until it moved from there to the Community Centre campus in 2011. Pat's seminal history of the club written in 1975, 'Over 30 years a-boxing', is archived in the local Millennium publication Thirty Years of The Bridge.

Front: Tommy Howard, Art McCoy, Tony Aspell, Eamon Lynch, Christy Howard, Tommy Morris; Second row: Hugh Peacocke, John McCoy, Colm McCoy, Captain Cyril Russell (trainer), Paddy Aspell, Paddy Bathe; Back row: Christy Meaney, Mr McCoy, Jim Byrne Jr, Pat Lynch and Tommy Orford.

Nessa Dunlea and Pat with CDs of their memories.

In 2009, Pat recorded many of his life memories for the Tralee-based Irish Life and Lore. These included stories of his father Paddy who used to drive Michael Collins around Dublin in a Crossley tender at the height of the Civil War. As foreman of the Cavalry Workshop at the Curragh Camp, Pat's father later became custodian of the Sliabh na mBan Rolls Royce armoured car in which Collins was travelling when he was killed. Pat himself, born in the Curragh in 1925, later trained as a motor mechanic with the Irish Army, and afterwards with the Board of Works was for many years involved with keeping that Rolls Royce armoured car in good working order. 

Indeed, four generations of the Lynch family, including Pat's sons Noel and Padraig and granddaughter Emily, have all had parts to play in maintaining and restoring the historic vehicle. Pat was a guest at the Curragh in May 2022 during the commemoration of the centenary of the handing over of the camp by the British to the Irish Free State, during which he recalled the many occasions he had driven the armoured car at military display shows.

As a longtime President of Kilcullen GAA, Pat welcomed many celebrities to the club. These included famous GAA commentator Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh (above) during the Kilcullen-Lissan match in the RTE Celebrity Bainisteor series in 2011. But it was the club itself that was in his heart, and the players and coaches who had served it through the decades. He had a fantastic memory for matches played many years before and he always loved to visit the clubhouse for a cup of tea and chat.

Pat receiving a KCA Community Award from Tony Gahan.

In 2015, following his 90th birthday, he was presented with a Community Award by KCA. The commendation recorded his 'amazingly active' role in the community in a wide variety of areas and facilities, many of which were still in the town because of his work and people like him. At the event, he recalled how the family had come to Kilcullen during WW2, his parents cycling here to find a house when they had to leave their Curragh married quarters during 'The Emergency'. They picked Kilcullen as their preference after making similar cycling reconnaissances of Kildare Town and Newbridge. 

Preparing for the parade.

Even in his 90s, Pat was always ready to take part in community events of every kind — sporting, heritage, or just any occasion where the people of Kilcullen came together. In 2016, for the Kilcullen St Patrick's Day Parade, he carried his father's 1916 medal in a Kilcullen Centenary Medal Holders parade section for local families who had IRA and War of Independence medals from their forebears. 

In 2018, representing Kilcullen GAA Club, he presented Scoil Bhride Principal Anne Flanagan with a plaque acknowledging the support the club had received from the school down the years. In that same year, Pat himself was presented with his original tennis racket in a frame (above) by the reformed Tennis Club at Logstown, the original entity of which he had been a founder and chairman.

In 2019, at a celebration in Keadeen Hotel, he helped cut a cake marking 130 years since Kilcullen GAA was founded. In December of that year, he officially switched on floodlighting of the tower of Old Kilcullen for 'Walk with the Light', the final event in the Kilcullen 700 celebration year.

In June 2021, Pat read the prayer during the special parade at Kilcullen Garda Station to mark the funeral of Detective Garda Colm Horkan, killed in the line of duty. The following month he was a guest of honour at the official opening of the revived and expanded Kilcullen Tennis Club, founded 70 years before. A short bout with Covid had him recuperating at Curragh Lawn Nursing Home, but he took a trip back into Kilcullen on his 96th birthday to enjoy a cake inscribed 'The Oldest Swinger in Town' along with a drop of his favourite whiskey. 

Pat's beloved wife Dolly passed away in 2008, and his sister Laura Bathe in 2019. His son Peter died in 2021 and his sister Ethna Stapleton just last month. 

The foregoing is only a small part of a man who over a very long life helped to make Kilcullen the community that it is today. No doubt, much more will be spoken about in coming days and weeks. But for all his community and sporting achievements, it is as a father, grandfather, and great-grandfather that he will be remembered where it is most important. To Mairead, Eamon, Noel and Padraig and all the extended family and Pat's many friends, we extend our condolences. 

Pat's motto in life was summed up in an anonymous verse which he learned as a young man and which he liked to quote: Somebody said that it couldn't be done/And he with a grin replied/Maybe that's so, but here is one/Who will not say No till he's tried'.

Rest in peace.

With Kilcullen's first Mayor Michael Lambe, welcoming home for Christmas Kilcullen's first Freeman, Donal St Leger in 2013.

Old friends together in 2013 for a chat over memories in the Kilcullen Heritage Centre — Marie McHugh, Pat Lynch, Kathleen Berney and Hilda McCarthy.

Pat with his longtime friend Gerry Coleman at Logstown in 2020.

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