Patrick Lynch (1715–1789) was an Irish emigrant who became a significant landowner in
Rio de la Plata, which is now part of Argentina.[1]
Biography
He was born in
Galway and was the second son of Captain Patrick Lynch of
Lydican Castle and Agnes Blake. The Lynches and the Blakes were two of the 14
tribes of Galway, who dominated the political, commercial, and social life of the city of Galway in western Ireland between the mid-13th and late-19th centuries.[2] The Lynches left Ireland after their defeat at the hands of
Cromwell's forces and later those of
William of Orange. Patrick left in the 1740s for
Bilbao, Spain, and travelled from there to Rio de la Plata, where he was appointed "regidor" (royal representative) and captain in the "Milicias".[3] In 1749 he married Rosa de
Galayn y de la Camara, a wealthy Argentine heiress. His eldest surviving son,
Justo Pastor Lynch who was a customs official under Viceroy
Cisneros, also a captain and regidor, inherited Captain Lynch's vast land holdings. [4]
Descendants
Lynch's descendants through various branches of the family include the following:
Patricio (Patrick) Lynch, (grandson), who set up a shipping company. He fitted the privateer frigate "Heroina", commanded by the American Colonel
David Jewett which went after Spanish ships in 1820. Patricio Lynch married Maria Isabel de Zavaleta y Riglos, a descendant of the Conquistador
Domingo Martínez de Irala through the Spanish aristocrat Riquelme de Guzman, who was forced by Irala to marry Ursula, one of his
mestizo daughters. Patricio and Maria are the great-great-grandparents of
Che Guevara, (see below).
Patricio Lynch, (great-grandson), a rear-admiral in the
Chilean Navy, who served in China in HMS Calliope, son of Estanislao, above
Francisco Lynch, (great-grandson), Argentine soldier who participated in the War of Independence and the civil wars of his country, and the
Cisplatine War. Great-grandfather of Che Guevara.
Benito Lynch, (great-great-great-grandson), Argentine novelist and short-story writer of
gaucho literature