Born John Smyth, Gort was the son of Charles Smyth, Member of the Irish Parliament for Limerick City, and Elizabeth Prendergast. His paternal grandparents were the Rt. Review Thomas Smyth, Bishop of Limerick, and Dorothea Burgh, daughter of the Rt.
Reverend Ulysses Burgh, Bishop of Ardagh.
Gort"s maternal grandparents were Brigadier-General Sir Thomas Prendergast, 1st Baronet, who was killed in action at the Battle of Malplaquet in 1709, and Penelope Cadogan, sister of William Cadogan, 1st Earl Cadogan. In 1810 he was raised to the Peerage of Ireland as Baron Kiltarton, of Gort in the County of Galway, and in 1816 he was further honoured when he was made Viscount Gort, also in the Peerage of Ireland. Lord Gort also served as Governor of County Galway from 1812 to 1817.
Gort was a Colonel in the Limerick Militia and sat as a Member of the Irish House of Commons for Carlow Borough from 1776 to 1783 and for Limerick City between 1785 and 1798.
