Background
Patrick Egan was born at Ballymahon, County Longford, Ireland, the son of Francis Egan, a civil engineer.
Patrick Egan was born at Ballymahon, County Longford, Ireland, the son of Francis Egan, a civil engineer.
Moving with the family in his boyhood to Dublin, at fourteen Patrick entered the employ of the North Dublin City Milling Company, but for several years he studied in the evenings under private tutors.
He also founded a successful bakery business in 1868 in partnership with James Rourke.
The following year he presided over the Supreme Council of the Fenian Brotherhood in Dublin.
When the Irish National Land League was organized in October 1879» Charles S. Parnell, Thomas Brennan, and Patrick Egan were named its Executive Council, with Egan as treasurer, and in December of that year he left his business to his partners in order to devote full time to the League.
He subsequently handled enormous sums for the League without audit.
In December 1880 and January 1881, he was one of the thirteen defendants in the famous State trials, whom the jury acquitted by a vote of ten to two.
The Government then suspended the habeas corpus so that the suspected Leaguers could be imprisoned without trial, and to prevent the confiscation of the Land League funds, Egan moved the treasury to Paris.
Until the close of 1882 he skilfully directed activities for the whole movement, while the other leaders were confined in an Irish prison.
In December 1882 he resigned as treasurer and returned to his business in Ireland.
Shortly afterward he learned of Government plans to arrest him, and in February sailed for Holland, and thence for New York.
Soon afterward he settled with his family in Lincoln, Nebr. , having sold his share in the Dublin bakery firm to Rourke.
At Lincoln he again entered the grain and milling business, establishing a chain of elevators ; and also interested himself in real estate and woolen mills.
He took an enthusiastic part in the development of Lincoln during the boom days.
He applied for his citizenship papers in 1883 and received them in 1888.
In 1888-89, when the Parnell Commission made its sensational inquiry into the truth of the London Times articles charging Parnell and Egan with complicity in the Phoenix Park murders, Egan sent evidence from America which proved the letters on which the charges were based to be forgeries.
He threw himself just as vigorously into American politics.
Having observed the effect of free trade upon Ireland, he joined the Republican party.
He became a close friend of Blaine, and supported him in the campaign of 1884.
He was elected delegate-at-large to the Republican National Convention in 1888 by a vote of 594 to 67, and declined the chairmanship of the convention in favor of John M. Thurston.
Again he supported Blaine for president, and later swung a large Irish vote to Harrison.
Egan was thereupon appointed minister to Chile, and served to the end of the administration.
All through his term of service, and long afterward, his appointment was bitterly attacked by political opponents, who asserted that here was a flagrant example of the spoils system.
Nevertheless, it is certain that Secretary Blaine considered Egan well fitted to carry out his policy of discouraging British influence in South America.
Events justified Egan’s appointment.
In 1890, however, the Balmaceda Government was overthrown by a revolution, and for some time conditions were very unsettled.
The position of the American minister through this period was a peculiarly difficult one, and Egan maintained it with suitable dignity, and with his characteristic energy.
The chief incidents in his term were his granting of asylum in the American legation to political refugees; the serious Baltimore affair, in which about 120 sailors from the U. S. S. Baltimore were attacked by mobs while on shore leave at Valparaiso, two being killed and several wounded; and a treaty submitting to arbitration the claims of Chilean and United States citizens, negotiated and signed by Egan.
He threw himself wholeheartedly into the work of promoting better diplomatic and commercial relations between the two countries.
He was singularly upright.
A survey of his diplomatic correspondence confirms this judgment.
He visited Ireland again only once, in 1914.
On his return to the United States, Egan settled in New York City, where he engaged in various business enterprises and renewed his activities in Irish and American politics.
He supported Bryan in his free-silver campaign.
He again became an active leader of the Irish Home Rule sympathizers in America, and vigorously opposed the forces in the United States who supported the move for Irish independence.
At the outbreak of the World War he defended John E. Redmond against those who attacked him for holding Ireland loyal to the British Empire.
A man of quick and generous sympathies, intense patriotism, with a joyous Gaelic love for a fight—later in life he confessed that one did him “more good than medicine”—he was stirred by the pitiful condition of the Irish peasants under the grinding system of absentee landlordism, and soon became deeply interested in the land movement.
Quotations: A man of quick and generous sympathies, intense patriotism, with a joyous Gaelic love for a fight—later in life he confessed that one did him “more good than medicine”.
member of St. Patrick’s Brotherhood in 1860
one of the founders of the Amnesty Association
Home Rule League
presided over the Supreme Council of the Fenian Brotherhood in Dublin
Irish National League of America
delegate-at-large to the Republican National Convention in 1888
active leader of the Irish Home Rule sympathizers in America
The same qualities of personal integrity, executive ability, and rare judgment of men which brought him early success in business, combined with an irrepressible energy and a charm of personality that won the admiration of even his enemies, made him a dominating figure in Irish politics while yet a young man.
Although he was unfavorably criticized in a number of historical writings published during the two decades following his term of service, in the words of a recent diplomatic historian “He demonstrated unusual ability.
Moreover, he was tactful, discreet, and courageous. ”
On Sept. 30, 1919, after an illness of several months, he died at the home of his daughter in New York City.
