Lynch Law in Galway: Schooner Days MLXIX (1069)

by C. H. J. Snider

GALWAY, August, 1952

BEFORE leaving this Port of the Strangers for pastures new - more islands, more old stones, more good people—I came across a local story. It was fresh to me, though to you it may be a chestnut. But if so, apologies for more "cauld kail het ower." But not all who make the acquaintance of lynch law for the first time are able to talk about it afterwards, so -

The big blue limestone church here is dedicated to St. Nicholas of Myra, patron of thieves, sailors, children and merchants. This church was begun in 1320, and its big-bells still boom the hours. Columbus heard mass in it before he started for America the first time. Rice de Culvey, a Galway man from one of the Welsh "Tribes" settled in the city, made the epochal voyage with Columbus. Christopher returned to Spain in 1493, and Galway was the first city north of the Pyrenees to receive news of the discovery of the new world.

ARISTOCRATS OF TRADE

One of the Anglo-Norman tribes or families who colonized the ancient Port of the Strangers bore a lynx as their crest or cognizance, and they were known as the lynxes or Lynches. These "Tribes" held their chins high, but they did not despise trade, not they. They were like the ancient Carthaginians who had come here before them for that precious metal, tin. The Tribes traded native gold and hides and horses and wool and beef cattle for Toledo blades and eastern silks and Spanish wine, and from the profits built a walled city with churches and warehouses and stately mansions. They condemned alike rugheaded Irish kerns and Scotch gallowglasses, soldiers of fortune, and English adventurers, whether in steel suits or furred gowns. And they would not allow an O' or a Mac to pass the city gates without their leave. They were big business two capital B's.

On hearing the great news of Columbus return, James Lynch Fitzstephen, third of the lynx-crested merchant princes to become mayor of the rich trading city, embarked in haste for Spain. In Cadiz he consorted with one of the great Spanish families of the Gomez name.

What they concocted is unknown, but the haughty Don sent his only son, a youth yet in his teens, home with the great Irish merchant for "fosterage." He was to be instructed in the mysteries of these princes of trade.

Perhaps he was a pledge of a new world cartel or partnership. The mayor of Galway pledged himself to treat the young Spaniard as his own son. He had, indeed, a son of his own, Walter, of just the same age. These lads were the first merchant princes - presumptive of America. Walter was already betrothed to the daughter of another of the great Galway magnates. This may have been for commercial reasons, but Walter was nothing the less jealous.

GREEN EYED MONSTER

The young Spaniard was immediately popular among the Tribes families. He was courted by all because of his own family's reputation for wealth. He was invited to a stately dinner given by the father of Walter's fiancee.

The jealous Walter tracked his foster-brother-in-trade to the mansion. He did not know of the banquet, and wildly imagined his bride-to-be was the honey which attracted this Spanish wasp.

Gnashing his teeth, Walter waited till after midnight. When his assumed rival at length appeared, somewhat unsteady after long conviviality, he followed him, stabbed him, and hurled him into the harbor.

"Let the cursed tide that brought you from Spain take you home again!" he exclaimed.

His own voice startled him. These were the first words he had heard spoken for hours, for ages. There had been no accusation, no explanation sought or offered. The young Spaniard had died without a groan. Supposing?

Walter burst into a cold sweat. Had he been mistaken? Doubt tortured him worse than jealousy had done. He began to run away from himself. He coursed the empty streets of Galway till dawn. In broad daylight he found his own father's door. Excited people were there, around something which dripped blood and seawater on the threshold. His dagger, Walter's dagger, was in its back. The tide had returned its offering.

He told his father everything.

"Wretched fool!" exclaimed James Lynch Fitzstephen. "Your betrothed came here seeking you when you were spying upon your foster brother. She spent the night here with your mother, because of the banquet in her own home. Your foster brother never raised his eyes above her shoetips, such respect had he for his fosterage. By your folly you have ruined a great enterprise, you have ruined your father's reputation as a man of business and a man of honor. You shall not hang his reputation as a man of justice. As chief magistrate of Galway I take you into custody for murder. You shall hang for it if I have to hang you myself."

He was as good or as bad as his word. Walter's mother, a Blake, and his fiancee of noble family, pleaded for him. Finding the father obdurate, they roused the "Tribes" against him. The public executioner refused to carry out the sentence which the mayor and chief magistrate imposed upon his own son, and a tumult arose.

The Lynch mansion, which with its warehouses and offices occupied a whole block in the old city, was surrounded by an armed mob bent on rescue, The household servants deserted.

James Lynch Fitzstephen, magnate, judge and jailor of his own son, locked and barred all his shutters and stout doors of iron studded oak. He dragged his manacled boy to an upper floor with a halter around his neck, flung open the casement, took a turn with the rope around a grinning gargoyle, and pushed him over the stone window sill.

The rope was long, the building high. The crowd below heard Walter's neckbone snap. He died without a struggle. James Lynch Fitzstephen never spoke again.

LYNCH LAW

Such was the origin, of lynch law and its promulgation by Judge Lynch in Galway in 1493. Was he right or wrong?

Galway in after ages placed a tablet (it is here for all to read) on the ruins of the Lynch mansion, paying tribute to their chief magistrate's sense of justice. He had assuredly a difficult decision to make. Had he hanged himself in expiation of his son's crime he might have earned a nobler epitaph.

This tablet is on a ruined wall behind the Church of St. Nicholas, where the Lynch chapel and the Lynch family pew and Lynch tombs with various escutcheons and quarterings are shown. The tablet is beside a grisly carving of skull-and-crossbones and below an arched window, which is said to be the identical one from Which the judical murder was committed. That is the only part of the story doubtful, for the window is but a few feet above the ground. The rescue mob could have got in by it, or could have saved the boy when he was thrust out. I believe all this happened, but that the window was elsewhere in the Lynch mansion. Perhaps in the top story of such a building as the ancient gargoyled and escutcheoned one around the corner, in the heart of Galway's business and shopping district now occupied by a bank.