Introduction
Patrick Neeson Lynch (March 10, 1817 – February 26, 1882) was an Irish-born clergyman of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Bishop of Charleston from 1857 until his death in 1882.
Biography
Patrick Lynch's birthplace is sometimes mistakenly attributed to Clones, County Monaghan but he was actually born in the County Fermanagh portion of the Parish of Clones, most likely in the townland of Kibberidogue where his family had settled in the mid to late 17th century. His parents were Conlaw Peter and Eleanor (née Neison) Lynch. Through his mother, he was said to have been related to Marshal McMahon, who served as President of France (1873–1879). In 1819, he and his parents came to the United States, where they settled in Cheraw, South Carolina.
He was ordained to the priesthood in Charleston in 1840 and consecrated as bishop in 1858. On February 20, 1864 he was named by President Jefferson Davis of the Confederate States of America to be its delegate to the Holy See which maintained diplomatic relations in the name of the Papal States. Pope Pius IX, as had his predecessors, condemned chattel slavery. Despite Bishop Lynch's mission, and an earlier mission by A. Dudley Mann, the Vatican never recognized the Confederacy, and the Pope received Bishop Lynch only in his ecclesiastical capacity. During his visit the Pope suggested that ""something might be done looking to an improvement in [the slaves'] position or state, and to a gradual preparation for their freedom at a future opportune time."
He was the third bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charleston which at the time covered North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, the Bahamas and Bermuda. It was later subdivided leaving the Diocess of Charleston to cover only the state of South Carolina.
Bishop Lynch was a granduncle of pioneering US Naval aviator Patrick N. L. Bellinger.