The Poet Edward Egan of Meelaghan, Tullamore
and other members of that Family

By Michael Byrne

The Egan family of the Meelaghans, Tullamore have excited some interest from family history enthusiasts, especially in the United States arising from the fact that Howard Egan born in Tullamore in 1815 was among the celebrated employees of the Pony Express while two of his sons, Howard and Richard, also served as riders.

Pony Express

James Molloy, writing in the Sunday Independent for 23rd June 1985 stated:

'The fabled Pony Express, inaugurated on April 3rd 1860, comprised an initial 80 riders, 400 horses and 190 relay stations, all of which bridged the 1,840 mile route from St. Jo., Missouri to Sacramento, California.

The journey took 12, and later nine days in all.

Among the Pony Express's celebrated employees was Irishman Howard Egan born in Tullamore, King's Co., on June 15th 1815.

A former sailor, policeman and personal body-guard of Mormon founder, John Smith, Egan played a prominent part in Brigham Young's "Pioneer Party" of 1847 and eight years later explored the famous "Egan Trail", which became part of the mail route.

Egan was appointed Divisional Superintendant, covering the route from Salt Lake City to Rush Roberts Creek, Nevada. He later served as Deputy Clerk for the Third Judicial Court of Utah, dying on March 1st 1878.

Two sons, Howard and Richard served as riders. Richard carried the first west bound "Mohila" or Mail Bay 75 miles from Salt Lake city to Rush Valley, in 4½ hours, and on another occasion covered 330 miles'.

The story of the Pony Express can be found in illustrated form in National Geographic for July 1980 (vol. 158, no. 1). The Pony Express was started about 1860 and lasted a mere 18 months. The east-west trail was some 1840 miles in extent and had 157 relay stations placed five to twenty miles apart with 400 horses and some eighty young riders - one of the stations was known as Egan station. Major Howard Egan, a staunch Mormon, was a superintendent of the Pony Express trail from Salt Lake City to Nevada's Robert's Creek. This Major Howard Egan was son of Howard Egan who was born at Tullamore in 1782, married Ann Meath or Meade, who died 15th February 1823 and emigrated to Montreal, Canada in 1823 shortly after his wife's death and died there in 1829. Major Howard Egan, died in 1878 in Salt Lake City having married in 1839 Tamson Parshley.

Howard Egan was one of at least ten children of Howard Egan and Ann Meath born over the period 1806 to 1823. His mother could be presumed to have died from a childbirth complication, some two weeks after the birth of the last child Margaret on 1st February 1823.

Howard Egan's grand parents were Bernard Egan born about 1760 at Tullamore and Betty Egan born about the year 1762. Major Howard Egan has left diaries which were published as Pioneering the West (Salt Lake City, Utah, 1916), lately reprinted.

Among the children of Major Howard Egan involved in the Pony Express were Richard Erastus Egan (born 1842, died 1918) and Howard Ranson Egan (born 1840, died 1916).

Major Howard Egan is commemorated in the name Egan canyon, a treacherous canyon west of Steptoe Valley, in Nevada.

The Poet Egan

A descendant of William Egan (Uncle to Major Howard Egan) remained in the Meelaghans and married c. 1805 a Miss Watson and had children including Edward born 1806 and who in turn married Margaret Coffey. One of their children William, born 1829 married 1857 Maria Murphy and to this couple was born Edward Egan on 9th August 1858. Edward Egan was the last of the line and died unmarried c. 1940 and is buried at Killeigh Church of Ireland cemetery in an unmarked grave. He attended the Meelaghans school:

Date of Entrance: 5th July 1869
Pupil's Full Name: Edward Egan
Age of Pupil at last birthday: 14
Residence: Meelahans
Pupil's Strike Off Date: 5th June 1875
Religion: RC
Occupation of Father: Widower

and later emigrated to Australia. He did not find Australia to his liking and returned c. 1890. He was a regular contributor of verse and prose in the 1890s and up to the 1930s and was popular. His booklet King's Co. Couplets was published at Birr in 1892. Among his verses published in the 1890s were:

• Geashill Castle King's County
• Eoghan, The Splendid
• Tullamore River
• Waterworks
• Cahir O'Connor Faily
• The King's County Members
• How To Improve Tullamore Water
• The Widow King and The Tullamore Guardians
• Ballad Singers Fete
• The Tullamore Newsvendors

We have looked at some of the descendants of Bernard Egan and Betty Egan born about the year 1760 and 1762 respectively. Among them were Major Howard Egan and his two Sons Richard Erastus Egan and Howard Ranson Egan, all of whom were connected with the Pony Express in the Pioneer West.

Another member of the family, who after a short stay in Australia, cheered the hearts of many Offaly people and was known as the Poet Egan. Edward Egan known affectionately as the "Poet Egan" was born at the Meelaghans, Tullamore in 1858 and died c. 1940. He is buried in an unmarked grave in the old Killeigh cemetery. He was interned in 1935 and the record of it has survived and runs as follows:

In the exaggerated language of a celebrated American professor, "the elements were emphatically tempestuous" that dark November evening [1935] on which I called to see Edward Egan of The Meelahans, Tullamore. His fame as a writer of short stories, racy of the soil, once rang round Ireland, and far beyond her shores, Advancing years and infirmities that are its natural accompaniments, have long since forced him to lay aside the gifted pen with which he delighted thousands of admiring readers. Some time ago an accepted authority compiled an informative article, in which he paid tribute to the many brilliant Iiterati of Offaly birth or extraction. He unpardonably omitted several including Edward Egan.

A POET IN KNOCKNAGOW

Mr. Edward Egan, who is now in his seventy-seventh year, lives alone in a modest cottage. There is a cluster of comfortable farmhouses all round, forming a typical Kickham village, where the people there, Mr. Egan says, are as Celtic and as kindly as any of those to be found in Knocknagow. "I have the best neighbours in Ireland" he declared with emphasis. Mr. Egan began his literary career at a very early age, and soon after he had returned from Australia, where he was a very discontented emigrant for a short period.

"Australia," he declared, "is; or at least was, in my time a land of white slavery, and no man ever turned his back on it with greater pleasure than I did."

In 1890 Mr. Egan published a book of verse entitled Kings County Couplets. The publication had a great run, not only in the country, but all over the Midlands and in Dublin. Many of the poems were topical, while some were political. A staunch supporter of Parnell, Mr. Egan wooed the muse in support of the hapless chief The book has been long out of print. [Does any reader have a copy?] Nearly all the poems had a local flavour, and many readers of the other generation will recall "The Blue Ball House," The Four Roads," "The Tullamore Newsboys", etc., while he sweetly sang of Geashill's grandeur in:-

"Oh sweetly rural is the scene,
Where Geashill Castle stands.
Beneath a line of old green hills,
This lovely vale expands.

Oh what a deep - a holy calm,
Pervade the village neat!
No surging crowd, with deafening din,
Disturb its quiet street."

The late T. P. O'Connor, M.P., in one of his popular weeklies, once paid Mr. Egan's poetry a handsome compliment, and quoted extensively from the King's County Couplets. Mr. Egan has been a life-long student of Burns, the ploughman poet of Scotland. He visited the Burns country and is quite familiar with "The Banks and Braes o' Doon." He also is well versed in English classic literature.

A SHORT STORY WRITER

But it is as a writer of short stories that Mr. Egan deserves to be remembered. For a man who pursued with skill and industry the toilsome life of a small farmer, his output was prolific, and earned him a handsome income. A plain man of the people, he wrote about the people and for the people of the Irish countryside. And, unlike some of the so-called Irish writers of today, he never wrote a line or penned a word to wound the humblest child of Adam's kin or bring the blush of shame to the cheek of the most modest maiden. Of him it can be truly said that he wrote for the honour of Ireland. The aroma of Ireland exhales from his every page. And, through it all, runs a delightfull sense of humour. Laughter ever trembles on the borderland of tears. He writes of pattern, dance and fair. We hear the merry laughter of the hay-making, and he makes the cricket chirrup on the Christmas hearth. He has drawn Irish characters, true to lush life, with faultless fidelity. On his canvas appear the parish patriarch and the successful gombeen man; the kindly soggarth and the sharp-witted tangier. They are all there. We hear the laughter of the now-forgotten cross road's dance. He takes his readers to a turf-cutting party, or lets them hear the hum of the threshing machine, or see the grief of Irish emigrants as they wave a fond farewell to those they leave behind. It seems a great pity that some enterprising publisher would not get the opportunity of publishing in book form a collection of Edward Egan's short stories. They would not be excelled by the "Hidden Ireland" by Aodh de Blacam. To the people of another generation Edward Egan's stories were a gripping feature in several Irish publications. To the people of the greater Ireland beyond the seas they were of much more significance.

BUT PERHAPS HIS GREATEST ACHIEVEMENT LAY IN THE FACT THAT HE DID A MAN'S PART IN SENDING FORTH ON THE WINGS OF THE PRESS STORIES OF THE REAL. OLD RURAL IRELAND, AND THAT AT A TIME WHEN THE COUNTRY WAS TORN BY DISSENSION, AND UNSCRUPULOUS SCRIBES DID NOT HESITATE TO HOLD UP THE MERE IRISH RIDICULE AND DEPICT THEM AS A RACE OF SEMI-BARBARIANS.

Such a man deserves well of his country, and if Mr. Egan's lot was cast outside the shores of Ireland he would be feteed and feasted by the great ones of the land. He would be hailed as one of the children of genius, who had done honour to his country. As it is, he lives in obscurity, unnoticed and unknown, while mediocrities, whose talents have been used in many cases to defame the land that bore them, are lionised and given a place in the front rank as intellectual and social celebrities.

HISTORICAL LORE

Mr. Egan's store of historical lore, both local and national, is remarkable. For him there is no country like Ireland, and no people like the Irish. He has visited from time to time, every spot of historic interest in the land. His treasured literary reliques include letters from men and women well known to fame in days gone by. A man of great intellectual calibre, Edward Egan carries lightly the burden of seventy-seven winters. He possesses a charming old world courtesy, that stamps him as a man apart. Although he has had more than his share of life's trials, he is not soured or disappointed. Unlike many men who belong to the past, he has nothing harsh to say of the present. He believes there is a great future before Ireland, and that a great Irish literary field remains to be explored. He has no regrets that the Fates have not been more kind. He believes with Gray that -

"The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that wealth e'er gave.
An act alike th' inevitable hour,
The paths of glory lead but to the grave."

Mr. Egan's friends and admirers in Offaly will be very pleased to hear that he is "hale and hearty and as humorous as any of the droll characters of his creation."

It is strange that while the Poet Egan is little remembered locally the OHAS has had seven or eight letters from overseas seeking details of the Egan family and providing descendants of the first Howard who went to Montreal some 170 years ago. He died c. 1940 and is buried at the old cemetery in Killeigh.

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