Usher Gahagan

Last updated

Usher Gahagan (died 1749), was an Irish classical scholar.

Gahagan belonged to a good family of Westmeath, Ireland; was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, but took no degree, and then proceeded to study for the Irish bar. His parents had brought him up as a Protestant, but he was converted in youth to Roman Catholicism, and was thus prevented from being called to the bar. He soon married a rich heiress, whom he treated very cruelly, and a separation followed. His relatives were alienated by his conduct, and he came to London, where he tried to make a livelihood out of his classical scholarship.

He edited in Brindley's beautiful edition of the classics the works of Horace, Cornelius Nepos, Sallust, Juvenal, Persius, Virgil, and Terence, all published in 1744; Quintus Curtius Rufus in 1746; Catullus, Propertius, and Tibullus, issued in 1749. He also translated into good Latin verse Pope's ‘Essay on Criticism’ (‘Tentamen de re critica’), which appeared in 1747 with a Latin dedication to the Earl of Chesterfield, and a poem descriptive of the earl's recent reception in Dublin as lord-lieutenant.

Gahagan fell into very bad company in London. A compatriot, Hugh Coffey, suggested to him a plan for making money by filing coins or ‘diminishing the current coin of the realm.’ Another Irishman, of some education, Terence Connor, who is variously described as Gahagan's servant or lodger, was introduced into at the end of 1748. Coffey turned informer, and Gahagan and Connor were arrested in a public-house at Chalk Farm early in January 1748–9. The trial took place at the Old Bailey on Monday, 16 Jan. 1748–9, and both were convicted on Coffey's evidence. While awaiting execution in Newgate, Gahagan translated Pope's ‘Messiah’ and ‘Temple of Fame’ into Latin verse, and this was published immediately (1749), with a dedication to the Duke of Newcastle, praying for pardon. Gahagan also addressed Prince George to the same effect in English verse, while Connor wrote a poetic appeal in English to the Duchess of Queensberry. These effusions are printed in the ‘Newgate Calendar.’ But all efforts failed, and the young men were hanged at Tyburn on Monday, 20 Feb. 1748–9. Some verses lamenting Gahagan's fate are quoted in the ‘Newgate Calendar.’ In the preface to the collected edition of Christopher Smart's poems, ‘unfortunate Gahagan’ is described as Smart's immediate predecessor in the successful writing of Latin verse.

Related Research Articles

John Gay English poet and playwright

John Gay was an English poet and dramatist and member of the Scriblerus Club. He is best remembered for The Beggar's Opera (1728), a ballad opera. The characters, including Captain Macheath and Polly Peachum, became household names.

Nahum Tate was an Irish poet, hymnist and lyricist, who became Poet Laureate in 1692. Tate is best known for The History of King Lear, his 1681 adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear, and for his libretto for Henry Purcell's opera, Dido and Aeneas.

Brian Coffey was an Irish poet and publisher. His work was informed by his Catholicism, his background in science and philosophy, and his connection to French surrealism. He was close to an intellectual European Catholic tradition and mainstream Irish Catholic culture. Two of his long poems, Advent (1975) and Death of Hektor (1979), were widely considered to be important works in the canon of Irish poetic modernism. He also ran Advent Books, a small press, during the 1960s and 1970s.

Ambrose Philips 17th/18th-century English poet and politician

Ambrose Philips was an English poet and politician. He feuded with other poets of his time, resulting in Henry Carey bestowing the nickname "Namby-Pamby" upon him, which came to mean affected, weak, and maudlin speech or verse.

Anthony Gerard Richard Cronin was an Irish poet, arts activist, biographer, commentator, critic, editor and barrister.

Wentworth Dillon, 4th Earl of Roscommon 17th-century Irish earl and poet

Wentworth Dillon, 4th Earl of Roscommon, was an Anglo-Irish landlord, Irish peer, and poet.

Christopher Pitt English poet

Christopher Pitt was an English clergyman poet; he was also a translator whose performance was esteemed in his day.

Robert Yelverton Tyrrell, FBA was an Irish classical scholar who was Regius Professor of Greek at Trinity College, Dublin.

Constantia Grierson [née Crawley], was an editor, poet, and classical scholar from County Kilkenny, Ireland. She was married to the Dublin printer and publisher George Grierson.

Events from the year 1749 in Ireland.

Eoghan Rua Ó Súilleabháin, anglicized as Owen Roe O'Sullivan, was an Irish poet. He is known as one of the last great Gaelic poets. A recent anthology of Irish-language poetry speaks of his "extremely musical" poems full of "astonishing technical virtuosity", and also notes that "Eoghan Rua is still spoken of and quoted in Irish-speaking districts in Munster as one of the great wits and playboys of the past."

Joseph Trapp

Joseph Trapp (1679–1747) was an English clergyman, academic, poet and pamphleteer. His production as a younger man of occasional verse and dramas led to his appointment as the first Oxford Professor of Poetry in 1708. Later his High Church opinions established him in preferment and position. As a poet, he was not well thought of by contemporaries, with Jonathan Swift refusing a dinner in an unavailing attempt to avoid revising one of Trapp’s poems, and Abel Evans making an epigram on his blank verse translation of the Aeneid with a reminder of the commandment against murder.

Samuel Boyse

Samuel Boyse was an Irish poet and writer who worked for Sir Robert Walpole and whose religious verses in particular were prized and reprinted in his time.

Henry Jones (1721–1770), born in Ireland, was a poet and dramatist active in London.

Thomas Marlay (c.1680–1756) was an Irish politician and judge, who ended his career as Lord Chief Justice of Ireland. He is remembered chiefly for beginning the rebuilding of Celbridge Abbey, and as the grandfather of the statesman Henry Grattan.

Henry Boyd was an Irish cleric and translator of Dante.

Richard Mounteney

Richard Mounteney (1707–1768) was an Irish judge and classical scholar.

William King (St Mary Hall)

William King (1685–1763) was an English academic and writer, Principal of St Mary Hall, Oxford from 1719, He was known for strongly held Jacobite views, and as a satirist and poet.

Richard Rolt was an English writer, also known as a poet and librettist.

William James Niall Rudd was an Irish-born British classical scholar.

References

    Wikisource-logo.svg This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain : "Gahagan, Usher". Dictionary of National Biography . London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.

    This page is based on this Wikipedia article
    Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
    Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.