Immigrants Mr. and Mrs. Conlaw Peter Lynch, both members of prominent Irish families, had married young and had been disinherited by her father. They arrived in Georgetown, SC, in 1819 and built a home in Cheraw, SC. There was no priest or church in Cheraw, but Mr. Lynch was well formed in the Catholic faith and their 12 children were faithfully taught it.

Some of  the Lynch story is told by Jeremiah Joseph O’Connell in Catholicity in the Carolinas and Georgia, page 128ff. Below is a paragraph worth sharing.

Bishop England, on a visit to Cheraw, was so impressed with eldest son Patrick, that he recommended his own classic school in Charleston. Patrick was to become a priest and the third Bishop of the Diocese of Charleston. He served as bishop from 1858 to 1882.

What does this have to do with the Graveyard at the Basilica of St. Peter. Not much so far, but, of the twelve children, three were siblings of the Bishop. A prominent sister of Bishop Lynch, Ursuline Mother Baptista Lynch, is buried in the Ursuline section of the BOSP graveyard.

Also a brother of Bishop Lynch, Dr. John Hugh Lynch, who was born at sea on the way to America and became Surgeon General of South Carolina, is buried in the graveyard along with his wife and two daughters.

Anna Lynch, born in Ireland and the older sister of Bishop Lynch, brings the total of persons with identified connection to Mr. and Mrs. Conlaw Peter Lynch buried in the graveyard to six. The grave of Bishop Lynch is at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Charleston.

There are twelve Lynch markers in the Graveyard, and we have shown that six have known direct connections to the immigrating parents. Including Mother Baptista, there are three children, a daughter in law, and two granddaughters of these devout Irish immigrants. The other six are almost certainly second or third generation descendants, or spouses of same, but no direct connection has been found using Ancestry.com.

In the chart below, the column at the left is copied from Ancestry.com and gives the names of Conlaw Peter’s wife and their twelve children. To the right, highlighted in yellow, are the twelve Lynch markers in the Graveyard, matched as completely as possible with the names in the Ancestry list.

The twelve children are listed in the order of birth. Note the decreasing Trend in number of years survived, mom and dad having each become octogenarians.

Additional interesting information about the Lynch clan can be found in Celtic Columbia a 2022 book by Tom Elmore.

The Fenced Section

This fenced section of the graveyard is just east of the O’Connell section and contains the remains of six persons, four Lynches, a McQueen, and a McNamara. Maybe Robert S. MacNamara was a brother of Elizabeth Steele MacNamara Lynch. Five year old Donald McQueen is the only McQueen in the graveyard records so the lad’s family relationship to the Lynches is likely but unknown.

Other Lynches are buried separately.Markers for two Ursuline nuns besides Mother Baptista Lynch are in the fenced Ursuline section. The other ten are listed alphabetically on this page of this website. 

Dr. John Hugh Lynch Obituary