Thomas J. Kelly (Irish nationalist)

Thomas Joseph Kelly (6 January 1833 – 5 February 1908) was an Irish revolutionary and leader of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB).

The son of a farmer and public house owner, Patrick Kelly, and Margaret Divilly, Thomas Joseph Kelly was born in Mountbellew, County Galway, in 1833. Having received a better than average education, it was originally intended that he should become a priest and attended St. Jarlath's College in Tuam. At school, he came to be influenced by his teacher Michael Joseph MacCann (1824–1883) who, in 1843, wrote "O'Donnell Abu", a ballad about Rudhraighe Ó Domhnail, 1st Earl of Tyrconnell. This influence kindled patriotism in Kelly.

After serving an apprenticeship in the printing trade in Loughrea, at the age of eighteen, he emigrated to New York City, arriving on the ship Castillian on 27 March 1851, where he worked as a printer, and joined the Printer's Union in New York City. He joined the National Guard in New York and received basic military training. He later joined the Emmet Monument Association, an Irish-American Irish republican group.

In 1857, Kelly went to Nashville, Tennessee, where he worked as a foreman for the S. W. Publishing House. Soon afterwards he started the Nashville Democrat, which supported the presidential campaign of Stephen A. Douglas in the Presidential election of 1860. Following the outbreak of the American Civil War, Kelly, a supporter of the Union, chose to leave Nashville for the North. In doing this, he lost his savings and printing business.

En route to join the famous Irish 69th Infantry Regiment, he heard about the Irish 10th Ohio Infantry, and enlisted with them for its initial three months, and then re-enlisted for an additional three years. He served in Company "C", where his military knowledge and ability was soon recognized and he was promoted to Sergeant. By the end of the summer of 1861 he was functioning as First Sergeant of Company "C". Although shot in the jaw at the Battle of Carnifex Ferry in Western Virginia, 10 September 1861, he volunteered to return to duty before the end of the year. Part of his jaw and three teeth were destroyed by a bullet that lodged in the muscles of the left side of his neck, from which it was removed surgically. It has been suggested that the goatee beard, which appears in all of his pictures was grown to hide what could have been a disfiguring scar.

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