MacGill, Patrick (1890–1963)

Irish novelist and poet. Born into a poor farming family in the Glenties, County County Donegal, MacGill was sold into servitude by his parents, but escaped to Scotland, where he found employment as a farm labourer. His first novels, Children of the Dead End (1914) and The Rat-Pit (1915), were uncompromising depictions of the brutal existence of Irish migrant workers. He served in World War I, and wrote powerful accounts of trench warfare.

His early poetry attracted the attention of patrons, and he worked at the London Daily Express, before being taken on as secretary by Canon John Dalton of Windsor. MacGill's army service during World War I, for which he volunteered, resulted in the novels The Amateur Army (1915), The Red Horizon (1916), and The Great Push (1916). He returned home after being wounded, and later emigrated to the USA in 1930.

Other works by MacGill include Glenmornan (1919), Lanty Hanlon (1922), Moleskin Joe (1923), and Black Bonar (1928).