Life
1848-1916; b. Co. Kilkenny, son of P. J. Kelly of Mount Brandon, Graigue-na-Managh; ed. Clongowes and RMA Woolwich, Artillery Regt.; adventure stories include The Stonecutter of Memphis (n.d.); a novel, Schoolboys Three [1895], set in Clongowes Wood College in 1860s; faithful and lively, highly praised in reviews. IF SUTH
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Commentary
Peter Costello, Clongowes Wood (1991), Schoolboys Three ... the only novel dealing with an Irish public school; at Clongowes 1858-60, novel published in 1895; nine books, mostly historical (p. 47); W. P. Kelly, born Co. Mount Brandon, Graigue-na-Managh, Co. Kilkenny, trained Woolwich, Royal Artillery, retired 1874. ... an example [after 1916] to most nationally minded Clongownians of what they most disliked in the older Clongowes. ... Schoolboys Three modelled on Tom Brown’s Schooldays (1857) (ibid p. 148). Costello shows illustration of Schoolboy
pranks from novel.
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References
John Sutherland, The Longman Companion to Victorian Fiction (Harlow: Longmans 1988); ed. Clongowes Wood, lived at Harrowgate after training in Royal Artillery and service till 1878; large number of hist. adventure stories; best work Schoolboys Three (1895), evidently autobiographical; considered ‘healthy’.
BL 12.
Eric Stevens (1992) lists William Patrick Kelly, The Stranger from Iona [novel] (Routledge 1911) [1st ed.], 426pp. [£8.]
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