John Lynch (congressman)


John Lynch was a nineteenth-century politician, merchant, manufacturer and newspaper publisher from Maine.
Born in Portland, Maine, Lynch attended public schools as a child and graduated from Portland High School in 1842. He engaged in mercantile pursuits, was manager of the Portland Daily Press in 1862 and was a member of the Maine House of Representatives from 1862 to 1864. He was elected a Republican to the United States House of Representatives in 1864, serving from 1865 to 1873. There, Lynch served as chairman of the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of the Navy from 1869 to 1871 and of the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of the Treasury from 1871 to 1873. Afterward, he permanently moved to Washington, D.C. where he established the Washington Daily Union in 1877 and engaged in the manufacturing of bricks and drain pipes. Lynch died while on a visit to Portland, Maine on July 21, 1892 and was interred in Evergreen Cemetery in Portland.