"Kelly the Boy from Killane" is an Irish air in 4/4 time and D Major. The parts are played AABB. John Moulden identifies this song as written by a Dublin City Councillor and Patrick Street publican, Patrick Joseph McCall (1861-1919), a prolific songwriter of mostly patriotic ballads whose ballad sheet collection is in the National Library of Ireland. Moulden states his style of writing was informed by ballad sheets and therefore is missing from “polite” anthologies. John Kelly was a merchant's son from Kilane, County Wexford and a man of impressive size, seven feet or more. He participated in the rising of 1798, fighting under the command of Bagnal Harvey, one of the Protestant leaders of the rebellion. Kelly led the men from the Wexford areas of Bargy, Forth, Shelmalier and the Barony of Bantry in Harvey’s attack on the town of New Ross. The United Irishman captured the town, rested, and lost it again and several hundered croppies were lost in the battle. Kelly was badly wounded in the engagement and was captured at his sister’s house where he was recovering. Subsequently he was tried at a court-martial and convicted; a story goes it was on the evidence of a yeoman sergeant, a neighbor whose life he had saved some days before. He was hanged on Wexford bridge, his trunk thrown into the water and his head spiked over the courthouse to rot after being kicked about. Kelly’s head was eventually recovered by friends who brought it to Killane, where, much later a monument to his memory was erected. It was printed in Roche's Collection of Traditional Irish Music, vol. 3 (1927). It was recorded by Leo Rowsome on Classics of Irish Piping (1938), Makem & Clancy, Luke Kelly, The Dubliners, The Irish Ramblers, The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem, Jackie O'Brien, Brian Roebuck, Blackthorn, Paddy Murphy, Johnny Denegan, The Davitts, The Makem Brothers and others. Songs from Irish uprisings and rebellion in this collection are: "Bold Fenian Men" "Boolavogue" "The Boyne Water" "The Boys of Kilmichael" "Croppies Lie Down" "The Croppy Boy" "The Foggy Dew" "Kevin Barry" "The Men of the West" "The Old Orange Flute" "The Protestant Boys" "The Rising of the Moon" "The Wearing of the Green" "The Wind That Shakes the Barley"