John Byrne reveals: ‘I’m the product of incest’

THE writer and artist John Byrne has revealed that he is the child of an incestuous relationship – and that the man he thought was his grandfather was actually his father.

Byrne was brought up believing that he was the son of Patrick Byrne and Alice, formerly McShane, his mother. However, in 2002, he learned that his father was actually his “grandfather” Patrick McShane.

At the time he was living with the actress Tilda Swinton in a house near Tain in northern Scotland. A phone call from his cousin Aileen was answered by Swinton and she was told there was news for “Iain”, the name which Byrne was known by in the family. “Aileen’s mother, my Auntie Helen, the youngest in the McShane family, had died. She told Aileen what my mother had told her when she was much younger,” he said. Aileen asked Swinton whether Byrne should be told. She said yes. Afterwards, he said “everything fell into place”. He recalled how his mother used to walk regularly the eight miles from their home in Ferguslie Park, Paisley, to his grandparents’ house in Cardonald. He said: “She was in love with her own father, utterly and totally. She just wanted to be in his company.”

His mother died in hospital in the 1980s after a long struggle with mental illness which he believes was brought on because of her relationship with McShane.

One of his earliest memories was of watching from the thirdfloor flat in Paisley as his mother was taken away to hospital for the first time. After a succession of confinements in hospital, she was diagnosed with a form of schizophrenia and died aged 74.

Alice’s husband Patrick went to his grave never knowing he was not the natural father of Byrne.