born of Protestant mother and Catholic father, her doctor in Cork; mother widowed and left destitture; m. at 16; returned to her mother, then in Paris; became mistress of Francisco Solano López, son of dictator of Paraguay; travelled to Paraguay with him, 1855; already pregnant; mixed the unmarried mothers of Paraguay, known as “Golden Combs”, but did not engage in social amelioration of their condition; gave López seven children; López succeeded his father in 1862; López instigated War of Triple Alliance, attacking his neighbours, 1864-1870;

he instituted Tribunals of Death (aka “The Altar of Blood”); Eliza established military hospitals; siphoned off funds and amassed land; named sole beneficiary in his will, drafted in his last days; gained release from Brazilian captors after her defeat and death by proclaiming her British citizenship; spent her last years in Europe; along with her husband, by Gen. Stroessner, she was made a national hero, in 1961; she is the subject of The Pleasures of Eliza Lynch (2002), a novel by Anne Enright, q.v.