He took the Anti-Treaty side in the Irish Civil War, and was arrested by Pro-Treaty forces in 1923.
In his Civil War memoir The Gates Flew Open, Peadar O'Donnell describes an incident where Ryan, under sentence of execution, was mistakenly transferred to Harepark Camp in the Curragh.
[2] He did not take his seat in the Dáil due to Sinn Féin's abstentionist policy.
[3] He emigrated to the US, where he became a businessman, still supporting Irish nationalist campaigns, he died in America on 21 January 1944.
His uncle was the priest and GAA figure Canon Michael Kennedy Ryan, and his brother Martin Ryan served as a Fianna Fáil TD for Tipperary from 1933 to 1943.