John Galvin was born on the 23rd December 1838 in Townland of Lisfuncheon in the Parish of Ballydoreen, County Tipperary, Ireland. He was educated at Mount Melleray Seminary, Cappaquin, County Waterford and All Hallows College Dublin. He was ordained a Priest on the 24th June 1861 in Dublin specifically for missionary work in the Eastern District of Scotland as it was known before the restoration of the Hierarchy in Britan and the re-establishment of the ancient See of the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh.

After he was ordained, Fr Galvin was then posted to Scotland and his first parish was St Mary's Cathedral in Edinburgh where he was an assistant Priest for some months in 1861 before being moved to St Andrew's Cathedral in Dundee for another few months later than same year. Subsequently, he was posted to St Andrew's Cathedral in Dumfries for a year between late 1861 and 1862. He then spent almost 3 years at the Parish of the Immaculate Conception in Bathgate, West Lothian from 1862 to 1865 again as an assistant Priest.

His first posting as Parish Priest was here in St Patrick's Kilsyth. The Catholic people of Kilsyth had been petitioning the Bishop in Edinburgh since the 1840's for a resident Parish Priest. The Parish of St Machan's Lennoxtown had been established and Fr. Gillon and Fr MacLachlan had serviced Kilsyth not as a Parish but as a 'Station' of St Machan's. Indeed Fr MacLachlan's territory covered virtually the whole of Stirlingshire, so visitations to Kilsyth were very infrequent. Finally in an attempt to attract the attention of the Bishop to the rapidly growing number of Catholics in the Kilsyth area, a committee was established on Sunday the 19th January 1862 and a missive was sent to The Right Rev Dr Gillis, Bishop of Limyra and Vicar Apostolic of the Eastern District of Scotland, pleading for a resident Priest. It was not until 3 years later that this missive was answered with the presence of Fr John Galvin who arrived on the 5th January 1865 and was tasked with the founding of St Patrick's Parish Kilsyth and building a church suitable for worship to accomodate the growing numbers of Catholics in the town. It is great credit to this young priest who, still only 27 years old, managed to organise a Parish, obtain the land for a Church and Parish House, organise the Sunday Schools and days Schools which were already present and build the first St Patrick's which stood for almost 100 years - all within the space of 15 months from his arrival. Fr Galvin was to stay in Kilsyth, consolodating the new St Patrick's Parish in until 1873.

Many people at this time were economic migrants and left Scotland for the United States of America. The Church had to respond by establishing an Amercian Mission. Fr Galvin was posted to the USA to minister to the growing numbers of Catholics who were arriving from all over Europe at this point in history. Fr Galvin was posted to Harrisburgh, Pennsylvania from 1873 to 1876. The records in Scotland no longer follow Fr Galvin after this point.