when we find such distinctive Irish Christian names as Darby, Malachi,
Patrick, Brian, Cormac, Connor and the like. And when we see O’Bryan
Smiths, Patrick Smiths, and Michael and Jeremiah Smiths, and other
similar name combinations, we can safely assume that in the majority of
cases they were of Irish origin or birth.
MEMORIAL TO JERSEY PRISON SHIP HEROES.
Since many prominent Irish Americans played an important part in the
success of the project for a fitting memorial to the heroes of the
British prison-ships of the Revolution, it is fit that reference be made
here to this noble tribute and the manner of its accomplishment.
The magnificent monument, costing in the neighborhood of $200,000, was
dedicated at Fort Greene Park, Borough of Brooklyn, New York, on
November 14, 1908, in the presence of one of the most distinguished and
representative gatherings which ever honored a like occasion in this
country. Addresses were made by President-elect Taft, by Governor Hughes
of New York, Secretary Luke E. Wright of the Navy, and by other
distinguished men, including Patrick F. McGowan, Chairman of the Board
of Aldermen of the City of New York, and Daniel F. Cohalan, Grand Sachem
of the Tammany Society of New York, an organization which did much
toward the success of the project and which contributed a substantial
amount.
The monument itself is one of the finest memorials in the world. It
stands in the center of a broad plaza, reached by three flights of 34
steps each, 100 feet in width. The height from the bottom of the plaza
to the top of the monument is nearly 200 feet. The top is accessible and
is reached by an electric elevator. The monument is constructed of white
granite from New York state, and the steps from granite quarried at
Stonington, Penobscot Bay, Maine. The architects were McKim, Mead and
White, and the work is said to have been the last of an extensive nature
by the late Stanford White.
The funds for the erection of this noteworthy tribute were obtained
through a government appropriation of half the amount, a state
appropriation of $25,000, an appropriation by the city of twice that
amount, and the rest through subscriptions from societies and historical
and patriotic organizations. The Tammany Society contributed the final
$1,000 to complete the required amount. This well-known organization was
the very first to secure a proper recognition of the courage and
patriotism of the prison ship martyrs more than one hundred years ago.
Among the heroes of the British prison-ships were many of Irish birth or
extraction, and it is therefore a subject for pride and satisfaction to
us as a race that their valor has at last been recognized, and
especially that an organization largely controlled by our people has
played so important a part in the accomplishment of such recognition.
Never in the history of the world have prisoners of war been made the
victims of such unexampled cruelties as those practised on the Americans
by the British in the Revolution, and it is a striking and
never-to-be-forgotten commentary on British methods toward their enemies
in war that the record of the prison-ships of the Revolution is deemed
by all the world a black mark on English history.
THE IRISH IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.
SHORT ADDRESS DELIVERED BY MASTER KARL EGAN, AT THE IOWA OPERA HOUSE,
EMMETSBURG, IOWA, MARCH 17, 1909, DURING THE PRESENTATION OF THE
IRISH DRAMA, “THE HERO OF WICKLOW,” UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE
ANCIENT ORDER OF HIBERNIANS. SOME FACTS OF INTEREST TO THE PEOPLE OF
IRISH BIRTH OR ANCESTRY.
_Ladies and Gentlemen_: On this important anniversary, which is
associated with so many achievements of interest to the people of our
race, it is fitting to enquire what part the Irish took in the
Revolutionary War. What did they do for the cause of human liberty at
this most critical time in the world’s history? All we ask is the truth.
For some reason our ordinary school histories have never given us any
credit for the prominent part our ancestors took in that great struggle.
What I shall say will bear the closest historical investigation.
It was Patrick Henry, who, by his soul-stirring speech, aroused the
members of the Virginia Assembly to a sense of patriotic duty. In 1776
he ran for governor on the Independence ticket and carried that
important colony for the Revolutionary cause. Still, he claimed that
John Rutledge of South Carolina was the greatest American orator of his
time. The latter was also elected president of South Carolina in 1776,
on the same ticket. John Rutledge and Patrick Henry were both sons of
Irishmen.
[Illustration:
MR. WILLIAM J. FEELEY.
Of Providence, R. I.
One of the Committee in charge of the Sullivan Memorial and under
whose guidance the Memorial was designed and executed.
]
During the Revolutionary War men of Irish birth or ancestry served as
governors in South Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware,
New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. They were among
the most ardent and fearless of the patriots of that history-making
period.
It was in John Duggan’s tavern in Boston that the Boston Tea Party was
planned. Several Irishmen were in the execution of the plan.
Eleven of the fifty-four members of the first Continental Congress were
Irishmen and sons of Irishmen. Thomas Johnson, who nominated George
Washington for commander-in-chief of the American forces, was a Celt of
the old school.
The war began April, 1775, but it was not officially declared until July
4, 1776. October 15, 1775, Congress sent a committee to interview
General Washington and to decide as to the advisability of continuing
the struggle. Of the five who participated in that most important
conference, Joseph Reed and Thomas Lynch were Irish. The other members
were Benjamin Franklin, Colonel Harrison and General Washington.
A rough draft of the Declaration of Independence was prepared by Thomas
Jefferson. It was re-written and carefully revised by Charles Thompson,
who was styled the Samuel Adams of Philadelphia, and the life of the
cause of liberty. When the Declaration was first proclaimed, it was
signed by John Hancock, as president of the Continental Congress, and by
Charles Thompson, as secretary. The other names were attached later.
Thompson was an Irishman and Hancock an Irish American. John Nixon first
publicly read it and Thos. Dunlap first printed it and published it to
the world. Both were Celtic to the backbone. Who periled most in signing
the immortal document? History answers, Charles Carroll of Carrollton,
another Irish American.
Who fought the hardest in the British House of Parliament for the rights
of American colonists? Edmond Bourk, an Irishman, and one of the
greatest statesmen the world has ever known.
In placing his most important officers, General Washington had Morgan
and Hand leading his rifles, Knox at the head of his artillery, John
Dunlap as his life guard, Edward Hand as his adjutant-general, Andrew
Lewis as his brigadier-general, Stephen Moylan and John Fitzgerald as
his aids, and Ephraim Blaine as his quartermaster. All were Irish by
birth or ancestry. When Washington was retreating through New Jersey, he
sent word to Thomas Johnson, a Maryland Celt, that he had not enough men
to fight the British and too few to run away with. Johnson raised a
force of 1,800 men and hurried to his assistance.
All students of American history have read of the gallant Richard
Montgomery, Mad Anthony Wayne, John Sullivan, Daniel Morgan, Stephen
Moylan, John Fitzgerald, Henry Knox, Wm. Irvine, Richard Butler, and
Generals Cochran, Campbell, McDowell, McCall, McClary, Jasper, Graham,
Hazelett, Colonel Pickens, and many others who were among the most
valiant and successful officers in that eventful conflict. All belonged
to our liberty-loving, heroic race. It has been officially ascertained
that out of 131 of the most prominent officers in the war for American
Independence, 20 were of English ancestry, 25 of French, 10 of German
and Dutch, 8 of Scotch, 2 of Polish, and 84 of Irish and Welch.
Commodores Barry, Perry, McDonough and Stewart, of the wars of 1776 and
1812, were scions of brave-hearted exiles from the Emerald Isle.
June 16, 1779, Joseph Galloway, speaker of the Pennsylvania House of
Representatives, who had to fly to England because of his sympathy with
the Tories, was examined as a witness by a committee of the British
House of Parliament, and he testified that the Irish constituted
one-half of the American army, the native Americans one-fourth and that
the other one-fourth were English and Scotch. This statement is
corroborated by Lecky, the English historian, Lord Mountjoy, General
Lee, Count Rochambeau, Col. J. C. Custis, the adopted son of General
Washington, and Rev. P. Allison, the Presbyterian chaplain of
Washington’s army. They are competent authorities. President Roosevelt
and James G. Blaine, in public addresses, have acknowledged, in
substance, the accuracy of this testimony. Hutchinson, the last royal
governor of Massachusetts, declared that his colony would never have
voted for independence, had it not been for the rebellious Irish.
There were 15 Irish in the battle of Lexington and 258 at Bunker Hill.
The monument at Bunker Hill is covered with Irish names. Captain Parker,
who commanded at Lexington, and who was killed, was Irish. Colonels
Barrett, Smith and Davis, who commanded at Concord, were also Irish.
When the American forces took possession of Boston, John Sullivan was
officer of the day and the countersign was “St. Patrick.”
After the treason of Benedict Arnold, General Washington ordered that
none but the Irish be placed on guard at West Point.
When the soldiers of Lafayette were half naked and starving, the Irish
people of Baltimore, then a place of only one hundred homes, gave them
food and clothing. In 1780, when the finances of the struggling republic
were at the lowest ebb, when it took from $30 to $50 in paper to make $1
in specie, after our soldiers had suffered at Valley Forge and
elsewhere, the business men of Philadelphia raised 315,000 lbs. sterling
and gave it to Congress. Twenty-seven Irishmen of that city contributed
103,500 pounds of that amount. They were members of the Friendly Sons of
St. Patrick, which gave 399 officers of the highest rank to the city,
state and nation during its early history. Washington became an honorary
member of that patriotic organization.
When our country so badly needed assistance, Bishop Carroll accompanied
Benjamin Franklin to France to seek the aid of that country. It was
secured. History gives Franklin the credit, but does not mention the
name of Bishop Carroll, who really made the mission a successful one.
Bishop Carroll also accompanied Franklin to the French Canadian
provinces for a similar purpose.
There were twelve Irish delegates to the convention that adopted the
Constitution, and there were five Irishmen in the first United States
Senate of twenty-two members.
Dr. Hugh Knox educated Alexander Hamilton, who was a poor boy. Doctor
Knox was a big-hearted Irishman. It was Matthew P. Lyon, an Irishman,
who was sold as a slave in Connecticut when a mere boy, who, on the
thirty-sixth ballot, as a congressman from Vermont, later in life, cast
the deciding vote that elected Thomas Jefferson president of the United
States over Aaron Burr.
Many who came with the French to assist the Americans were sons of
Irishmen, who had been driven to France with Patrick Sarsfield after the
treachery of the British at Limerick in 1691.
From 1691 to 1791, over 400,000 different Irishmen served in the French
army. When the Revolutionary War broke out, they petitioned the French
War Department to come to America to fight their national foes. There
were entire Irish regiments in the French army when Cornwallis
surrendered at Yorktown. A young Irishman, Robert Wilson, was appointed
to take charge of the surrendered flags and the news of the great
victory was sent in haste to President Thomas McKean, of the Continental
Congress at Philadelphia. McKean was one of the foremost Irish Americans
of his time.
Molly Pitcher and Nancy Hart, two Irish women who participated in the
Revolutionary War, deserve rank with the greatest heroines in history.
The Irish were among the leading educators, journalists, theologians,
historians, scientists, canal constructors, and railway builders of the
decades subsequent to the Revolutionary War. They were leaders in laying
substantially the broad foundation for our material, educational and
moral greatness. They gave us such statesmen as James Monroe, Andrew
Jackson, John C. Calhoun, James K. Polk, and many others, who were among
the very ablest national leaders in the early history of our republic.
I shall not refer to the part the Irish took in the War of 1812, the
Mexican War, the great Civil conflict, or the Spanish-American struggle
for supremacy. All I ask is for you to reflect on their great fight for
liberty from 1775 to 1783—that struggle that has been felt around the
world—and to tell the facts to your children, to your friends, and to
your fellow citizens, for they will not, for some unknown reason, find
it in ordinary histories. I can do no better than to quote, in closing,
the words of Colonel John Parke Custis, the adopted son of General
Washington:
“Then honored be the old and good services of the sons of Erin in the
war of independence. Let the shamrock be entwined with the laurels of
the Revolution; and truth and justice, guiding the pen of history,
inscribe on the tablets of American remembrance: ‘Eternal gratitude to
Irishmen.’”
[Illustration:
HON. THOMAS HASSETT.
New York.
Elected a Life Member in 1908.
]
HON. ELI THAYER, ONE OF THE EARLY MEMBERS OF THE AMERICAN IRISH
HISTORICAL SOCIETY. A MOST DISTINGUISHED AMERICAN, KNOWN THE WORLD OVER.
A FEW FACTS ABOUT HIS LIFE AND WORK.
BY THE SECRETARY-GENERAL.
Hon. Eli Thayer was born in the town of Mendon, in the state of
Massachusetts, June 11, 1819, and deceased at Worcester, in that state,
April 15, 1899, aged eighty years.
He was elected a member of the American Irish Historical Society in
1897, shortly after its first meeting, and was an active and interested
member at the time of his death.
Mr. Thayer was a descendant in the seventh generation from Thomas Thayer
and seventh in descent from John Alden of _Mayflower_ fame, through
Ruth, daughter of Rev. Noah Alden of Bellingham, Mass., who married his
grandfather, Benjamin Thayer. John Alden was an Irishman and Thomas
Thayer was Irish on the side of one of his parents.
He was the eldest of eight children. He received his early education in
the district schools of Mendon, and at the Bellingham High School. Later
he attended the academy at Amherst and the manual training school at
Worcester, afterwards the Worcester Academy. He always ranked high in
his scholarship, and in 1835–’36 taught school in Douglass, and for the
four succeeding years assisted his father in a country store at
Millville. In May, 1840, he re-entered the manual labor school, in order
to fit for Brown University. Two years later he taught school at
Hopkinton, Rhode Island, and while there was elected a member of the Phi
Beta Kappa fraternity, an honor seldom conferred before the senior year.
In September, 1844, the superintendent of schools in Providence, Nathan
Bishop, induced him to take charge of the boys’ high school for the
remainder of the year for $600, a large salary for that period. This
school had proven for some time unmanageable in the hands of several
masters, but he reduced it to order and subjection. By accepting this
position, he lost a year at Brown University, but was able to graduate
in 1845, the second in his class. After his graduation, he immediately
came to Worcester and became a teacher at the Academy, and was later its
principal.
In 1845 he purchased of John Jaques four acres and ninety rods of land
in Worcester, on what was then called Goat Hill. In 1848 he began the
erection of the building called the Oread, which was completed in 1852.
It is built of the stone underlying the hill. At first only the north
tower was completed, and it was in this portion of the building that he
established the famous school for young women, which he conducted with
great success until he entered upon his later political work.
At the time that the school was opened, it was the only institute in the
country that promised a full college course for women. It was the
forerunner of Vassar, Smith and Wellesley. The name Oread means “the
abode of the mountain nymphs.” The south tower was completed in 1850,
and the connecting portion of the building a year or two later.
The towers are 40 feet in diameter and four stories high, while the
entire length of the building is 250 feet. It was constructed after
designs entirely Mr. Thayer’s own, without the aid of an architect, and
the beauty of the building and the charming location have been remarked
by strangers from all over the country.
He entered political life in 1852, when he was elected a member of the
school board. Later he was a member of the board of aldermen and served
during the years of 1853–’54 in the state legislature. It was during his
first year in the state House of Representatives that he became
conspicuous by the introduction of a bill to incorporate the Bank of
Mutual Redemption, which was hailed with delight by bankers and monied
men throughout the state, as it seemed to afford a means of release from
the autocratic rule of the Suffolk Bank of Boston.
This bill was passed in the course of years and the Bank of Mutual
Redemption loaned the money to the government when Andrew was governor
during the Civil War.
It was not, however, until 1854 that Mr. Thayer accomplished the great
act of his life, the one which enrolls his name among the benefactors of
mankind, in originating the plan which saved Kansas and other
territories to the Union and perhaps settled the destiny of the nation,
for if the southern leaders had secured the territories, it would have
given them the balance of power for many years to come and there would
have been no rebellion. The North would have acquiesced, as it always
had, in the decision of the congressional majority. In his original idea
of making Kansas free, he actually settled the destinies of the country.
It was at a meeting to protest against the repeal of the Missouri
compromise, held in the old city hall on the evening of March 11, 1854,
that Mr. Thayer announced his celebrated “plan of freedom.” In effect it
was simply to take possession by lawful means of the new territories
through organized immigration of free-state men sustained by a base of
supplies.
Mr. Thayer defined this plan as “business anti-slavery,” distinguished
from sentimental and political anti-slavery, both of which had been
tried for many years and found to be faulty, slavery in the meantime
constantly growing stronger. He clearly saw that whichever side gained
the majority of the settlers would control the situations of the new
section, in spite of all efforts to establish others among them, and to
the purpose of securing this majority for freedom he devoted all his
energies and all of his means until that end was accomplished.
As the first means toward fortifying himself for this undertaking he
immediately secured the passage of an act to incorporate the
Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company and before the vote to repeal the
Missouri compromise was taken, hired a hall in Boston and began to speak
afternoon and evening in behalf of his undertaking.
The intense excitement and strong opposition which followed the first
announcement of the purpose to repeal the compromise in a great measure
subsided after that act was accomplished, and he found extreme
difficulty in the succeeding months in persuading a sufficient number of
men to join in his enterprise to form the first colony.
The Know-Nothing frenzy absorbed the public mind so fully that other
considerations were almost entirely excluded, and the Free Soil vote of
1854 dwindled to a few thousands, the Republican candidate for governor
himself deserting his party and voting with the native Americans. The
Know-Nothing organization had controlled the state for three years, and
the frenzy had seized the public mind to such an extent that no man who
aspired to public office had a chance of election unless he was
affiliated with that party.
Every member of Congress belonged to it, and it has been commonly said
that Henry Wilson and other prominent office-holders of that time were
elected upon that platform. The national Know-Nothing party did not
agitate the slavery question, but maintained that Congress ought not to
legislate on the question of slavery, which was regulated by the
statutes of the various states.
In 1856 the Republicans of the Massachusetts congressional district in
which Worcester is situated came to the front, but, feeling that they
stood no show of winning at the pending elections, made alliances with
the Know-Nothing party, whereby the offices were to be divided, and Col.
Alexander Dewitt made an agreement with Henry Chapin that he would not
run against him. At the last moment, however, Governor Gardiner sent
word that he must make the run against Chapin. It was at this crisis
that Charles White, a party manager, nominated Eli Thayer for Congress,
and took a carriage and went to the Oread to notify him of his
nomination.
Mr. Thayer was warmly greeted in the convention and, although it was but
five days before the election, he announced his determination to stump
the district and called for means of transportation to the various towns
and villages. During the five days he made on an average four speeches a
day. At the close of the campaign Dr. Joseph Sargent said to Mr. Thayer
that no man could do what he had done and live, but he replied that he
was prepared to undertake the same ordeal again in the same cause.
During this campaign he would speak at Clinton in the morning, at
Leominster at noon, at Ashburnham in the afternoon and at Fitchburg in
the evening, and it was in this way that he covered the entire Worcester
district in the short space of five days. The result of this bitter
contest was most gratifying to Mr. Thayer, who won by a vote of nearly
two to one. The election was in November, 1856, but Mr. Thayer did not
take his seat until the December of the following year.
At this time a new matter was interesting the southern members—the
retention of the state of Kansas in the Democratic column. The notable
southern propagandists, of which Quitman of Mississippi was the
representative, had, in order to amend the neutrality laws, put on foot
a scheme for the unification of Mexico, Cuba and Central America and the
formation of an immense slave empire. This was regarded by the northern
representatives with a great deal of apprehension, but much to the
surprise of everyone Mr. Thayer came out in favor of it.
[Illustration:
MR. WILLIAM J. FARRELL.
Of New York.
A New Life Member of the Society.
]
He said to the southern leaders that he intended to colonize this new
empire with New England Yankees. His speeches on Central American
colonization, on the “Suicide of Slavery,” and on the “Admission of
Oregon” brought him great fame. Against the caucus decision of his own
party he secured the admission of Oregon into the Union, and in this
act, though in opposition to partisan dictation, he was sustained by
leading Republican organs throughout the country, although he received
some censure in his own district.
Soon after these speeches his political enemies in the district began to
organize against him, but his popularity was not to be overcome and he
was returned with a flattering endorsement. During his second term in
Congress he was instrumental in the admission of Oregon as a state to
statehood. The Republicans were of the opinion that the admission of
Oregon into the Union would mean heavier Democratic representation. Mr.
Thayer, however, argued that the best way to make Oregon a Republican
state would be to admit it into the Union. Succeeding events proved that
his view of the matter was correct, but at the time the Republicans in
the House opposed the admission.