At least six American Presidents had more or less of the Celtic strain. President Jackson, whose parents came from Co. Down, more than once expressed his pride in his Irish ancestry. Arthur"s parents were from Antrim, Buchanan"s from Donegal, and McKinley"s grandparents came from the same vicinity. Theodore Roosevelt boasts among his ancestors two direct lines from Ireland, and the first American ancestor of President Polk was a Pollock from Donegal. The present occupant of the White House, Woodrow Wilson, is also of Irish descent. Among the distinguished Vice-Presidents of the United States were George Clinton and John C. Calhoun, sons of immigrants from Longford and Donegal respectively, and Calhoun"s successor as chairman of the committee on foreign relations was John Smilie, a native of Newtownards, Co. Down.
Among American governors since 1800, we find such names as Barry, Brady, Butler, Carroll, Clinton, Conway, Carney, Connolly, Curtin, Collins, Donaghey, Downey, Early, Fitzpatrick, Flannegan, Geary, Gorman, Hannegan, Kavanagh, Kearney, Logan, Lynch, Murphy, Moore, McKinley, McGill, Meagher, McGrath, Mahone, McCormick, O"Neal, O"Ferrall, Orr, Roane, Filey, Sullivan, Sharkey, Smith, Talbot, and Welsh, all of Irish descent. Today we have as governors of States, Glynn in New York, Dunne in Illinois, Walsh in Ma.s.sachusetts, O"Neal in Alabama, Burke in North Carolina, Carey in Wyoming, McGovern in Wisconsin, McCreary in Kentucky, and Tener in Pennsylvania, and not alone is the governor of the last-mentioned State a native of Ireland, but so also are its junior United States Senator, the secretary of the Commonwealth, and its adjutant-general.
In the political life of America, many of the sons of Ireland have risen to eminence, and in the legislative halls at the National Capital, the names of Kelly, Fitzpatrick, Broderick, Ca.s.serly, Farley, Logan, Harlan, Hannegan, Adair, Barry, Rowan, Gorman, Kennedy, Lyon, Fitzgerald, Fair, Sewall, Kernan, Butler, Moore, Regan, Mahone, Walsh, and Flannegan, are still spoken of with respect among the lawmakers of the nation. William Darrah Kelly served in Congress for fifty years, and it remained for James Shields to hold the unique distinction of representing three different States, at different times, in the Senate of the United States. Senator Shields was a native of Co. Tyrone.
In the judiciary have been many shining lights of Irish origin. The Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court is Edward D. White, grandson of a "98 rebel, and one of his ablest a.s.sociates is Joseph McKenna. No more erudite or profound lawyer than Charles O"Conor has adorned his profession and it can be said with truth that his career has remained unrivalled in American history. James T. Brady, Daniel Dougherty, Thomas Addis Emmet, and Charles O"Neill were among the most eminent lawyers America has known, while the names of Dennis...o...b..ien, Chief Justice of the New York Court of Appeals, John D.
O"Neill, who occupied a like elevated place on the bench of South Carolina, John D. Phelan of the Alabama Supreme Court, Richard O"Gorman, Charles P. Daly, Hugh Rutledge, Morgan J. O"Brien, and others of like origin, are household words in the legal annals of America. There is no State in the Union where an Irish-American lawyer has not distinguished himself.
The history of medicine in the United States is adorned with the names of many physicians of Irish birth or blood. Several Irish surgeons rendered valuable services in the army of the Revolution, among whom are found Drs. McDonough, McHenry, McCloskey, McCalla, Burke, Irvine, and Williamson. Dr. John Cochran was appointed by Washington surgeon-general of the army. Dr. James Lynah of Charleston, a native of Ireland, became surgeon-general of South Carolina in recognition of his valuable services to the patriot army.
Dr. John McKinley, a native of Ireland, who was a famous physician in his day, became the first governor of Delaware. Dr. Ephraim McDowell is known in the profession as the "Father of Ovariotomy", as is Dr.
William J. McNevin the "Father of American Chemistry". Dr. John Byrne of New York had a world-wide fame, and his papers on gynecology have been p.r.o.nounced by the medical press as "the best printed in any language". One of the most conspicuous figures in medicine in the United States was Dr. Jerome Cochran of Alabama. Drs. Junius F. Lynch of Florida; Charles McCreery of Kentucky; Hugh McGuire and Hunter McGuire of Virginia; Matthew C. McGannon of Tennessee; and James Lynch, Charles J. O"Hagan, and James McBride of South Carolina are mentioned prominently in the histories of their respective localities as the foremost medical men of their times, while in Wisconsin the pioneer physician was Dr. William H. Fox, and in Oregon, Dr. John McLoughlin. Among New York physicians who achieved high reputations in their profession were Drs. Thomas Addis Emmet, Frank A. McGuire, Daniel E. O"Neill, Charles McBurney, Isaac H. Reiley, Alfred L.
Carroll, Howard A. Kelly, Joseph O"Dwyer, and James J. Walsh. These and many others of Irish descent have been honored by medical societies as leaders and specialists, while it can be said that no surgeon of the present day has achieved such a world-wide reputation as Dr. John B. Murphy of Chicago. Among experts in medico-legal science, the names of Drs. Benjamin W. McCreedy and William J.
O"Sullivan of New York stand out prominently, and among the most noted contributors to medical journals in the United States, and recognized as men of great professional skill and authorities in their respective specialties, have been Drs. F.D. Mooney of St.
Louis; Thomas Fitzgibbon of Milwaukee; John D. Hanrahan of Rutland; James McCann and James H. McClelland of Pittsburgh; John A. Murphy and John McCurdy of Cincinnati; John Keating of Philadelphia; John H.
Murphy of St. Paul; John W.C. O"Neal of Gettysburg; and Arthur O"Neill of Meadville, Pa. Indeed, it can be said that American medical science owes an incalculable debt to Irish genius.
Theodore Vail, the presiding genius of the greatest telephone system in the world, is Irish, and so is Carty, its chief engineer. Morse, the inventor of the telegraph, was the grandson of an Irishman; Henry O"Reilly built the first telegraph line in the United States; and John W. Mackey was the president of the Commercial Cable Company.
John P. Holland, the inventor of the submarine torpedo boat, was a native of Co. Clare; and McCormick, the inventor of the reaping and mowing machine, was an Irishman"s grandson.
Sons of Irishmen have stood in the front rank of American statesmen and diplomats who represented their country abroad. To mention but a few: Richard O"Brien, appointed by Jefferson American representative at Algiers; James Kavanagh, Minister to Portugal; and Louis McLane, Minister to England in 1829 and afterwards Secretary of State in 1832. In recent years, an O"Brien has represented American interests in Italy and j.a.pan; a Kerens in Austria; an Egan in Chili and another of the same name in Denmark; an O"Shaughnessy in Mexico; a Sullivan in Santo Domingo; and an O"Rear in Bolivia.
Among historians were John Gilmary Shea, author of numerous historical works; Dr. Robert Walsh, a learned historian and journalist of the last century, whose literary labors were extensive; McMahon and McSherry, historians of Maryland; Burk, of Virginia; O"Callaghan, Hastings, and Murphy of New York; Ramsay of South Carolina; and Williamson of North Carolina, all native Irishmen or sons of Irish immigrants.
In the field of American journalism have been many able and forcible writers of Irish birth or descent. Hugh Gaine, a Belfast man, founded the New York _Mercury_ in 1775. John Dunlap founded the first daily paper in Philadelphia, John Daly Burk published the first daily paper in Boston, and William Duane edited the _Aurora_ of Philadelphia in 1795. All these were born in Ireland. William Coleman, founder of the New York _Evening Post_ in 1801, was the son of an Irish rebel of 1798; Thomas Fitzgerald founded the Philadelphia _Item_; Thomas Gill, the New York _Evening Star_; Patrick Walsh, the Augusta _Chronicle_; Joseph Medill, the Chicago _Tribune_. Henry W. Grady edited the Atlanta _Const.i.tution_; Michael Dee edited the Detroit _Evening News_ for nearly fifty years; Richard Smith, the Cincinnati _Gazette_; Edward L. G.o.dkin, the New York _Evening Post_; William Laffan, the New York _Sun_; and Horace Greeley, the New York _Tribune_. All of these were either natives of Ireland or sprung from immigrant Irishmen, as were Oliver of the Pittsburgh _Gazette_, O"Neill of the Pittsburgh _Despatch_, John Keating of Memphis, William D. O"Connor, and many other shining lights of American journalism during the last century. Fitz James...o...b..ien was "a bright, particular star" in the journalistic firmament; John MacGahan achieved fame as a war correspondent; Patrick Barry of Rochester, an extensive writer on horticultural and kindred subjects, was the recognized leader of his craft in the United States; and William Darby, son of Patrick and Mary Darby, and Michael Twomey were the ablest American geographers and writers on abstruse scientific subjects.
In the field of poetry, we have had Theodore O"Hara, the author of that immortal poem, "The Bivouac of the Dead"; John Boyle O"Reilly; Thomas Dunn English, author of "Ben Bolt"; Father Abram Ryan, "the poet priest of the South"; James Whitcomb Riley; Eleanor Donnelly; M.F. Egan; T.A. Daly; and Joseph I.C. Clarke, president of the American Irish Historical Society.
To recount the successful men of affairs of Irish origin it would be necessary to mention every branch of business and every profession.
Recalling but a few, Daniel O"Day, Patrick Farrelly, John and William O"Brien, Alexander T. Stewart, John Castree, Joseph J. O"Donohue, William R. Grace, John McConville, Hugh O"Neill, Alexander E. Orr, William Constable, Daniel McCormick, and Dominick Lynch, all of New York, were dominant figures in the world of business. Thomas Mellon of Pittsburgh; John R. Walsh and the Cudahy brothers of Chicago; James Phelan, Peter Donahue, Joseph A. Donohoe, and John Sullivan of San Francisco; William A. Clark and Marcus Daly of Montana; George Meade, the Meases and the Nesbits, Thomas FitzSimmons and Thomas Dolan of Philadelphia; Columbus O"Donnell and Luke Tiernan of Baltimore, all these have been leading merchants in their day. Few American financiers occupy a more conspicuous place than Thomas F.
Ryan, and no great industrial leader has reached the pinnacle of success upon which stands the commanding figure of James J. Hill, both sons of Irishmen. The names of Anthony N. Brady, Eugene Kelly, James S. Stranahan, and James A. Farrell, president of the United States Steel Corporation, are household words in business and financial circles.
John Keating, the first paper manufacturer in New York (1775); Thomas Faye, the first to manufacture wall-paper by machinery, who won for this distinction the first gold medal of the American Inst.i.tute; John and Edward McLoughlin of New York, for many years the leading publishers of ill.u.s.trated books; and John Banigan of Providence, one of the largest manufacturers of rubber goods in America, were natives of Ireland. John O"Fallon and Bryan Mullanphy of St. Louis, and John McDonough of Baltimore, who ama.s.sed great wealth as merchants, were large contributors to charitable and educational inst.i.tutions; William W. Corcoran, whose name is enshrined in the famous Art Gallery at Washington, contributed during his lifetime over five million dollars to various philanthropic inst.i.tutions; and one of the most noted philanthropists in American history, and the first woman in America to whom a public monument was erected, was an Irishwoman, Margaret Haughery of New Orleans.
Irishmen have shown a remarkable apt.i.tude for the handling of large contracts, and in this field have been prominent John H. O"Rourke, James D. Leary, James Coleman, Oliver Byrne, and John D. Crimmins in New York; John B. McDonald, the builder of New York"s subways; George Law, projector and promoter of public works, steamship and railroad builder; and John Roach, the famous ship-builder of Chester, Pa. John Sullivan, a noted American engineer one hundred years ago, completed the Middles.e.x Ca.n.a.l; and John McL. Murphy, whose ability as a constructing engineer was universally recognized, rendered valuable service to the United States during the Civil War. Among pioneer ship-builders in America are noted Patrick Tracy fron Wexford and Simon Forrester from Cork, who were both at Salem, Ma.s.s., during the period of the Revolution and rendered most valuable service to the patriot cause; and the O"Briens, Kavanaghs, and Sewalls in Maine.
But it is not in the material things of life alone that the Irish have been in the van. Thousands of Americans have been charmed by the operas of Victor Herbert, a grandson of Samuel Lover, and with lovers of music the strains of Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore"s band still linger as a pleasant memory. Edward A. MacDowell, America"s most famous composer, was of Irish descent. The colossal statute of "America" on the dome of the National Capitol was executed by Thomas Crawford, who was born in New York of Irish parents in 1814; Henry Inman, one of the very best of portrait painters, was also born in New York of Irish parents; John Singleton Copley, the distinguished artist, came to Boston from Co. Clare in 1736; Thompson, the sculptor, was born in Queen"s Co.; another noted sculptor was William D. O"Donovan of Virginia; and Augustus Saint Gaudens, one of the greatest sculptors of modern times, was born in Dublin. Other sculptors of Irish race have been elsewhere mentioned. Among America"s most talented artists and portrait painters may be mentioned George P. Healy, William J.
Hennessy, Thomas Moran, Henry Pelham, Henry Murray, John Neagle, and William Magrath, all of Irish birth or descent.
Ireland has given many eminent churchmen to the United States. The three American Cardinals, Gibbons, Farley, and O"Connell, stand out prominently, as do Archbishops Carroll, Hughes, McCloskey, Kenrick, Ryan, Ireland, Glennon, Corrigan, and Keane, all of whom have shed l.u.s.tre on the Church. History has given to an Irishman, Francis Makemie of Donegal, the credit of founding Presbyterianism in America, while among noted Presbyterian divines of Irish birth were James Waddell, known as "the blind preacher of the wilderness,"
Thomas Smyth, John Hall, Francis Allison, William Tennant, and James McGrady, all men of great ability and influence in their day. Samuel Finley, President of Princeton College in 1761, was a native of Armagh, and John Blair Smith, famous as a preacher throughout the Shenandoah Valley and the first president of Union College (1795), was of Irish descent. Among the pioneer preachers of the western wilderness were McMahon, Dougherty, Quinn, Burke, O"Cool, Delaney, McGee, and many others of Irish origin.
Irishmen and their sons have founded American towns and cities, and the capital of the State of Colorado takes its name from General James Denver, son of Patrick Denver, an emigrant from county Down in the year 1795. Sixty-five places in the United States are named after people bearing the Irish prefix "O" and upwards of 1000 after the "Macs", and there are 253 counties of the United States and approximately 7000 places called by Irish family or place names.
There are 24 Dublins, 21 Waterfords, 18 Belfasts, 16 Tyrones, 10 Limericks, 9 Antrims, 8 Sligos, 7 Derrys, 6 Corks, 5 Kildares, and so on.
Immigrant Irishmen have also been the founders of prominent American families. One of the most ancient of Irish patronymics, McCarthy, is found in the records of Virginia as early as 1635 and in Ma.s.sachusetts in 1675, and all down through the successive generations descendants of this sept were among the leading families of the communities where they located. In Virginia, the McCormick, Meade, Lewis, Preston, and Lynch families; in the Carolinas, the Canteys, Nealls, Bryans, and Butlers; and in Maryland, the Carrolls and Dulanys are all descended from successful Irish colonizers.
Even from this very incomplete summary, we can see that Irish blood, brain, and brawn have been a valuable acquisition to the building of the fabric of American inst.i.tutions, and that the sons of Ireland merit more prominent recognition than has been accorded them in the pages of American history. The pharisees of history may have withheld from Ireland the credit that is her due, but, thanks to the never-failing guidance of the records, we are able to show that at all times, whether they came as voluntary exiles or were driven from their homes by the persecutions of government, her sons have had an honorable part in every upward movement in American life. Testimony adduced from the sources from which this imperfect sketch is drawn cannot be called into question, and its perusal by those who so amusingly glorify the "Anglo-Saxon" as the founder of the American race and American inst.i.tutions would have a chastening influence on their ignorance of early American history, and would reopen the long vista of the years, at the very beginning of which they would see Celt and Teuton, Saxon and Gaul, working side by side solidifying the fulcrum of the structure on which this great nation rests.
REFERENCES:
The archives, registers, records, reports, and other official doc.u.ments mentioned in the text; the various Town, County, and State Histories; the collections and publications of the following societies: Ma.s.sachusetts Historical Society, Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania, New York Historical Society (34 vols.), New York Genealogical and Biographical Society (44 vols.), Maine Historical Society, Rhode Island Historical Society, Connecticut Historical Society, South Carolina Historical Society, and American Historical Society; New England Historical and Genealogical Register (67 vols., Boston, 1847-1913); New England Historical and Biographical Record; Hakluyt: Voyages, Navigations, Traffiques, and Discoveries of the English Nation (London, 1607); Dobbs: The Trade and Improvement of Ireland (Dublin, 1729); Hutchinson: History of Ma.s.sachusetts from the First Settlement in 1628 until 1750 (Salem, 1795); Proud: History of Pennsylvania, 1681-1770 (Philadelphia, 1797-1798); Savage: Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England (Boston, 1860-1862); Morris (ed.): The Makers of New York (Philadelphia, 1895); Pope: The Pioneers of Ma.s.sachusetts (Boston, 1900), The Pioneers of Maine and New Hampshire (Boston, 1908); Richardson: Side-lights on Maryland History (Baltimore, 1913); Spencer: History of the United States; Ramsay: History of the United States; Prendergast: Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland.
THE IRISH IN CANADA
By JAMES J. WALSH, M.D., Ph.D., Litt.D., Sc.D.
When Wolfe captured Quebec and Canada came under British rule, some of the best known of his officers and several of his men were Irish.
After the Peace was signed many of them settled in Canada, not a few of them marrying French wives, and as a consequence there are numerous Irish, Scotch, and English names among the French speaking inhabitants of Lower Canada. Two of Wolfe"s officers, Colonel Guy Carleton, born at Strabane in the county Tyrone, and General Richard Montgomery, born only seven miles away at Convoy, in the same county, were destined to play an important role in the future history of Canada. Montgomery was in command of the Revolutionary Army from the Colonies, when it attempted to take Quebec, and Carleton, who had been a trusted friend of General Wolfe, was in command of the Canadian forces. The two men were the lives of their respective commands, and with the death of Montgomery Carleton"s victory was a.s.sured. Carleton was made Governor-in-Chief of Canada, and during the trying years of the early British rule of New France and the American Revolution, his tact did more than anything else to save Canada for the British. Bibaud, the French historian, says, "the man to whom the administration of the government was entrusted had known how to make the Canadians love him, and this contributed not a little to retain at least within the bounds of neutrality those among them who might have been able, or who believed themselves able, to ameliorate their lot by making common cause with the insurgent colonies." Shortly after being made governor, Carleton went to England and secured the pa.s.sage of the Quebec Act through the English parliament, which gave the Canadian French a.s.surance that they were to be ruled without oppression by the British Government.
Subsequently, in 1786, Carleton, as Lord Dorchester, became the first governor-general of Canada, being given jurisdiction over Nova Scotia and New Brunswick as well as Upper and Lower Canada, and to him more than to any other is due the early loyalty to the British crown in the Dominion.
After the army the next important source of Irish population in Canada were the loyalists who after the Revolution removed from the United States to the British Dominions in America. There were probably many thousands of them, more than enough to make up for the French who left Canada for France when the territory pa.s.sed over to England. Among the Irish loyalists who went to Canada was the Rev.
John Stuart, who had become very well known as a missionary in the Mohawk Valley before the Revolution, and who, though born a Presbyterian, was destined to win the t.i.tle of the "Father of the Church of England in Upper Canada." When the first Canadian parliament met in December 1792, Edward O"Hara was returned for Gaspe, in Lower Canada, and D"Arcy McGee could boast that henceforward Lower Canada was never without an Irish representative in its legislative councils.
When the question of settling Upper Canada with British colonists came up, Colonel Talbot, a county Dublin man, was the most important factor. He obtained a large grant of land near what is now London and attracted settlers into what was at that time a wilderness. The tract settled under his superintendence now comprises twenty-nine townships in the most prosperous part of Canada.
The maritime Provinces had been under British rule before the fall of Quebec and contained a large element of Irish population. In Newfoundland in 1753 out of a total population of some thirteen thousand, Davin says that there were nearly five thousand Catholics, chiefly Irish. In 1784 a great new stimulus to Irish immigration to Newfoundland was given by Father O"Connell, who in 1796 was made Catholic bishop of the island. Newfoundland, for its verdure, the absence of reptiles, and its Irish inhabitants, was called at this time "Transatlantic Ireland", and Bonnycastle says that more than one half of the population was Irish.
In 1749 Governor Cornwallis brought some 4,000 disbanded soldiers to Nova Scotia and founded Halifax. Ten years later it was described as divided into Halifax proper, Irishtown or the southern, and Dutchtown or the northern, suburbs. The inhabitants numbered 3,000, one-third of whom were Irish. They were among the most prominent men of the city and province. In the Privy Council for 1789 were Thomas Corcoran and Charles Morris. Morris was president of the Irish Society and Matthew Cahill the sheriff of Halifax in that year. A large number of Irish from the north of Ireland settled in Nova Scotia in 1763, calling their settlement Londonderry. They provided a fortunate refuge for the large numbers of Irish Presbyterians who were expelled from New England by the intolerant Puritans the following year. They also welcomed many loyalists who came from New York and the New England States after the acknowledgment of the independence of the American Colonies by Great Britain. Between the more eastern settlers around Halifax and those in the interior, the greater part of the population of Nova Scotia was probably Irish in origin.
It was in the Maritime Provinces that the first step in political emanc.i.p.ation for Catholics under British rule was made. In 1821 Lawrence Cavanaugh, a Roman Catholic, was returned to the a.s.sembly of the Province for Cape Breton. He would not subscribe to the declaration on Transubstantiation in the oath of office tendered him, and as a consequence was refused admittance to the a.s.sembly. But he was elected again and again, and six years afterwards Judge Haliburton, better known by his _nom de plume_ of "Sam Slick", in an able speech, seconded the motion to dispense with the declaration, and Cavanaugh was permitted to take the oath without the declaration.
The War of 1812 brought over from Ireland a number of Irish soldiers serving in the British army, many of whom after the war settled down and became inhabitants of the country. They were allotted farm lands and added much to Canada"s prosperity. A type of their descendants was Sir William Hingston, whose father was at this time a lieutenant adjutant in the Royal 100th Regiment, "the Dublins." Sir William"s father died when his son was a mere boy, but the lad supported his mother, worked his way through the medical school, saved enough money to give himself two years in Europe, and became a great surgeon. He was elected three times mayor of Montreal, serving one term with great prestige under the most trying circ.u.mstances. He afterwards became a senator of the Dominion and was knighted by Queen Victoria.
Prince Edward Island was settled mainly by the Scotch and French, and yet many Irish names are to be found among its old families. It was ceded to Great Britain in 1763, and the first Governor appointed was Captain Walter Patterson, whose niece, Elizabeth Patterson, was married to Jerome Bonaparte in Baltimore in 1803. Captain Patterson was so ardent an Irishman that through his influence he had an act pa.s.sed by the a.s.sembly changing the name of the island to New Ireland, but the home Government refused to countenance the change.
At this time the island was known as St. John"s, and the name Prince Edward was given to it in honor of the Duke of Kent in 1789. One of the most popular governors of the island was Sir Dominick Daly, knighted while in office. He was a member of a well known Galway family, and first came to America as secretary to one of the governors. He afterwards became provincial secretary for Lower Canada.
Canada suffered from the aftermath of the revolutions which took place in Europe during the early part of the nineteenth century. The year 1837 saw two revolutions, one in Upper, the other in Lower, Canada, though neither of them amounted to more than a flash in the pan. As might be expected, there were not a few Irish among the disaffected spirits who fostered these revolutions. Their experience at home led them to know how little oppressed people were likely to obtain from the British Government except by a demonstration of force. There were serious abuses, especially "the Family Compact", the lack of anything approaching const.i.tutional guarantees in government, and political disabilities on the score of religion.
However, most of the Irish in Canada were ranged on the side of the government. Sir Richard Bonnycastle, writing in 1846, said "The Catholic Irish who have been long settled in the country are by no means the worst subjects in this transatlantic realm, as I can personally testify, having had the command of large bodies of them during the border troubles of 1837-8. They are all loyal and true."
Above all Bonnycastle pledged himself for the loyalty of the Irish Catholic priesthood.
One of the Irishmen who came into prominence in the rebellions of 1837 was Edmund Bailey O"Callaghan, the editor of the _Vindicator_, the newspaper by means of which Papineau succeeded in arousing much feeling among the people of Lower Canada and fomented the Revdlution.
O"Callaghan escaped to the United States and settled at Albany, where he became the historian of New York State. To him, more than to any other, we owe the preservation of the historical materials out of which the early history of the State can be constructed. Rare volumes of the Jesuit Relations, to the value of which for historical purposes he had called special attention, were secured from his library for the Canadian library at Ottawa.
Towards the middle of the nineteenth century, when the population of Ireland reached its highest point of over 8,000,000, the pressure on the people caused them to emigrate in large numbers, and then the famine came to drive out great crowds of those who survived. In proportion to its population Canada received a great many more of these Irish emigrants than did the United States. Unfortunately the conditions on board the emigrant sailing vessels in those days cost many lives. They were often becalmed and took months to cross the ocean. My grandmother coming in the thirties was ninety-three days in crossing, landing at Quebec after seven weeks on half rations, part of the time living on nothing but oatmeal and water. Ship fever, the dreaded typhus, broke out on her vessel as on so many others, and more than half the pa.s.sengers perished. Many, many thousands of the Irish emigrants thus died on ship-board or shortly after landing. In 1912, the Ancient Order of Hibernians erected near Quebec a monument to the victims. In spite of the untoward conditions, emigration continued unabated, and in 1875, in the population of Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, it was calculated that the Irish numbered 846,414 as compared with 706,369 English and 549,946 Scotch (Hatton, quoted by Davin in _The Irishman In Canada_).
It had become clear that Canada would prosper more if united than in separate provinces jealous of each other. The first move in this direction came from the Maritime Provinces, where the Irish element was so much stronger than elsewhere, and when a conference of the leading statesmen of these Provinces was appointed to be held at Charlottetown, P.E.I., September 1864, representatives of Upper and Lower Canada asked to be allowed to be present to bring forward a plan for a Federation of all the British Provinces in North America.
The British North America Act was pa.s.sed, and received the royal a.s.sent, the queen appointing July 1, 1867 as the formal beginning of the Dominion of Canada.
Among the men who were most prominent in bringing about federation and who came to be known as the Fathers of Confederation were several distinguished Irishmen. Thomas D"Arcy McGee was the best known and probably did more than any other Canadian to make the idea of confederation popular by his writings and speeches. He had come to Canada as a stranger, edited a newspaper in Montreal, and was elected to the a.s.sembly after a brief residence, in spite of the opposition cries of "Irish adventurer" and "stranger from abroad," was subsequently elected four times by acclamation, and was Minister of Agriculture and Education and Canadian Commissioner to the Paris Exposition of 1867. His letters to the Earl of Mayo, pleading for the betterment of conditions in Ireland, were quoted by Gladstone during the Home Rule movement as "a prophetic voice from the dead coming from beyond the Atlantic."
Another of the Fathers of Confederation was the Honorable Edward Whalen, born in the county Mayo, who as a young man went to Prince Edward Island, where he gained great influence as a popular journalist. He was an orator as well as an editor, and came to have the confidence of the people of the island, and hence was able to do very much for federation. A third of the Fathers of Confederation from the Maritime Provinces was the Honorable, afterwards Sir, Edward Kenny, who, when the first Cabinet of the New Dominion was formed, was offered and accepted one of the portfolios in recognition of the influence which he had wielded for Canadian union.
At all times in the history of Canada the Catholic hierarchy has been looked up to as thoroughly conservative factors for the progress and development of the country. After the Irish immigration most of the higher ecclesiastics were Irish by birth or descent, and they all exerted a deep influence not only on their own people but on their city and province. One of the Fathers of Confederation was Archbishop Connolly, of Halifax, of whom the most distinguished Presbyterian clergyman of the Lower Provinces said the day after his death: "I feel that I have not only lost a friend, but as if Canada had lost a patriot; in all his big-hearted Irish fashion he was ever at heart, in mind, and deed, a true Canadian." Among his colleagues of the hierarchy were such men as his predecessor Archbishop Walsh, Archbishop Lynch, the first Metropolitan of Upper Canada when Toronto was erected into an archbishopric, Bishop Hogan of Kingston, Archbishop Hannan of Halifax, Archbishop Walsh of Toronto, and Archbishop O"Brien of Halifax, all of whom were esteemed as faithful Canadians working for the benefit of their own people more especially, but always with the larger view of good for the whole commonwealth of Canada.