FAMOUS IRISH SOCIETIES

By JOHN O'DEA,

_National Historian, A.O.H._.

In the social organization of no nation of antiquity were societies of greater influence than in pagan Ireland. During many centuries these societies, composed of the bards, ollamhs, brehons, druids, and knights, contended for precedence. In no country did the literary societies display greater vigor and exercise a more beneficent power than in pagan Ireland. Although the Hebrews and other Asiatic nations had societies organized from among the professions, yet in Ireland alone these societies seem to have been constructed with a patriotic purpose, and in Ireland alone they seem to have had ceremonies of initiation, with const.i.tutions and laws. These societies existed from the earliest times until after the coming of St. Patrick. Traces of them are visible during all the centuries from the conversion of Ireland down to the Anglo-Norman epoch, and it is apparent that the clan system and the introduction of the feudal system by the English failed to eliminate completely their influence.

When the Irish emigration flowed towards the American colonies in the eighteenth century, the social instinct early found expression in societies. One of the earliest of these was founded in Boston, where, in 1737, twenty-six "gentlemen merchants and others, natives of Ireland or of Irish extraction", organized the Charitable Irish Society. In Pennsylvania, where the Irish emigration had been larger than in any other colony, the Hibernian Fire Company was organized in 1751. The Friendly Sons of St. Patrick was founded in Philadelphia in 1771, and about that time societies bearing this name were founded in Boston and New York, as convivial clubs welcoming Irish emigrants to their festive boards. These societies were formed upon the model of the Friendly Brothers of St. Patrick, which had existed in Dublin and other Irish cities a generation before, and was well and favorably known throughout Ireland.

The Society of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick in Philadelphia contained some of the most prominent merchants and leading citizens of the city, and in 1780 they subscribed 103,000, or one-third of the sum collected, to supply the Continental army with food. Among its members were Commodore Barry, the Father of the American Navy; General Stephen Moylan; General Anthony Wayne; and the great merchants, Blair McClenachan, Thomas Fitzsimons, and Robert Morris.

Washington, who was an honorary member, described it "as a society distinguished for the firm adherence of its members to the glorious cause in which we are embarked." Whether upon the field or upon the sea, in council or in the sacrifice of their wealth, their names are foremost in the crisis of the Revolution.

The Hibernian Society for the Relief of Emigrants from Ireland was founded in Philadelphia on March 3, 1790. Other Hibernian Societies, with the same t.i.tle and organized for the same purpose, were founded in other cities along the Atlantic coast in the early years of the nineteenth century, but the Philadelphia Hibernian Society was, from the character of its members, the extent of its beneficence, and the length of its existence, the most famous. The emigrants from Ireland during the eighteenth century had pushed on to the frontier, or, in some instances, remained in the cities and engaged successfully in mercantile pursuits. The emigration which came after the Revolution was, however, in great part composed of families almost without means. Unable to subsist while clearing farms in the virgin forest, thousands were congested in the cities. The Hibernian Society extended a ready and strong hand to these helpless people, and not only aided the emigrants with gifts of money, but also secured for them employment, disseminated among them useful information, and provided them with medical attendance. While the Hibernian Society was regarded as the successor of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, yet the two societies, which contained largely a membership roll bearing the same names, flourished, in the work of patriotism, side by side. The first officers of the Hibernian Society for the Relief of Emigrants from Ireland were: President, Chief Justice Thomas McKean; Vice-President, General Walter Stewart; Secretary, Matthew Carey, the historian; Treasurer, John Taylor. It was said that no other society in America contained so many men distinguished in civil, military, and official life as the Hibernian Society. In almost every city where the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick and the Hibernian Society for the Relief of Emigrants were found, there was a close and intimate connection between them, which ultimately resulted in amalgamation.

The Ancient Order of Hibernians traces its origin to those orders which flourished in pagan Ireland, and which exercised so potent an influence upon the history of the Celtic race. The order of knighthood was the first of these orders to be founded. It existed from the earliest times, and is visible in the annals of the nation, until the Anglo-Normans invaded the land in the twelfth century. In pagan Ireland the knightly orders became provincial standing armies, and there are many glorious pages describing the feats of the Clanna Deagha of Munster, the Clanna Morna of Connacht, the Feni of Leinster, and the Knights of the Red Branch of Ulster. When the island was Christianized, these knightly orders were among the staunchest supporters of the missionary priests, and were consecrated to the service of the church in the sixth century, a.s.suming the cross as their distinctive emblem, and becoming the defenders of religion.

Among the names which are upon the rolls of the ancient orders of knighthood are those of most of the kings, bards, saints, and statesmen, and in the long list there was no family of greater renown than that of Roderick the Great, to which belonged Conall Cearnach and Lugaidh, who, according to MacGeoghegan and others, were the direct ancestors of the O'Mores of Leix. In this family the ancient splendor of the knightly orders was a tradition which survived for centuries, and they were in almost continual rebellion against the English, from the siege of Dublin by Roderick O'Connor until the rebellion against Queen Elizabeth, led by Rory Oge O'More and his son Owen in the latter part of the sixteenth and the early seventeenth century. A nephew of Rory Oge, the sagacious and statesmanlike Rory O'More, revived the ancient orders in the Catholic Confederation of Kilkenny in 1642. A grandson of Rory O'More, Patrick Sarsfield, Earl of Lucan, was the most distinguished commander of Irish armies who opposed, in Ireland, the forces of William of Orange.

There is no stranger story in all history than the intimate connection of the O'More family with the annals of the Ancient Order of Hibernians. The lineage of this family furnishes the links connecting the ancient orders of pagan Ireland through the centuries with the Ancient Order in modern times. Under the names of Rapparees, Whiteboys, Defenders, Ribbonmen, etc., the Confederation of Kilkenny was carried on through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries until the nineteenth. At various times the duties of these organizations were subject to local conditions. Thus the Defenders were occupied in protecting themselves and their priests against the hostility of the Penal Laws, engaging in armed conflict with the Orangemen in the north, while the Whiteboys were waging war against the atrocities of landlordism in the south. Between these two organizations there was a secret code, which operated until they were combined, under the name of Ribbonmen, in the early nineteenth century. The contentions of the Whiteboys regarding Irish landlordism have since been acknowledged to be just, and have been enacted into statutes. The Defenders joined with Wolfe Tone in the formation of the United Irishmen.

About 1825 the Ribbonmen changed their name to St. Patrick's Fraternal Society, and branches were established in England and Scotland under the name of the Hibernian Funeral Society. In 1836 a charter was received by members in New York City, and in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. The headquarters were for some years in Pennsylvania, but in 1851 a charter was granted to the New York Divisions under the name of "The Ancient Order of Hibernians." New York thus became the American headquarters. National conventions were held there until 1878, since which year they have been held in many other cities biennially. Many of the most distinguished leaders of the Irish race in America have been members of the Order, and from a humble beginning, with a few emigrants gathered together in a strange land, the membership has grown to nearly 200,000. General Thomas Francis Meagher, Colonel Michael Doheny, General Michael Corcoran, and Colonel John O'Mahony were among the members in the late '50's.

Among the organizations which have sprung from the ranks of the A.O.H. were the powerful Fenian Brotherhood, the Emmet Monument a.s.sociation, and scores of smaller a.s.sociations in all sections of the United States and Canada. During the Know Nothing riots, the Order furnished armed defenders for the Catholic churches in New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston, and it has ever been foremost in preserving its position as the hereditary defender of the faith. In 1894, the Ladies' Auxiliary was founded, and this body of women numbered in 1914 over 63,000, and had donated great sums to charity, education, and religion. The A.O.H. had, in 1914, a.s.sets of $2,230,000. It pays annually, for charity, sick and death benefits, and maintenance, over $1,000,000, and during its existence in America has donated nearly $20,000,000 to works of beneficence. One of the most celebrated of the gifts of the Order was the endowment of the Chair of Celtic in the Catholic University of America, and one of its greatest gifts to charity was its contribution of $40,000 to the sufferers from the San Francisco earthquake.

The Clan-na-Gael is a society organized to secure the independence of Ireland by armed revolution. Its organization is secret and it is the successor of the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood, called in America the Fenian Brotherhood, which promoted many daring raids and risings in Ireland in 1867. The I.R.B. was perfected by James Stephens in Ireland, and by John O'Mahony in America, from 1857 to 1867. An invasion of Canada was made in great force under the general direction of Colonel William R. Roberts, president of the Fenian Brotherhood, but was unsuccessful owing to the att.i.tude of the United States Government, which declared that the Fenians were violating the principles of neutrality. After the disorganization of the Fenian Brotherhood, the idea of revolution languished until revived by the founding of the Clan-na-Gael by Jerome J. Collins in 1869, and the membership during the twenty years from 1880 to 1900 included almost fifty thousand of the flower of the men of Irish blood in America.

The principle of revolution was first given organized public expression in America through the formation in 1848 of the Irish Republican Union, which was succeeded by the Emmet Monument a.s.sociation, these societies influencing the creation of the Sixty-Ninth and Seventy-Fifth Regiments of the New York State Militia, and the Ninth Ma.s.sachusetts, which became so famous for valor during the Civil War. Although not putting forth all its strength, so as to allow full scope to the parliamentary efforts to ameliorate the state of the Irish people, the Clan-na-Gael is as vigorous a section as ever of the forces organized for the service of patriotism.

The Land League, founded in Ireland in 1879, was transplanted to America in 1880, when the first branch was established in New York City through the efforts of Patrick Ford, John Boyle O'Reilly, John Devoy, and others. Michael Davitt soon after came to America and travelled through the country founding branches of the League. In a few years the whole American continent was organized, and in this organization Michael Davitt declared that the members of the Ancient Order of Hibernians and the Clan-na-Gael were everywhere foremost. To the enormous sums collected by the League in this country, and to the magnificent labors of Parnell, Davitt, Redmond, Ferguson, Dillon, Kettle, Webb, and others in Ireland, is due in a large measure the present improved state of the people, resulting from the sacrifices made by those who supported this greatest of leagues devoted to the amelioration of unbearable economic conditions. A Ladies' Auxiliary to the Land League was established by the sisters of Parnell, and was for some years a brilliant vindication of the power and justice of feminine partic.i.p.ation in public questions.

The Land League, the name of which was changed to the Irish National League in the early '80's, having prepared the path to eventual victory, declined in potency after the political movement was divided into Parnellites and Anti-Parnellites in 1890. The elements composing these rival parties were, through the initiative of William O'Brien, M.P., and in commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of the United Irishmen of Wolfe Tone's day, joined in 1898 under the name of the United Irish League, John E. Redmond becoming the first president, and also the chairman of the Parliamentary Party which it had been instrumental in uniting. This organization is now a living, vital force in the affairs of Ireland on both sides of the Atlantic, Mr. Redmond being still its head, with Michael J. Ryan, of Philadelphia, as president of the American Branch.

The Knights of Columbus were organized in 1881 by Rev. Michael McGivney, in New Haven, Connecticut, and a charter was granted by the Connecticut Legislature on March 29,1882. At first the activity of the organization was confined to Connecticut, but the time was ripe for its mission, and it soon spread rapidly throughout New England.

In 1896 it began to attract the attention of Catholic young men in other parts of the nation, and during the next few years its appeal was made irresistibly in almost every State. It now exists in all the States of the Union, the Dominion of Canada, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Panama, Porto Rico, Mexico, Cuba, and the Philippine Islands, with a total membership of 328,000, of whom 108,000 are insurance members and 220,000 a.s.sociate members. Its mortuary reserve fund is $4,500,000, being over $1,000,000 more than is required by law. It is one of the most successful fraternal societies ever organized, and the Irish-American Catholics have given to it the full strength of their enthusiasm and purpose.

The temperance movement among Catholics was, from the visit of Father Mathew in 1849, largely Irish. The societies first formed were united by no bond until 1871, when the Connecticut societies formed a State Union. Other States formed unions and a national convention in Baltimore in 1872 created a National Union. In 1878 there were 90,000 priests, laymen, women, and children in the Catholic Total Abstinence Benevolent Union. In 1883 the Union was introduced into Canada, and in 1895 there were 150,000 members on the American continent. From the C.T.A.B.U. were formed the Knights of Father Mathew, a total abstinence and semi-military body, first inst.i.tuted in St. Louis in 1872.

The Catholic Knights of America, with a membership chiefly Irish-American, were organized in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1877, and the advantages offered for insurance soon attracted 20,000 members.

The decade of the '70's was prolific of Irish Catholic a.s.sociations.

The Catholic Benevolent Legion was founded in 1873, shortly followed by the Catholic Mutual Benevolent a.s.sociation, the Catholic Order of Foresters (which started in Ma.s.sachusetts and spread to other States), the Irish Catholic Benevolent Union, and the Society of the Holy Name, which latter, although tracing its origin to Lisbon in 1432, is yet dominantly Irish in America.

In the large industrial centres there are scores of Irish county and other societies composed of Irishmen and Irish-Americans, organized for the service of country and faith, beneficence and education, and all dedicated to the uplifting of humanity and to the progress of civilization. The ancient genius for organization has not been lost, the spirit of brotherhood pulsates strongly in the Irish heart, and through its powerful societies the race retains its place in the advance of mankind.

REFERENCES:

John M. Campbell: History of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick and Hibernian Society; Maguire: The Irish in America; McGee: Irish Settlers in America; John O'Dea: History of the Ancient Order of Hibernians and Ladies' Auxiliary in America; Michael Davitt: The Fall of Feudalism in Ireland; Cashman: Life of Michael Davitt; T.P.

O'Connor: The Parnell Movement; Joseph Denieffe: Recollections of the Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood; Articles in the Catholic Encyclopedia; Report of the Knights of Columbus, 1914; The Tidings, Los Angeles, 7th annual edition.

THE IRISH IN THE UNITED STATES

By MICHAEL J. O'BRIEN,

_Historiographer, American Irish Historical Society_.

Students of early American history will find in the Colonial records abundant evidence to justify the statement of Ramsay, the historian of South Carolina, when he wrote in 1789, that:

"The Colonies which now form the United States may be considered as Europe transplanted. Ireland, England, Scotland, France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Sweden, Poland, and Italy furnished the original stock of the present population, and are generally supposed to have contributed to it in the order named. For the last seventy or eighty years, no nation has contributed so much to the population of America as Ireland."

It will be astonishing to one who looks into the question to find that, in face of all the evidence that abounds in American annals, showing that our people were here on this soil fighting the battles of the colonists, and in a later day of the infant Republic, thus proving our claim to the grat.i.tude of this nation, America has produced men so ign.o.ble and disingenuous as to say that the Irish who were here in Revolutionary days "were for the most part heartily loyal," that "the combatants were of the same race and blood", and that the great uprising became, in fact, "a contest between brothers"!

Although many writers have made inquiries into this subject, nearly all have confined themselves to the period of the Revolution. We are of "the fighting race", and in our enthusiasm for the fighting man the fact seems to have been overlooked that in other n.o.ble fields of endeavor, and in some respects infinitely more important, men of Irish blood have occupied prominent places in American history, for which they have received but scant recognition. The pioneers before whose hands the primeval forests fell prostrate; the builders, by whose magic touch have sprung into existence flourishing towns and cities, where once no sounds were heard save those of nature and her wildest offspring; the orators who roused the colonists into activity and showed them the way to achieve their independence; the schoolmasters who imparted to the American youth their first lessons in intellectuality and patriotism; all have their place in history, and of these we can claim that Ireland furnished her full quota to the American colonies.

It must now be accepted as an indisputable fact that a very large proportion of the earliest settlers in the American colonies were of Irish blood, for the Irish have been coming here since the beginning of the English colonization. It has been estimated by competent authorities that in the middle of the seventeenth century the English-speaking colonists numbered 50,000. Sir William Petty, the English statistician, tells us that during the decade from 1649 to 1659 the annual emigration from Ireland to the western continent was upwards of 6000, thus making, in that s.p.a.ce of time, 60,000 souls, or about one-half of what the whole population must have been in 1659.

And from 1659 to 1672 there emigrated from Ireland to America the yearly number of 3000 (Dobbs, on Irish Trade, Dublin, 1729).

Prendergast, another noted authority, in the _Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland_, furnishes ample verification of this by the statistics which he quotes from the English records. Richard Hakluyt, the chronicler of the first Virginia expeditions, in his _Voyages, Navigations, Traffiques, and Discoveries of the English Nation_ (London, 1600), shows that Irishmen came with Raleigh to Virginia in 1587 and, in fact, the ubiquitous Celts were with Sir John Hawkins in his voyage to the Gulf of Mexico twenty years earlier. The famous work of John Camden Hotten, ent.i.tled "The Original Lists of Persons of Quality, Emigrants, Religious Exiles, Political Rebels, Serving Men sold for a term of years," etc., who were brought to the Virginia plantations between 1600 and 1700, as well as his "List of the Livinge and the Dead in Virginia in 1623," contains numerous Celtic names, and further evidence of these continuous migrations of the Irish is contained in "A Booke of Entrie for Pa.s.sengers pa.s.sing beyond the Seas", in the year 1632. The Virginia records also show that as early as 1621 a colony of Irish people sailed from Cork in the _Flying Harte_ under the patronage of Sir William Newce and located at what is now Newport News, and some few years later Daniel Gookin, a merchant of Cork, transported hither "great mult.i.tudes of people and cattle" from England and Ireland.

In the "William and Mary College Quarterly," in the transcripts of the original records published by the Virginia Historical Society, and in all County histories of Virginia, there are numerous references to the Irish "redemptioners" who were brought to that colony during the seventeenth century. But the redemptioners were not the only cla.s.s who came, for the colonial records also contain many references to Irishmen of good birth and education who received grants of land in the colony and who, in turn, induced many of their countrymen to emigrate. Planters named McCarty, Lynch, O'Neill, Sullivan, Farrell, McDonnell, O'Brien, and others denoting an ancient Irish lineage appear frequently in the early records. Much that is romantic is found in the lives of these men and their descendants.

Some of them served in the Council chamber and the field, their sons and daughters were educated to hold place, with elegance and dignity, with the foremost of the Cavaliers, and when in after years the great conflict with England began, Virginians of Irish blood were among the first and the most eager to answer the call. Those historians who claim that the South was exclusively an "Anglo-Saxon" heritage would be completely disillusioned were they to examine the lists of Colonial and Revolutionary troops of Celtic name who held the Indians and the British at bay, and who helped in those "troublous times" to lay the foundations of a great Republic.

There is no portion of the Atlantic seaboard that did not profit by the Irish immigrations of the seventeenth century. We learn from the "Irish State Papers" of the year 1595 that ships were regularly plying between Ireland and Newfoundland, and so important was the trade between Ireland and the far-distant fishing banks that "all English ships bound out always made provisions that the convoy out should remain 48 hours in Cork." In some of Lord Baltimore's accounts of his voyages to Newfoundland he refers to his having "sailed from Ireland" and to his "return to Ireland," and so it is highly probable that he settled Irishmen on his Avalon plantations. After Baltimore's departure, Lord Falkland also sent out a number of Irish colonists, and "at a later date they were so largely reinforced by settlers from Ireland that the Celtic part of the population at this day is not far short of equality in numbers with the Saxon portion"--(Hatton and Harvey, _History of Newfoundland_, page 32). Pedley attributes the large proportion of Irishmen and the influence of the Catholics in Newfoundland to Lord Falkland's company, and Prowse, in his History (pp. 200-201), refers to "the large number of Irishmen" in that colony who fled from Waterford and Cork "during the troubled times"

which preceded the Williamite war (1688). Many of these in after years are known to have settled in New England.

But it was to Maryland and Pennsylvania that the greatest flow of Irish immigration directed its course. In the celebrated "Account of the Voyage to Maryland," written in the year 1634 by Mutius Vitellestis, the general of the Jesuit Order, it is related that when the _Arke_ and the _Dove_ arrived in the West Indies in that year, they found "the island of Montserrat inhabited by a colony of Irishmen who had been banished from Virginia on account of their professing the Catholic faith." It is known also that there were many families in Ireland of substance and good social standing who, at their own expense, took venture in the enterprise of Lord Baltimore and afterwards in that of William Penn, and who applied for and received grants of land, which, as the deeds on record show, were afterwards divided into farms bought and settled by O'Briens, McCarthys, O'Connors, and many others of the ancient Gaelic race, the descendants of those heroic men whose pa.s.sion for liberty, while causing their ruin, inspired and impelled their sons to follow westward "the star of empire."

After the first English colonies in Maryland were founded, we find in all the proclamations concerning these settlements by the proprietary government, that they were limited to "persons of British or Irish descent." The religious liberty established in Maryland was the magnet which attracted Irish Catholics to that Province, and so they came in large numbers in search of peace and comfort and freedom from the turmoil produced by religious animosities in their native land.

The major part of this Irish immigration seems to have come in through the ports of Philadelphia and Charleston and a portion through Chesapeake Bay, whence they pa.s.sed on to Pennsylvania and the southern colonies.

The "Certificates of Land Grants" in Maryland show that it was customary for those Irish colonists to name their lands after places in their native country, and I find that there is hardly a town or city in the old Gaelic strongholds in Ireland that is not represented in the nomenclature of the early Maryland grants. One entire section of the Province, named the "County of New Ireland" by proclamation of Lord Baltimore in the year 1684, was occupied wholly by Irish families. This section is now embraced in Cecil and Harford Counties.

New Ireland County was divided into three parts, known as New Connaught, New Munster, and New Leinster. New Connaught was founded by George Talbot from Roscommon, who was surveyor-general of the Province; New Munster, by Edward O'Dwyer from Tipperary; and New Leinster, by Bryan O'Daly from Wicklow, all of whom were in Maryland prior to 1683. Among the prominent men in the Province may be mentioned Charles O'Carroll, who was secretary to the proprietor; John Hart from county Cavan, who was governor of Maryland from 1714 to 1720; Phillip Conner from Kerry, known in history as the "Last Commander of Old Kent"; Daniel Dulany of the O'Delaney family from Queen's County, one of the most famous lawyers in the American Colonies; Michael Tawney or Taney, ancestor of the celebrated judge, Roger Brooke Taney; the Courseys from Cork, one of the oldest families in the State; the Kings from Dublin; and many others.

The only place in the State bearing a genuine Irish name which has reached any prominence is Baltimore. Not alone has the "Monumental City" received its name from Ireland, but the tract of land on which the city is now situate was originally named (in 1695) "Ely O'Carroll," after the barony of that name in King's and Tipperary counties, the ancient home of the Clan O'Carroll. To subdivisions of the tract were given such names as Dublin, Waterford, Tralee, Raphoe, Tramore, Mallow, Kinsale, Lurgan, Coleraine, Tipperary, Antrim, Belfast, Derry, Kildare, Enniskillen, Wexford, Letterkenny, Lifford, Birr, Galway, Limerick, and so on, all indicating the nationality of the patentees, as well as the places from which they came.

From such sources is the evidence available of the coming of the Irish to Maryland in large numbers, and so it is that we are not surprised to find on the rosters of the Maryland Revolutionary regiments 4633 distinctive Irish names, exclusive of the large numbers who joined the navy and the militia, as well as those who were held to guard the frontier from Indian raids, whose names are not on record. However, it is not possible now to determine the proportion of the Revolutionary soldiers who were of Irish birth or descent, for where the nationality is not stated in the rosters all non-Irish names must be left out of the reckoning. The first census of Maryland (1790), published by the United States Government, enumerates the names of all "Heads of Families" and the number of persons in each family. A count of the Irish names shows approximately 21,000 persons. This does not take into account the great number of people who could not be recorded under that head, as it is known there were many thousand Irish "redemptioners" in Maryland prior to the taking of the census, and while no precise data exist to indicate the number of Irish immigrants who settled in Maryland, I estimate that the number of people of Irish descent in the State in 1790 was not far short of 40,000.

The Land Records and Council Journals of Georgia of the last half of the seventeenth and the first half of the eighteenth century afford like testimony to the presence of the Irish, who crossed the sea and colonized the waste places of that wild territory, and whose descendants in after years contributed much of the strength of the patriot forces who confronted the armed cohorts of Carleton and Cornwallis. From the Colonial Records of Georgia, published under the auspices of the State Legislature, I have extracted a long list of people of Irish name and blood who received grants of land in that colony. They came with Oglethorpe as early as 1735 and continued to arrive for many years. It was an Irishman named Mitch.e.l.l who laid out the site of Atlanta, the metropolis of the South; an O'Brien founded the city of Augusta; and a McCormick named the city of Dublin, Georgia.

From the records of the Carolinas we obtain similar data, many of an absorbingly interesting character, and the number of places in that section bearing names of a decidedly Celtic flavor is striking evidence of the presence of Irish people, the line of whose settlements across the whole State of North Carolina may be traced on the high roads leading from Pennsylvania and Virginia. Hawk, one of the historians of North Carolina, refers to the "Irish Romanists" who were resident in that Province as early as 1700, and Williamson says that "the most numerous settlers in the northwestern part of the Province during the first half of the eighteenth century were from Ireland." The ma.n.u.script records in the office of the Secretary of State refer to "a ship load of immigrants" who, in the year 1761, came to the Carolinas from Dublin. The names of the Irish pioneers in the Carolinas are found in every conceivable connection, in the parochial and court records, in the will books, in the minutes of the general a.s.sembly, in the quaint old records of the Land and Registers' offices, in the patents granted by the colonial Government, and in sundry other official records. In public affairs they seem to have had the same adaptability for politics which, among other things, has in later days brought their countrymen into prominence. Florence O'Sullivan from Kerry was surveyor-general of South Carolina in 1671. James Moore, a native of Ireland and a descendant of the famous Irish chieftain, Rory O'More, was governor of South Carolina in 1700; Matthew Rowan from Carrickfergus was president of the North Carolina Council during the term of office of his townsman, Governor Arthur Dobbs (1754 to 1764); John Connor was attorney-general of the Province in 1730, and was succeeded in turn by David O'Sheall and Thomas McGuire. Cornelius Hartnett, Hugh Waddell, and Terence Sweeny, all Irishmen, were members of the Court, and among the members of the provincial a.s.sembly I find such names as Murphy, Leary, Kearney, McLewean, Dunn, Keenan, McMa.n.u.s, Ryan, Bourke, Logan, and others showing an Irish origin. And, in this connection, we must not overlook Thomas Burke, a native of "the City of the Tribes", distinguished as lawyer, soldier, and statesman, who became governor of North Carolina in 1781, as did his cousin Aeda.n.u.s Burke, also from Galway, who was judge of the Supreme Court of South Carolina in 1778. John Rutledge, son of Dr. John Rutledge from Ireland, was governor of South Carolina in 1776 and his brother Edward became governor of the State in 1788.

But there were Irishmen in the Carolinas long before the advent of these, and indeed Irish names are found occasionally as far back as the records of those colonies reach. They are scattered profusely through the will books and records of deeds as early as 1676 and down to the end of the century, and in a list of immigrants from Barbados in the year 1678, quoted by John Camden Hotten in the work already alluded to, we find about 120 persons of Irish name who settled in the Carolinas in that year. In 1719, 500 persons from Ireland transported themselves to Carolina to take the benefit of an Act pa.s.sed by the a.s.sembly by which the lands of the Yemma.s.see Indians were thrown open to settlers, and Ramsay (_History of South Carolina_, vol. I, page 20) says: "Of all countries none has furnished the Province with so many inhabitants as Ireland."