CHURCH OF Our Lady of the Rosary SHRINE OF ST. ELIZABETH ANN SETON Irish Immigration and The Mission Church of Our Lady of the Rosary: The Vision of Charlotte Smith O'Brien
"Some in the struggle for existence in America will escape, their successes will be blazoned forth; those who fail and die, silence will cover them...who cares for a few children of the poor more or less - who cares for a few girls more or less, surrendered to infamy... -Charlotte Smith O'Brien
In 1881 an Irishwoman watched young Irish Girls being herded aboard a steamship in Dublin. Bound for America, the young, guileless misses were leaving home in the hope that the New World would offer them some promise in the way of employment and stability. The onlooker was Charlotte Grace O'Brien, daughter of famous Irish patriot and rebel, William Smith O'Brien. And as she watched the g
Immigration to the United States virtually ceased with the outbreak of the revolution. Before it could resume, the Napoleonic Wars effectively prevented travel across the Atlantic. It began again during the so-called Era of Good Feelings, which coincided with the administrations of James Monroe, but did not become significant until the 1830s. Many of the first emigrants from Ireland came to work upon the Erie Canal and then upon the host of other canal projects started in its wake. They then found work on the railroads. Many, perhaps most, were skilled workers. Often they had migrated first to England where they had acquired experience.
Suggested Reading Erin's Daughters in America: Irish Immigrant Women in the Nineteenth Century by Hasia R. Diner The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1983
The rapid extension of English industry could not have taken place if England had not possessed in the numerous and impoverished population of Ireland a reserve at command. The Irish had nothing to lose at home, and much to gain in England; and from the time when it became known in Ireland that the east side of St. George's Channel offered steady work and good pay for strong arms, every year has brought armies of the Irish hither. It has been calculated that more than a million have already immigrated, and not far from fifty thousand still come every year, nearly all of whom enter the industrial districts, especially the great cities, and there form the lowest class of the population. Thus there are in London, 120,000; in Manchester, 40,000; in Liverpool, 34,000; Bristol, 24,000; Glasgow, 40,000; Edinburgh, 29,000, poor Irish people. [4] These people having grown up almost. without civilisation, accustomed from youth to every sort of privation, rough, intemperate, and improvident, bring all their brutal habits with them among a class of the English population which has, in truth, little inducement to cultivate education and morality. Let us hear Thomas Carlyle upon this subject: [5]
c1999 Church of Our Lady of the Rosary Initial Design by Deb McCue Site maintained by the Church of O.L.R.
Conditions for many Irish immigrants to U.S. cities in the 1840s and 1850s were not much better than those they had left behind. They often crammed into shanty towns, living in shacks cobbled together out of discarded boards and other debris. Sanitation was haphazard at best. There were no streets but only paths which turned into ditches after a heavy rain. A remarkable source for life inside an Irish shanty town is a site at Cleveland State University which collects materials dealing with a murder in 1859. The victim, Rosa O'Malia, was a twenty-six-year-old resident of Cleveland's West Side. In the records of the coroner's jury are not only the gory details of the crime itself but also the testimony of O'Malia's neighbors. In addition to telling what they knew of the murder, they also describe a good deal about daily life.
Some common words found in the essay are:
Dr Kay, Thomas Carlyle, Irishman Englishman, George's Channel, Census Commissioners, Massachusetts' Know-Nothing, Smith O'Brien, Joseph Ryan, Irishmen Whenever, Erie Canal, catholic church, irish immigration, lady rosary, church lady rosary, ann seton, return text, elizabeth ann, church lady, smith o'brien, engels return, engels return text, note engels return, elizabeth ann seton, note engels, st elizabeth ann,
Approximate Word count = 3665
Approximate Pages = 15 (250 words per page double spaced)
