From the Boston Selectmen’s Records, Jan. 15, 1715: “Jarvice Bethell, sho maker Late of Ireland who wth his wife came by the way of New found Land into this Town in August Last is admitted an Inhabitt on condition, he finde suretyes to ye Satisfaction of ye Sel. men to ye value of 100 [£], Since its consented yt Mr. Shannon’s bond Shall Suffice.”
Hon. John Fanchereau Grimke was a colonel in the Revolutionary army and judge of the Supreme Court of South Carolina. Early in life he wedded Mary Smith. She was of Irish and English stock, and was the great granddaughter of the second landgrave of South Carolina, and descended on her mother’s side from the famous Irish chieftain, Roger Moore.
Daniel McCurtin, believed to be of Maryland, was in the Patriot army at the siege of Boston. He kept a journal of his observations and experiences. The same has been published and narrates many interesting incidents of the siege. The journal may be found in Papers Relating Chiefly to the Maryland Line During the Revolution, edited by Thomas Balch.
The town of Sterling, Conn., was named in honor of Dr. Henry Sterling, an Irish physician and surgeon, who was located in Providence, R. I., before and during the Revolution. When the patriots from Providence destroyed the British armed vessel Gaspee, June 10, 1772, Dr. Sterling responded to a summons to attend the wounded commander of the Gaspee.
Timothy Murphy, an Irish physician, came to this country in 1776 and settled in Monmouth county, New Jersey. He engaged in farming; married Mary Garrison, granddaughter of Richard Hartshorne, of that county, who was a member of the Colonial Council and of the Assembly of the Province. Murphy served in the Patriot army during the Revolution.
Nehemiah Walter was sent by his father from Ireland to America, about 1674, to serve an apprenticeship to an upholsterer in Boston. Having a fondness for books he, with the consent of his father, attended college and graduated in 1680. He settled in Roxbury, Mass., and married Sarah, a daughter of Increase Mather. (N. E. Hist., Gen. Register, Jan., 1853.)
Rev. James Hillhouse was born in Ireland, and in 1720 came to America. He settled in Connecticut and married a great granddaughter of Capt. John Mason. Their son, William Hillhouse, became a member of the Continental Congress and was a cavalry officer in the Revolution. He represented his town in 106 semiannual sessions of the legislature.
Sometime in 1745 as James McQuade and Robert Burns of Bedford, N. H., were returning from Penacook to their homes, whither they went to procure corn for their families, they were fired on by Indians who appeared to be lying in wait for the opportunity. McQuade was shot down and killed, but his companion escaped. (Drake’s French and Indian War.)
The Rev. Robert Morris, who was pastor of the First Church in Greenwich, Conn., in 1785, was “born and brought up in N. York. His parents came from Ireland, the Father a rigid Churchman, his mother a Roman Catholic. He living and being brot up with a Baptist at N. York became one.” (Rev. Ezra Stiles, quoted by Rev. James H. O’Donnell, Norwalk, Conn.)
We find Joseph Manly in Conventry, Conn., in 1786; Patrick Butler in Hartford, and Richard Kearney in New London in 1793. In the list of expenses paid by Connecticut for the capture of Ticonderoga and adjacent posts, occurs the name of an Irishman: “To Patrick Thomas, for boarding prisoners, £1, 5s.” (Rev. J. H. O’Donnell in Catholic Transcript, Hartford, Conn.)