Early records of the Town of Derryfield, now Manchester, N. H., 1751–’82, says: “On Sept. 23, 1751, at the call of John McMurphy, the proprietors, free-holders and inhabitants of Derryfield gathered at the inn of John Hall for the purpose of laying the foundation of self-government. Its early inhabitants were made up of Irish, who had begun to settle within its bounds as early as 1718, mostly near Amoskeag Falls. About 100 families settled there at that time.”
Harris’ Memorials to Oglethorpe (1841) says: “Governor Oglethorpe, founder of the colony of Georgia’s Mother was Elenora Wall, an Irishwoman of Rogane, Ireland.” Charles Dempsey was an able assistant to Governor Oglethorpe and did much to settle differences between Florida and Georgia. Under Governor Oglethorpe, as a military officer, was a Patrick Sutherland. That there were thousands of Irish settled not only in New Hampshire, Georgia, Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, but Maine, Virginia, Massachusetts and New York, in colonial days, may be attested if we are to believe Prendergast in his book, “Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland,” he says: “Thousands of Irish were sold into a kind of slavery by Cromwell to Massachusetts and the West India Islands from Ireland. Between 1651 and 1655 over 6,000 boys and girls, namely from the south of Ireland, were shipped to those two ports.” It seems difficult for some writers to give credit and justice to a people against whom they have an unwarranted prejudice—prejudice stimulated by ignorance of facts or malice.
After the quotations from the most reliable authorities as to the early settlement of America in colonial days by the Irish, it is to be wondered at which of the afore-mentioned causes impelled the president of a great university to give credit to other peoples in the settlement and upbuilding of America and omit the important part taken by the Irish.
Was it malice or ignorance that caused a gentleman holding one of the two highest positions in the United States government from Massachusetts, to give the Irish but partial credit in his paper, “Distribution of Ability in the United States,” published in the Century Magazine? The honorable gentleman quotes Appleton’s Encyclopedia of Biography for his authority, which, if closely examined, it will be found that his time or vision must have been exceedingly limited. A careful examination of the above authority will prove malice or ignorance or delegating the examination to some Celtophobe of the Goldwin Smith stamp. These writers can be truly accused of carelessness or credulity. The colonial settlers from Ireland did not claim to be anything but Irish,—God had not created at that time the new breed of higher animals, the Scotch-Irish.
Mr. James McMillen of Cincinnati, Ohio, in the New York Sun, refers to an article of Dr. Lyman Abbot in the North American Review, in which “he (Dr. Abbot) declares that the great forces which contribute to our civilization in this country are not Celtic, Slavic, Mongolian or African, but Anglo-Saxon.” Mr. McMillen adds: “From the very beginning we have been in the front ranks with our Anglo-Saxon brethren and will not be crowded out at this late day by any authority who would place us in the same category with the African, Mongolian or Slavic so long as we continue to demonstrate our equality if not superiority to the Anglo-Saxon.” The Abbots, Lodges, Eliots, Fisks and other minor satellites will find it an impossibility to eliminate from the pages of American history the absolutely necessary part taken by the Celt in the originating and perpetuating American liberty, institutions and ideals. The misinformers of history should stop to consider that civilization is not made up only of heat or cold, light or darkness, but a community of human beings, with likes and dislikes, with hopes and aspirations, with hearts beating with passion or sentiment and while human peculiarities are modified to a certain degree by condition and environment, they are not wholly changed. This will apply to the early Irish and English settlers of America. It would be a very uncertain belief to suppose that the thousands of Irish who settled in America in colonial days to escape the lauded Anglo-Saxon civilization, would tamely submit to a continuance of it in this broad land of liberty and opportunities.
The Celt came to America to better his condition and not for exploitation and plunder; and his splendid sentimental and kindly nature did have a modifying effect on the character of the brutal Saxon and if much of the land of America in colonial days was claimed as the land of the Saxon the sun that gave it national heat and light was Celtic love of God, Celtic love of justice, Celtic valor, Celtic zeal, Celtic intelligence that made it the greatest country on earth.
He who has read American history has read it in vain, if he does not know that had it not been for the moral and physical aid given by not only the Irish colonists, but by the people of Ireland, American independence would not have been achieved. Washington, himself, acknowledged publicly the great indebtedness to Ireland.
The admirers of the prefix and hyphen in American history probably had in mind the attempts of that brilliant young Irish scientist, John Butler Burke, to produce life artificially. The preface to Burke’s book, “Origin of Life,” somewhat changed, is “Although it is not the object of this book to lend support to the doctrine of abiogenesis or the development at the present day of living from absolutely non-living (Scotch-Irish) matter, the more hopeful, though as it must be admitted less gratifying view to take is that we have arrived at a method of structural organic synthesis of artificial (Scotch-Irish) cells, which if it does not give us organic life such as we see around us, gives us, at least, something which, according to (Eliot, Lodge, Fisk and others) admits of being placed in the gap, or, as it might be preferably called, the borderland between living and dead matter.” Dr. Burke says: “The why and wherefore we may ask, but get no answer to; the how is our only consolation; and even in that do the most careful steering to avoid the pitfalls and precipices of error.”
The afore-mentioned “historians” did not share Dr. Burke’s doubt, but went ahead and created a new set of cellular tissue and called it the Scotch-Irish. With characteristic zeal and industry begotten of their love of justice and fair play, “that the world may know” a Murray, a Linehan, a Roache, a Gargan and hosts of others of beloved memory have shed lustre on Ireland not only as men of Irish blood but as disseminators of historical truths as to the priceless part taken by men of Irish blood from the earliest days of the country’s history until the present time for the permanency of American institutions and government. In no man’s heart do the Stars and Stripes awake a more sincere and ardent patriotism than the Irish-American.
Rev. Edward Everett Hale writes in the Boston Daily Advertiser, January, 1852, the following: