Mr. Walsh’s personal traits were the admirable ones characteristic of the true Irishman, gentleness, kindliness and affection, mingled courage and tenacity. His family, to which he was most endeared, will ever regret his demise, and the sweet, gentle ties of father and children will ever remain with them, as long as life remains.
In a letter transmitting to the Secretary-General the above sketch “for the record of the Society,” Philip C. Walsh, Jr., a member of the municipal corporations committee of the New Jersey Senate, says:
Father had a very high regard for the Society, and was especially proud of the older members, who like himself, had been transplanted here, and never losing for a moment the great affection they bore their native land. The progress and advancement of the Society and its members always brightened his eye, and brought forth approving sentiments.
He was a typical Irishman—gentle, kind, affectionate and indulgent as a woman on one side and as fierce and courageous as a lion upon the other, the fighting spirit of his race, dominant when necessary; a curious combination of admirable characteristics, opposite in their nature, characteristics that seem more peculiar to Irishmen than any other people.
During his long life, he collected a great number of books dealing with Ireland and Irish affairs, all of which the writer is happy to state were given to me, and I earnestly hope that I may ever be as Irish as my dear father.
MAJOR JOHN W. BOURLET.
BY THE SECRETARY GENERAL.
Major John W. Bourlet, secretary of the Rumford Printing Company of Concord, N. H., and for several years an esteemed member of the American-Irish Historical Society, died at Concord, January 19, 1910, after a protracted illness. Mr. Bourlet was born in New York City, March 7, 1850, but in 1859 removed with his parents to Concord and resided in or near that city until his death, more than half a century later.
At the age of seventeen, he entered the office of the Concord Monitor, as an apprentice to learn the printer’s trade and quickly became a proficient workman. He was advanced to the position of foreman of the job room and acquired prominence in his profession in the State of New Hampshire and beyond as the organizer of the first printers’ association in the capital of New Hampshire. In 1893, Mr. Bourlet was nominated by Governor John B. Smith as commissioner of the New Hampshire Bureau of Labor. This position he occupied until 1896 when upon the reorganization of the book and job printing department of the Monitor Company into a separate corporation, Mr. Bourlet was made superintendent of the plant and a director in and clerk of the corporation. These positions he held until ill-health compelled him to retire from active work in the autumn of 1909.