The sun. [volume], March 16, 1919, Section 5 Books and the Book World, Image 53

About The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920

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BOORS AND THE BOOK WORLD.
NEW YORK, SUNDAY, MARCH l&r 1919. . . I
TWELVE ' . - SECTION I
PAGES Copytighl, 1919. thf Sttn Printing and Publishing Aitociation. FIVE jf
Irishmen in Our Revolution
Some Surprising Facts Dug Up by Michael J. O'Brien
Respecting Gaels Who Fought for American Freedom
T MAY say," remarks J-. I. C
Clarke in his introduction to
O'Brien's A Hidden
American Jlistoni, "lie
Michael .1
Phase of
establishes unc(iiivoealIy that 38 per
cent. of the Revolutionary army that
won American independence was
Irish." This, of course, is enough to
carry any dialectician on the sub
ject of Ireland, pro or coil, further
into the hook. The "hidden phase"
meant in Mr. O'Brien's title is the
part the Irish not the Scot eh -Irish,
or the Peruvian-Irish or the Estho-niau-Irish,
hut the regular Irish took
iri General Washington's great drive.
How II r. O'Brien, who is the his
toriographer of the American Trish
Historical Society, arrives at his per
centage is briefly described in one of
the 500 pages of his volume:
"I have not examined all of the
muster rolls, but have selected a num
ber indiscriminately from each of the
original thirteen Colonies. . . .
1 have made a careful calculation (1),
by counting the'total number of sol
diers in each unit, and (2), by a sep
arate count of those of undoubted
Irish birth or descent. In some com
panies 1 find the extraordinarily high
percentage of 75 per cent. Irish
while, on the other hand, it must be
s:iid that in other companies the per
centage runs as low as. 10, and in
.some N'ew England regiments a fid
.seme of those raised in the old Dutch
districts of New York arid the Ger
man settlements in Pennsylvania no
Irish names at all .appear. But on
averaging them all up I have deter
mined that 55.80 per cent, of the sol
diers of the. Kevolutionary army were
Irish. To tiiose must be added sonm
small percentage of those of non-Irish
names, and not recorded as Irish ; and
it is proper also to consider the Irish
proportion of those scattering bodies
not attached to the regiments of the
line. If we take the conservatively "
low figure of, 2 per cent, as representing these ele
ments we arrive at a total of 37.83 per cent., or
.substantially 3S per cent."
In his laborious search for contemporary opinion
on the number of Irish in the Kevolutionary army
Mr. O'Brien discovered, in the Library of Con
gress, some original issues of the Royal Gazette,
published in New York in 1779. These contained
the testimony, given before a Parliamentary com
mittee of inquiry, of Joseph Galloway, a loyalist
attorney from Maryland. In answer to a question
as to the composition of the rebel army Galloway
said : . - -
"The names and places of their nativity being
taken down I can answer the question with pre
cision. There were scarcely one-fourth natives of
America; about one-half Trish : the other fourth
were English and Scotch."
They Fought Like Fifty. 1
Another bit or contemporary evidence used by Mr.
O'Brien is the testimony of General Kobertson on
June 8, 1770. and printed in the Parlkimcntarii
Itegistcr. Edmund. Burke said to Kobertson:
"How are the provincial corps composed:
whether mostly of native Americans, or from emi
grants from various nations of Europe'?"
General Kobertson answered, in part: "I re-
KEPRODUCEO BY ANNA FRANCES LEVINS
tr
Facsimiles of despatches from Dublin ancf Philadelphia in New York
"Packet" of June ig, 1783. Illustration in "A Hidden
Phase of American History." ,
half the rebel army were from Ireland."
Mr. O'Brien dryly suggests that the mistake of
these guesses was natural, as enough' Irishmen to
make up 58 per cent, of an army would surely
appear like 50 per cent, in a fight
The contention, frequently heartfj! thatthcrc was
little Irish emigration to America before the Revo
lution except from the north of Ireland is taken
up boldly by Mr O'Brien. There is no way to ar
rive at the facts, he says, except by digging up the
passenger- ship arrivals from Ireland in that
period. From the newspapers of 1771-74 he com
piled a, list of the Irish-ships' arriving' at New York
and Philadelphia:
"Of 57G sailings : . . during these four
years only 247, or about 4:5 per cent., were to and
from thoiv northern ports where the 'Scotch-Irish'
emigrants would naturally embark, and 329, or 57
per cent., were to and from those parts of Ireland
where the 'old Irish' are admittedly the predomi
nant clement.' Mr. O'Brien, who says that evi
dence or this character on this subject has never
be oil presented before, submits that it is indisput
able; and he adds a guess which is likely to find
some assent in Ulster, "that not even the mast en
thusiastic advocate of the Scotch-Irish theory can
claim that the entire population of Ulster was of
Scotch descent." Also, an emigrant from Donegal
Very small ! Howdyc eat cm I Skins
an' all !), as Irish a count- as there is
in Ireland,, would sail from Lctter
r.umy or Londonderry, north of Ire
land ports. Mr. O'Brien's research,
makes him- conclude that between
1767 and 1774 America received
32,640 "Scotch-Irish" immigrants
and 63,360 "plain Irish" immigrants.
Kellys, Burkes and Sheas.
Well, then, says the interested
reader, there must have been a large
number of Kellys, Burkes and Sheas
in the Revolutionary army. Mr.
O'Brien, anticipating this yearning
for concrete information, presents It
fully. On the rolls of the Revolution
ary army there were 695 Kellys, 221
Burkes and 73 Sheas. There were
494 Murphys, 322 Ryans, 266 Sulli
vans and 231 O'Briens. There
were 88 separate and distinct John
"Kellys. Mr. O'Brien docs not as
sume that every Patrick on the rolls
was an Irishman, admitting that
there was a fondness for that name
among some of the Highland Scots,
but he adds that when a Patrick ap
pears on the rolls it is usually in con-
nection with a surname .strictly in
digenous to Ireland:
"One cannot be mistaken, for ex
ample, as to the racial origin of the
42 Patrick Kellys, the 34 Patrick
Murphys; the 35 Patrick Sullivan
and Patrick Ryans, or the 43 Patrick
Keiliys."
In an appendix of 130 pages "Mr.
O'Brien presents the" names of the
officers of the American army and
navy of the Revolution who were of
Irish birth or descent; and also the ,
muster roll of the non-commissioned
officers and enlisted men who bore the
twelve Irish names most common.
The author quotes General Wash
ington's order for the celebration of
St. Patrick's Day in 1780:
"The General congratulates the
Army in the ery 'interesting Proceedings of the
Parliament of Ireland, and the -Inhabitants of that
Country, which have been lately communicated,
not only as they appear calculated to remove those
heavy and tyrannical oppressions on their Trade,
but to restore to a brave and generous people their
ancient Rights and Freedom, and by their opera
tion to promote the Cause of America. Desirous
of impressing on the minds of the Army Transac
tions so important in their nature, the General di
rects that all Fatigue and Working Parties cease
for to-morrow, the 17th, a day held in particular
regard by the People of that Nation." General
Washington added his hope that the celebration -
of the day would not be marred by disturbances.
Mr. O'Brien has been careful to set down, in
hundreds of footnotes, the authorities for his
statements, particularly when they refer to mat-
tcrs which have been in contrOversey. He has not
spared the bayonet in attacking alleged distorters
of facts abouj the early American Irish, and he
takes particular delight in showing, by means of
the arm' rolls, the slips that were made, even in
Government publications, by writers whose esti
mates of the Irish population in America before
the Revolution were ridiculously small.
A HIDDEN' PHA8E OF AMERICAN HISTORY. Bt
,r..jn(WxJiejcenf rrJ4 .trilVJS,JPfi ,thay&,bftaiU S?Mm from !
Donegal
How 're, .the .praties 1.