| Title: | Letters from America |
|---|---|
| ID | 3945 |
| Collection | Irish Emigration Database |
| File | 1841-50/8 |
| Year | 1846 |
| Sender | unknown |
| Sender Gender | unknown |
| Sender Occupation | unknown |
| Sender Religion | unknown |
| Origin | Philadelphia, Penn., USA |
| Destination | unknown |
| Recipient | unknown |
| Recipient Gender | unknown |
| Relationship | re the history of Pennsylvania |
| Source | The Nation, 6 June 1846 |
| Archive | The Linenhall Library, Belfast |
| Doc. No. | 9512071 |
| Date | 06/06/1846 |
| Partial Date | |
| Doc. Type | EMG |
| Log | Document added by LT, 07:12:95 |
| Word Count | 1778 |
| Genre | |
| Note | |
| Transcript | Letters from America. Philadelphia, 14th May, 1846. IRISHMEN OF OTHER DAYS. To-day I write from the library established here more than seventy years ago by Benjamin Franklin. It is largely furnished with English and French authors, and is admirably conducted for the convenience of students. It is on many accounts a place of interest to the thoughtful Irishman. Some of the earliest and most important records of America are here deposited. William Penn, the founder of the state of Pennsylvania, received his education in a Quaker school at Clonmel, in the house of Charles the Second. It was there he became a Quaker. Being connected with the enterprise and adventure of Lords Berkely and Cartaret in the New World, who had obtained grants of New Jersey from that Monarch, William Penn returned to England, ingratiated himself with the King's brother, the Duke of York (afterwards James the Second), and obtained a patent to take possession, as proprietor, of that immense tract of country now designated Pennsylvania. Penn was assisted in the settlement of the wilderness by one Logan, an Irishman of great talent and enterprise, who may be said to have laid the foundation of literature in the new state. He was many years president of the council of the province, and left behind him in the Loganian Library a monument of his zeal, intelligence, and taste. In their intercourse with the native Indians, Penn and Logan behaved in the fairest and kindest manner. There was no butcheries, no robberies, no confiscations of land. The aborigines were paid for their lands. Quiet settlements were procurred for them in the interior; and, for a generatoin at least, they were not made to feel, by any act of harshness, the presence of the white man. Under the wise and humane policy of these two intelligent men, a stream of adventurers flowed into the new colony from the parent countries, and particularly from Ireland. The current increased considerably after the fall of James the Second. Those Irish who were persecuted by the fanatics of William the Third and Queen Anne's time, faced to France and to the wildernesses of America, carrying with them a hatred of that tyranny from which they fled, and a love of that freedom for which they suffered. The north, as well as the south of Ireland, sent its quota to the new settlements-for when the woollen trade was put down King William (of Glorious memory), upwards of fifty thousand Irish families were sent adrift upon a cold world. Many of them found homes in the American colonies. And thus was begun that system of emigration which has continued since, increasing each new year, and promising, at no distant day, to react with miraculous effect upon Britain. Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and the neighbouring terrorities, received the large majority of their early settlers from Ireland. These settlers were of two creeds-Catholic and Presbyterian. The Episcopalians were in power at home for half a century-they occupied the fat livings, lucrative offices, and valuable lands-and they only, and their retainers, were permitted to breathe the air of their native country in peace. Those Presbyterians and Catholics who cut out their homes in the American wilderness, tought their children to hate that government and that aristocracy which had desolated their lovely native land. The Episcopalian party in the new colonies had assumed a tyrannic authority, under cover of a purer religion, during the ascendancy of their co-believers in England; but the increase of new settlers, the dissemination of knowledge, and a thousand other circumstances, tended to untwist that rope of bigotry and tyranny which bandaged a young nation almost to death. The days of colonial agitation arrived. The heavy hand of England was felt by the enterprising colonists. The embargo laws, so familiar to the oppressed Irish, had been in operation here. The merchants were not permitted to trade with any country direct but England, nor to send their produce out in any ships but those of English build. The anti-manufacture laws, so familiar to the poor Irish, were in operation here. The native-born was not permitted to smelt or manufacture the rich metals found embowelled in his own hills, nor even to saw up into planks the pine and oak that covered the wild earth; nor could textile fabrics be manufactured here. All things requiring the application of knowledge and the investment of capital must come from England. In addition to all these restrictions came the proposition from the British parliament to lay taxes on the poor scattered colonists-to draw a revenue from their labour and from their very thoughts. At this stage in the existence of the young colonies, let it be for ever remembered, that an Irishman begun an agitation in opposition to the british government. He was Charles Thompson, of Philadelphia, one who brouht to the task he undertook a great heart and a great mind-one whom no perils could terrify, and no diplomacy deceive. He, in truth, was the organiser of the American resistance-the Carnot of the American Revolution. For ten years before the battle commenced he led the agitation in Philadelphia. When it began he was Secretary to Congress. And for eight years of its perilous conflict in the field, his genius was present to unite, direct, and animate its efforts. The world-posterity can see in this great Revolution but the one colossal figure-of Washington. But there were other men of fertile resources, of towering genius, and of Spartan bravery, whom Washington did not create, but whom he found occupying the field of freedom when he was called to the command, and without whose active co-operation he never could have succeeded. The day is coming when some light will be flung back upon that glorious group-when the persons and deeds of those valiant Irishmen who laid down their wealth and their lives before the shrine of liberty shall be revealed to the admiring gaze of a grateful posterity. Facts and documents are in my possession which enable me to say, that the Irish exiles of the last century were the foremost men, the chief leaders of that movement which destroyed in America the authority in England. These facts and documents will, I hope, one day or other see the light. When they do, they will tend to animate the exiles of the present century to deeds of equal spirit and wisdom in reference to another oppressed colony, with whose fate and fortune their own are identified. WAR. I stated in my last, that the Mexican army had appeared on the banks of the Rio Grande river. This is the boundary line between the state of Texas and Mexico. Some skirmishing has commenced between the American and Mexican armies, by which the Americans lost in an ambush the entire of a reconnoitring detachment; following up this success, the Mexican General Padua has crossed the river, and, by a dexterous manoeuvre, has got to the rere of the American General (Taylor), whose army of 2,000 men he has surrounded and cut off from their magazines of provisions and stores. The Mexicans are reported at 8,000 picked men, with able commanders-the Americans at this point at 2,000; but levies of volunteers are now being made in the southern cities to proceed directly to their support. The country is wrought up to a high state of excitement indeed. The President, Congress, and Senate, have passed a bill authorising the immediate equipment of 50,000 volunteer soldiers, for which an appropriation of ten million dollars has been made. Meetings are now being held in all parts of the country to enrol volunteers, and to prepare for that which is now inevitable-a long and bloody war. It is unnecessary to fill my letter with the surmises and rumours that I find around me; but my deep and settled conviction is, that England is at the bottom of this war. The Mexican General circulated a proclaimation through the American camp, assuring to those who would join his standard great pay and the protection of England! Every day will, I think, make the agency of England in this affair more manifest. Her object is, of course, to occupy or divert the American army, while she lands an army of occupation upon the banks of the Columbia river in the Oregon. A British fleet sailed from Portsmouth, if I remember rightly, some months ago for the Pacific, and may have ere this arrived before the disputed territory. Should this turn out well-founded, we are likely to have busy times on this side of the Atlantic, and, of course, on the other side also! REPEAL. The Repealers of Philadelphia held a glorious meeting the other evening; it was the best held in this city for at least two years. In the absence of the patriotic president, Robert Tyler, Esq., the chair was filled by Colonel Dickson, an Irishman of valor, of heart, and mind. The question is safe here. I am happy to inform you that an increased fervour of sympathy is manifested for the suffering people of Ireland. Just as the war broke out there were many indications of a movement in aid at least of the starving people, and which, of course, would extend to their political and social privations. The brave and successful opposition to the coercion bill by the patriotic band of Irishmen who defeated Peel at every step in the House of Commons, is the theme of every man's approbation. May their success stimulate themselves and their countrymen to greater deeds of agitation!-and now is the time for a move in advance. EMIGRATION. Every tide brings hither ship-loads of our countrymen. A special destiny directs their steps. Those that now arrive seem to be acquainted with the way of getting on in this country somewhat better than those who came here three or four years ago. They face towards the great western lands in little swarms; and this is what they should continue to do, for in the cities they are slaves, while in the west they become lords of the soil. With the charity of religion, the steadiness of temperance, and the industry of Irishmen, they cannot fail to establish themselves happily in the vacant lands westward. To-day their home it may be a wilderness; but in one or two years it loses its dreary aspect, smiles on the toiling cultivator, yields him a rich abundance for his family, and plenty to sell, whereby necessaries of comfort and luxury can be procured. The settler of this day is lonely, but in one or two years he will be surrounded bu others like himself, who push cultivation and population backwards, and reciprocate with him the social hospitalities he generously administered to others. AN EXILE. |
