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Buy a hat, shirt, mug or other great "WGT" item at Show the world you are one of "The Wild Geese" "The Irish in the South 1815-1877" by David T. Gleeson Reviewed by Mauriel P. Joslyn Special to The Wild Geese Today previous histories of the Irish in America have centered on the Irish who came to the Northeast in the 19th century. Little has been written about the same period in the American South, when Irish immigrants fled famine and oppression only to arrive in a country on the verge of war within itself. A glance at any library shelf would give the impression that only the New England states had Irish communities. That erroneous assumption has happily been rectified by the thorough research of David Gleeson, himself a native of County Tipperary. To understand the Irish view of life in the South, one must understand the Irish perception of what they left behind in Ireland, and why they left. The society in Ireland left no opportunity for the poor to rise above a miserable and starving existence. This existence was made worse by the famine of 1846-1850 and the British policy towards it. But the history of Irish coming to America began well before The Great Hunger. "Scots Irish" migration began in the 18th century. First from New York, then Pennsylvania through the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, the Irish migrated through the backcountry of the American South. Many became prominent citizens in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, earning distinction by fighting in the American Revolutionary War. The average Irish immigration after 1815 increased to 33,000 per year. In the 30 years after 1815, between 800,000 and 1,000,000 left - twice the total for the preceding 200 years. Once in America, the Irish built canals and railroads, became planters, lawyers and doctors. The largest city in the South - New Orleans - became nearly one-quarter Irish. The Historic New Orleans Collection Levee workers and draymen, New Orleans, 1850s Why was the South attractive? Gleeson points out the tolerance Irish men found in the South, as opposed to the North. They found a niche in the South where they could retain aspects of their heritage, as well as consolidate their position as members of a wider community. The famine emigrants arrived in a region just beginning a rapid urban development. Even Northern Irish-owned newspapers touted the South as having better opportunities. The 1820-60 period was the greatest time of economic growth for the South as well. It offered better pay for the same jobs available up North, and needed the labor force. The Irish added significantly to this growth rate between 1840 and 1860, from 44% in South Carolina to a whopping 571.7% in Tennessee cities. Living in a strange country, they tried to assimilate, yet they remained interested in what was happening in Ireland. Southern cities and voluntary relief committees rallied to the famine-stricken Ireland, raising money to buy food and send supply ships overseas. This sympathy towards the new immigrants made an impression on them, endearing them to their adopted land. They seemed appreciated in the South, whereas the British view largely labeled them less than human. Sergeant S. Prentiss of Mississippi stated in 1847 that Ireland "had given to the world more than its share of genius. She had been prolific in statesmen, warriors and poets. Its brave and generous sons [had] fought successfully all battles but their own." .... a long awaited contribution to the history of the Irish in America. The Know-Nothing Party (anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant, and abolitionist) so prominent in the North did not pose the same danger in the South, because the Irish in the South were politically active in the Democratic Party, and accepted slavery. When Know-Nothingism did surface, Senator Jefferson Davis was among the Democrats who helped defeat it. Gleeson covers in depth the attitudes of the Irish towards slavery, blacks in general, and relations with Protestant neighbors. The Irish supported slavery because it gave them the advantage as white being automatically of the "ruling class," something they had never experienced in Ireland. But the relationship with slaves and free blacks became a complex one to understand. While a true sympathy existed towards blacks as human beings, the Irish upheld the institution of slavery for various reasons. They saw a much more humane person in the slaveholder than they had ever witnessed in an Anglo-Irish landlord. And they saw slavery as protecting their own economic status. Soon, they came to identify the South as much like the Ireland they had left, as being under the rule of a foreign government. Atlas and Cyclopedia of Ireland, 1900 Irish rebel and Confederate patriot, John Mitchel John Mitchel, Irish rebel of 1848 Rebellion fame, came to America in the 1850s and eventually settled in Richmond, Virginia. He witnessed, "a sort of parallel between the condition of the Southern States and that of Ireland" and the only solution "as in Ireland, is Repeal of the Union." The Irish rallied to the Confederate cause as states began seceding in 1861. Many Irishmen formed their own ethnic companies in all the major cities of the South, and joined the Confederate army. Many a community waved off a company of the Emmett Rifles, Sarsfield Southrons, or Emerald Guards. A greater proportion of Southern Irish served than Northern Irish, but it is overshadowed by the numbers. Some Irish rose to prominence in the war, and became known as fierce fighting troops. Dick Dowling and Patrick R. Cleburne are just two such names. Gleeson devotes a chapter to those who served outside a military capacity. He addresses Irish women and their contributions during the war, including the Sisters of Charity who ran convents in several Southern cities. Irishmen served as statesmen, like Father John Bannen who traveled to Europe at the request of Jefferson Davis on a mission to prevent immigrant Irish from being duped into joining the Union army. Bishop Patrick Lynch of Charleston was the Confederate States envoy to the Vatican. Reconstruction saw a drop in the Irish population by 1870, as they became displaced in the cities by newly freed blacks. Immigration to the South in general fell, since the region had been devastated by war. But the Irish had become such an accepted part of the American South that when Margaret Mitchell, herself the descendant of Irish emigrants, wrote Gone With the Wind in 1936, it was not unusual for plantation owner Gerald O'Hara to be Catholic Irish. Indeed, there were Irish emigrants who became planters in the years before the Civil War, so the character was not far-fetched. The story went on to become the quintessential story of Southern society. The Irish in the South, 1815-1877 is a long awaited contribution to the history of the Irish in America. It will stand as the definitive work on its topic for a long time to come. For the first time the story of the Irish and Irish-America in the old south is told by author David Gleeson. Buy his book now at Powells Books. David Gleeson, who is from County Tipperary, Ireland, received his B.A. in Social Science, History and Economics from the University of Westminister, his M.A. and PhD in History from Mississippi State University. He specializes in the Civil War, Irish-American studies, Jacksonian America, Civil War and Reconstruction, and Modern Ireland, and British Studies. He taught at Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah for five years before joining the History Department of the College of Charleston in 2002. The Irish in the South 1815-1877 was published by the Univeristy of North Carolina Press, 2001 Mauriel Joslyn (e-mail: info@patrickcleburne.com) is a Sparta, Ga.-based historian, founder and head of the Patrick Cleburne Society, and author of five books on Confederate history. Search WWW Search TheWildGeese.com E-mail us for more information about The Wild Geese Today Click to return to The Wild Geese Today's Home Page Copyright © 2001, GAR Media. All rights reserved.