Chapter IV: Part 4

Knox county was named for Gen. Henry Knox of the Revolution. He was born in Boston of Irish parents, and was a member of “The Irish Society” of that city. Logan county derives its name from Gen. Benjamin Logan. His parents came from Ireland. He was born in Pennsylvania. His is one of Kentucky’s great names. It is claimed that his son, William Logan, was the first white child born in Kentucky. McCracken county was named for Capt. Virgil McCracken, who was killed in the war of 1812. Meade county was named for Capt. James Meade, who was killed in the same engagement with Captain McCracken. Montgomery county derives its name from Gen. Richard Montgomery, who was killed at Quebec. Wayne county was named in honor of Gen. Anthony Wayne, who was born in Pennsylvania. His name appears on the roll of members of the “Friendly Sons of St. Patrick” of Philadelphia.

Another noted Kentucky family was that of the O’Haras. Kane O’Hara went to Kentucky in the latter part of the eighteenth century, and became in time one of its most distinguished educators. He was accompanied to this country by his father and two younger brothers. Of the two latter, Charles went to Georgia, where he followed the same profession; James remained in Kentucky teaching for some years, but later was admitted to the bar, and acquired the reputation of a profound lawyer and able advocate.

He was the father of Judge James O’Hara, Jr. Among the large number of pupils of Kane O’Hara who became famous after, were several of the Marshalls and Browns,—Major Croghan of the United States army, and President Zachary Taylor. When on his way to Washington to be inaugurated, General Taylor departed from his line of travel in order to visit his old teacher in Frankfort. “It was an affecting scene when the great soldier, then an old man, bowed himself in grateful homage before the venerable preceptor of his youth, and in few but earnest words, thanked him for the care bestowed on his early education, to which he attributed all the achievements of his after life.”

Col. Theodore O’Hara, poet, journalist, and soldier, was the son of Kane O’Hara. He was educated by his father with the greatest care, but received his collegiate finish, and graduated, at St. Joseph’s College, Bardstown, with the first honors of his class. His “Bivouac of the Dead” has made his name immortal:

“The muffled drum’s sad roll has beat
The soldier’s last tattoo!
No more on life’s parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few;
On fame’s eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards with solemn round
The bivouac of the dead.

* * * * *

Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead!
Dear as the blood ye gave;
No impious footsteps here shall tread
The herbage of your graves;
Nor shall your glory be forgot
While Fame her record keeps,
Or honor points the hallowed spot
Where valor proudly sleeps.”

A great and magnanimous government has had these verses, the composition of an ex-Confederate soldier, cast separately in bronze and set up in appropriate places in all the National cemeteries.

It is worthy of mention that a lady bearing a now historic name, at least in song, Mrs. Ann McGinty, brought the first spinning-wheel into Kentucky, and made the first linen in the territory. She is also credited with making the first butter there, and with bringing within its borders the first chickens, ducks and hogs. The first Catholic priest in Kentucky was Father Whalen, who was in Bardstown in 1787. There were then fifty Catholic families in the state. The first families to settle there were those of Daniel Boone, Hugh McGary, Thomas Denton and Richard Hogan. As has been mentioned, the first practising physician was Dr. Hart, and the first school teacher was Mrs. Coomes, both Catholics from Maryland.

Col. Matthew Lyon, mentioned elsewhere, is alluded to as the most remarkable character among the public men of southwestern Kentucky. He was born in Wicklow county, Ireland, in 1746. His father, for being engaged in conspiracy against the English government, was tried, condemned and executed. To secure his passage, Matthew bound himself to a sea captain to work for twelve months after his arrival in America. The captain sold him to a Connecticut farmer for two bulls; he served his time faithfully and became a free man. His favorite by-word was forever after “By the bulls that bought me.” It is worthy of record that Rudyard Kipling has put these words in the mouth of one of his recently created characters, without, however, giving Matthew proper credit. It is very evident that Colonel Lyon never forgot his father’s execution, for he was, up to the day of his death, an inveterate hater of the English government.

After he gained his freedom, he made his home in Vermont. He founded the town of Fairhaven in 1783, where he built saw and grist-mills, an iron foundry, engaged in paper making from basswood, and a variety of other occupations. He served in the Vermont legislature ten years, and for some time was assistant judge. He served in congress from his adopted state. He was one of the first arrested under the alien and sedition laws, was convicted of a libel on the president, John Adams, fined one thousand dollars, and served a jail sentence in addition.

While in congress, on the thirty-sixth ballot he decided the protracted seven days’ voting for president by casting his vote and that of Vermont for Thomas Jefferson, making him president in preference to Aaron Burr. Shortly after the beginning of the present century he went to Kentucky with his family. He served in the legislature of his newly adopted state, and from it, between 1803 and 1811, was in congress eight years.

Eighteen years after his death congress voted to refund with interest the amount of the fine inflicted on him in 1798. This was done on July 4, 1840. He had a son of the same name who was the father of Gen. H. B. Lyon. Col. Chittenden Lyon, Matthew’s oldest son, represented his state in congress eight years, and was fully as impetuous and honest as his father. Of Matthew Lyon, Gov. John Reynolds, of Illinois, said, “His Irish impulses were honest, and always on the side of human freedom. His leading trait of character was his zeal and enthusiasm, almost a madness itself in any cause he espoused.” This covered his zeal.

The opinion of the members of the first Continental congress, of the Irish in Ireland, and in the colonies, is well expressed in an address issued by that body in 1774. In part it said: “Your parliament had done us no wrong; you had ever been friendly to the rights of mankind, and we acknowledge with pleasure and gratitude that your nation has produced patriots who have nobly distinguished themselves in the cause of humanity and America. Accept our most grateful acknowledgments for the friendly disposition you have always shown towards us.”

The record made by the men whose names appear in this paper, is evidence that they were worthy of the tribute paid in this address. What the feeling was in Ireland, a little more than a year later, was well described by Gen. Ethan Allen, who said that the people of Cork when they found he was in the harbor, a prisoner on one of his majesty’s vessels, sent him a plentiful supply of money, food, and clothing; that it aroused the ire of Captain Simonds, his keeper, who put an end to the contributions, saying that “the damned rebels of America should not be feasted by the damned rebels of Ireland.”

GEN. JOHN SULLIVAN.

A distinguished soldier of the Revolution; born at Somersworth, N. H.,
1740; a son of Irish parents; member of the Continental Congress;
was made a brigadier-general, and participated in the siege of
Boston; became a major-general; took part in the battles of Long
Island, Trenton, and Princeton; commanded the American right wing at
the battle of Brandywine; rendered valiant service at the battle of
Germantown; repulsed the British at the battle of Rhode Island;
attorney-general of New Hampshire; president of the Commonwealth;
appointed U. S. Judge of New Hampshire by Washington; died in 1795.
]

REV. JAMES CALDWELL, A PATRIOT OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.

BY JAMES L. O’NEILL, ELIZABETH, N. J.

The territory now occupied by Elizabeth, N. J., was formerly the abode of savage tribes unknown to fame; whence they came and how long they had dwelt on these shores are questions that neither authentic history nor plausible tradition pretends to answer. They have since passed away without memorial.

It was on Sunday, the 6th day of September, 1609, that the eye of the stranger from the old world first saw this site. Three days before, a two-masted schooner called the _Half Moon_, under the command of the renowned Henry Hudson, cast anchor in Sandy Hook bay. The adventurous craft was manned by twenty men, Dutch and English, in the service of the East India Company. Their design was to explore a passage to China and the Indies by the northwest.

On Sunday, the 6th, John Coleman and four other men were sent out in a boat to explore the harbor, sailing through the narrows that they found. The narrow river through which they sailed was the Kills between Bergen Point and Staten Island and the open sea was Newark bay. The site of the town that bordered on the bay was, of course, in full view. These five men are believed to have been the first European discoverers of this particular spot. Coleman was slain the same day, on his return, by the treacherous arrow of one of the natives. It is not at all unlikely that Coleman was an Irishman, as his name bears the Celtic tone, and as there is nothing to verify it to the contrary.

The most distinguished man of Irish descent who identified himself completely with this old city was the Rev. James Caldwell, the eighth pastor of the First Presbyterian church. The Rev. Mr. Caldwell was a Virginian. His father, John Caldwell, came to this country with four sisters and his wife and several children, from the County Antrim, Ireland—what year is unknown to the writer. He settled first at Chestnut Level, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania.

Soon after, he removed to the new settlements in the southern part of Virginia and located on Cub creek, a branch of the Staunton river, in what is now known as Charlotte county. Here in the wilderness, James, the subject of this sketch, the youngest of seven children, was born in April, 1734. The place was generally known as the Caldwell Settlement or Cub Creek. A daughter of one of his brothers, also born here, was the mother of the Hon. John Caldwell Calhoun of South Carolina, the well-known senator and leading statesman of the South.

James was prepared for college under Rev. John Todd Caldwell and entered the College of New Jersey. He came hither when the college was at Newark and formed the acquaintance, while there, of a young maiden to whom he was afterwards married. He graduated in September, 1759, and on Sept. 17, 1760, he was ordained. He received a call from the Presbyterian church of this town in November, 1761, which he accepted. He was duly installed in March, 1762, with an annual salary of £160. He was at that time in the twenty-seventh year of his age, a young man of prepossessing appearance and of more than ordinary promise as a preacher of the gospel. In the year of 1775 charges were preferred to the Presbytery by former members of the congregation affecting the orthodoxy of their pastor, Mr. Caldwell, which, however, were found to be of trivial import and not affecting at all his soundness in the faith. Whatever uneasiness may have grown out of this matter, it was speedily forgotten in the rush of events that preceded and precipitated the War of the Revolution.

On the question then at issue Mr. Caldwell’s position was a matter of public knowledge. He waited not to learn how the struggle was likely to terminate; his ardent temperament was for his country, for liberty, for independence. In all his prayers, often in his sermons and exhortations, and in all his pastoral intercourse, no religious society in the land took a bolder move or stand, and few were more efficient for their country’s cause than Reverend Caldwell and his congregation. And not a little of this patriotism was owing to the fervent zeal of their pastor. Among his congregation at the commencement of the Revolution were such men as William Livingston, governor of the state; Elias Boudinot, afterwards president of the Continental Congress; Abraham Clark, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence; Hon. Robert Ogden, speaker of the assembly at an earlier day, with his three sons, Robert, Matthias and Aaron (the two last distinguished officers in the United States army); Hon. Stephen Crane, speaker of the assembly; Elias Dayton and his son Jonathan, both of them subsequently general officers of the army and the latter, speaker of congress. From this one congregation went forth about forty commissioned officers and privates to fight the battles for independence.

Among the men belonging to the militia of Elizabeth who enlisted on board of the different sloops as volunteers, in order to take the ship _Blue Mountain Valley_, January 22, 1776, under the command of Colonel Dayton, are to be found the following good old Irish names: Sergeant Thomas Quigley, Thomas McCarty, Timothy B. Stout, James Clancey, Timothy Burns, Moses Connell and William Higgins.

Among the commissioned officers of Reverend Caldwell’s congregation in the army are found a Capt. David Lyons, and Capt. Matthias Lyons, Irish or of Irish descent, without a doubt.

In April, 1776, Colonel Dayton’s regiment, that had been quartered in the town during the preceding winter, received orders to march to the relief of the Northern army then besieging Quebec. As most of the officers and many of the privates were members of Reverend Caldwell’s congregation, an ardent desire was expressed for his services as their chaplain.

Lieutenant Elmer in his diary, April 28, says: “Members of the Presbyterian meeting set about Reverend Caldwell’s going to Quebec with us, which was agreed upon after some debate. Drank tea at Colonel Dayton’s, then went to Major Spencer’s to lodge.” So it was determined that Reverend Caldwell, whose consent was readily obtained, should accompany his townsmen on their Northern expedition.

The troops left the town the following day, but Colonel Dayton and Reverend Caldwell did not join them until Saturday, May 11, at Albany, N. Y. The Jersey Brigade to which the regiment was attached was stationed the most of the season in the Mohawk valley. On the 16th of June Reverend Caldwell was at Johnstown and at German Flats in July, preaching twice every Sunday and taking an active part in military operations.

In July, as already related, the British troops had taken possession of Staten Island. The people of the town became greatly alarmed for their personal safety, and their relatives in the Northern army became exceedingly anxious for their friends at home.

Reverend Caldwell returned to his family and people early in the autumn, where his services were pressingly needed. On the retreat of the American, and the advance of the British, army the last week of November, 1776, Reverend Caldwell took his family up into the mountains and found a home for them in the town of New Providence. From this time forward Reverend Caldwell was occupied more or less continually in the service of his country to the close of his life.

The enemy having vacated the town at the end of the first week in January, he returned to his charge and resumed his ministrations, mingling the duties of the pastor and the soldier together. At various times through the long years of the war, during which his congregation were greatly scattered and their means of subsistence for the most part considerably diminished, Reverend Caldwell served not only as chaplain of the Jersey Brigade but as assistant commissary-general from the first of April, 1777, to April, 1779. Instead of a regular salary, he received for his pastoral service only what was contributed by the congregation on Sunday.

His church was burned down on the night of Tuesday, January 25, 1780, and the services of the congregation were thenceforth held in Colonel Hatfield’s red storehouse. It is probably while preaching here, or it may have been at an earlier date, that Reverend Caldwell (as related by Reverend McDowell) preached with his pistols lying on each side of him in the pulpit, and the sentinels had to keep watch during time of service.

The Sunday found him, whether at home or in camp, ready to proclaim the gospel with its message of mercy and comfort to his fellow men, while he was ever watchful at other times to improve every opportunity to promote the spiritual welfare of citizens and soldiers. He was held, therefore, in the highest esteem by officers and men, confided in by all, and regarded with enthusiastic love by the rank and file. No one, consequently, save his parishioner, Governor Livingston, was more feared and hated by the Tories and the British. Gladly would they have kidnapped him if they could.

At the fall ejection of 1780 he was chosen by his fellow-citizens a member of the State Council. He continued in the discharge of his various duties to which he was called until the autumn of 1781. The last record made of him by the Presbytery was at their meeting, May 7, 1782. It is in these words: “The Rev. James Caldwell departed this life, falling by the hands of a cruel murderer on the twenty-fourth day of Nov., 1781.” The circumstances attending this mournful event were very fully announced in the public prints at the time. Rivington of New York, in his _Gazette_ (a Tory journal of that time), said: “The Rev. Caldwell was shot dead without any provocation at the Point (now Elizabethport) by a native of Ireland named Morgan.” Note the sting this allegation placed to an Irish name.

The _New Jersey Journal_ and the _New Jersey Gazette_ devoted much space to the murder at the time, but they never mentioned the murderer’s name nor claimed him to have been Irish. These are the only accounts written and published at the time. As that of the _New Jersey Gazette_ is the most particular and was written after sufficient time had been allowed to obtain by means of the coroner’s inquest, and from other sources, the exact state of the case, it is apparently the most to be relied upon. It was generally affirmed at the time that the murderer, as intimated in the _New Jersey Journal_, was bribed by the British enemy to do the dreadful deed. And it is not strange that it should have been believed, as it was known that the British had offered a reward for the apprehension or assassination of Governor Livingston, and as no other reason could be assigned for the murder.

The body of Rev. Mr. Caldwell was carried to the public house at the Point, now Red Jacket Hotel. A homely ambulance was obtained and the body was slowly brought to town. A crowd of people, greatly excited, gathered by the way. The mournful cortege, tradition says, passed through Water street, now Elizabeth avenue, to Broad street; then to Jersey street; and then to the residence of Mrs. Noll. The day following, when the people gathered for public worship, the place where they met might well have been named “Bochim, the Weeping Place.” The people were crushed under the sad calamity.

The funeral service was held on Tuesday, the 27th, the whole town suspending all business and gathering in uncontrollable grief at the house of Mrs. Noll. An opportunity was given to the people to view the corpse in front of the house in the open street. After all had taken their last look and before the coffin was closed, Dr. Boudinot came forward leading nine orphan children, and placing them around the bier of the parent, made an address of surpassing pathos to the multitude in their behalf. It was an hour of deep sorrow. The procession then slowly moved to the grave and laid his body by his wife’s remains. Over his body was placed a marble slab with the following inscription:

“Sacred to the memory of Rev. James Caldwell and Hannah, his wife, who fell victims to their country’s cause in the year 1781. He was a zealous and faithful pastor of the Presbyterian church in this town, where, by his evangelical labors in the gospel vineyard and his early attachment to the civil liberty of his country, he has left in the hearts of his people a better monument than brass or marble. Here also lies the remains of a woman who exhibited to the world a bright constellation of female virtues. On that memorable day never to be forgotten, when a British foe invaded this fair village and fired even the Temple of the Deity, this peaceful daughter of heaven retired to her hallowed apartment, imploring heaven for the pardon of the enemy,—in that sacred moment she was by the bloody hand of a British ruffian despatched, like her divine Redeemer, through a path of blood to her long wished for native skies.”

THE IRISH IN SOUTH CAROLINA, GEORGIA, ALABAMA, LOUISIANA AND TENNESSEE.

BY HON. PATRICK WALSH,[24] AUGUSTA, GA.

The time has come when the history of the Irish people in America should be written. It will be a grand heritage for the Irish-Americans. It will show how many of their race fought and bled for liberty. This history will be a priceless gift for future generations. It will be a lasting memorial of the noble and patriotic work of the element.

It will show how nobly the men of Irish birth and lineage have illustrated old Ireland under the benign influences of free institutions and popular government, where liberty is regulated by law, where justice balances the scales between man and man without regard to race or creed, giving to every citizen equal advantages and equal opportunities in the race of life.

A people who have done so much for the honor and glory of this great republic should feel a just pride in publishing to the world the part they have taken in the progress of the United States. While there should be, in the ordinary affairs of life and of government, no discrimination on account of race or creed, as between citizens of our common country, each nationality that has borne a prominent part in its history should seek to perpetuate the record of its people.

In the war between the states Americans of Irish birth or descent stood for the right as they saw it, and fought for their principles and their convictions with a patriotic fortitude and heroic valor never surpassed in ancient or modern times. From the shot at Sumter that was heard around the world until the Confederate banner was furled forever in imperishable glory at Appomattox, the Irish and the Irish-Americans of the North and of the South participated in and confronted each other in battle array. They fought in the mightiest contest of all the ages, for their principles and for their altars and their firesides.

I cannot undertake to give in detail the history of the Irish and the Irish-Americans in South Carolina. It would fill a volume. The Irish immigration into South Carolina began long since. Of South Carolina history, they embrace a large part. I find the following in a reprint of the _Maryland Journal_ of August 20, 1773, for which I am indebted to Gen. Felix Agnus, proprietor of the _Baltimore American_, which is the successor of the former:

“PHILADELPHIA, Aug. 11, 1773.

“Since our last, arrived here the ship Alexander, Captain Hunter,
with five hundred passengers, and the ship Hannah, Captain Mitchel,
with five hundred and fifty, both from Londonderry.

“The ship Walworth, Captain McCausland, sailed from Londonderry for
South Carolina, about the first of June, with three hundred
passengers and servants, who were obliged to leave their native
country, not for their misbehavior, but on account of the great
distress among the middle and lower class of people.”

Hon. M. P. O’Connor, upon assuming the presidency of the Hibernian Society of Charleston many years ago, delivered an address in which he stated that the Hibernian Society of Charleston, S. C., was organized in 1799. “Its first president was the serene and scholarly Rev. Father Gallagher, who was worthily followed by O’Brien Smith, Simon Magwood, Samuel Patterson, William A. Caldwell, Thomas Stephens, Henry W. Conner, the father of Gen. James Conner; James E. Robinson, William Gilliland, Judge Burke, Governor A. G. Magrath, Bernard O’Neill and M. P. O’Connor. These men give dignity and character and purpose to the organization.

“Its founders were Thomas A. Malcolm, Edward Courtenay, William and James Hunter, Joseph Crombie, John S. Adams and a few others. They professed as the primary object of their union, aid and relief to the distressed emigrant. But there was latent in their bosoms an object beyond and higher. It was to preserve the traditions of their downtrodden race; to embody and cluster around a common centre, in a genial and hospitable clime, the virtues of their ancestors, and to reflect in all their splendor under the bright blaze of a Carolina sun the united rays of true Irish manhood and Irish intelligence.... At the base of our organization is one grand permeating idea, to give character and worth and potency to the Irishman in America. It was this society which built the first Irish-American hall in the United States.”

The gallant and distinguished Gen. M. C. Butler, in response to inquiries about his family, writes from his home at Edgefield, S. C.:

“I have been absent from home for a fortnight, and did not receive your letter in regard to the Irish-Americans in our late war from this state in time to aid you.

“I have a typewritten copy of the family history of the Butlers of my family, and would send that to you, but it is the only copy, and therefore do not like to risk it, as it is doubtless too late for your purpose. The Pierce Butler to whom you refer was of the same stock as my great-grandfather, James Butler, who came here from Prince Williams county, Virginia, sometime before the Revolution.

“Another branch moved to Kentucky, to which Gen. Wm. O. Butler belonged and also Col. E. G. W. Butler of Louisiana. They have always been a ‘fighting’ people—the cropping out of their Irish blood—and have taken a hand in all the wars of our past history.

“I think the most distinguished and conspicuous military man of my immediate family was my uncle, Col. Pierce M. Butler, who was killed at the head of the Palmetto Regiment on the 20th of August, 1847, at Churubusco, in Mexico. I have always understood he was held in the highest estimation by General Scott, and other general officers of rank in the United States army.

“I should think Armstrong, that witty, devil-may-care gallant Irishman of Charleston, could give you valuable information of the part the Irish-Americans of this state bore in the Confederate armies. He is himself a conspicuous example of their gallantry and patriotism.”

I publish the following extracts from letters of Col. James Armstrong, of Charleston, S. C., just mentioned, than whom there was no more gallant soldier in the army of Northern Virginia:

“Gen. John Rutledge, of Revolutionary fame, was of Irish descent. So were the Mannings, three of whom served as governors of the state. Judge J. Belton O’Neill, Judges Johnstone and Caldwell, James L. Pettigrew, George McDuffie, Governor Patrick Noble, Gen. John Barnwell, who defeated the Tuscarora Indians, were of the same race. The Rhetts are descendants of the renowned ‘Irish Rebel,’ Roger Moore. Judge A. E. Burke, who fought in 1776, and was afterward judge in South Carolina, was an Irishman.

“The most prominent South Carolina Irishman in the war of 1812 was, as you know, Andrew Jackson. In the Mexican war Col. Pierce Butler, who was killed in command of the famous Palmetto Regiment, was of Irish extraction. This regiment was in Shields’ Brigade. Patrick Leonard was color-bearer. Many other Irishmen were in the regiment.

“Charleston had several Irish companies in the Confederate army. Nearly every company had Irishmen. The flags of the first fourteen regiments, McGowan’s Brigade, were the first Confederate colors to enter the town of Gettysburg. The Irish Volunteers was the color company of the First Regiment and the flag was borne into the town by the captain of the company, the color-bearer having been shot.

“Capt. John Mitchell, son of the Irish patriot, was in command of Fort Sumter. He had developed superb courage on the ramparts and was struck by a shell.

“There were two regiments of South Carolina regulars; about half of the men were Irish. The middle and up-country regiments contained hundreds of the descendants of our race.

“Generals Wade Hampton and M. E. Butler have Irish blood. Gen. James Connor and Gen. Samuel McGowan were of Irish descent. Also Col. Edward McCrady and Capt. W. H. Ryan and Capt. A. A. Allemong, Capts. M. P. Parker, James Mulvaney, John C. Mitchell and Sergeant Dominick Spellman, who was another Sergeant Jasper, were born in Ireland.”

After the rebellion of ’98, in Ireland, a number of Irishmen emigrated to Georgia. Several families settled in Augusta. The Irish and their descendants are to be found in all the Southern cities on the coast, and in the interior from Washington to Galveston.

There were two distinguished lawyers and jurists of Irish birth in Georgia—Judge John Erskine and Judge O. A. Lochrane. Judge Lochrane was a wonderfully gifted man. He had great personal magnetism and unusual powers of brilliant eloquence. He had a handsome person, a noble head and a pleasing countenance. He had a wonderful memory, the imagination of a poet and all the graces of oratory. He was called the Irish orator. With brilliancy and depth and familiarity with the principles of law, he coped successfully with the ablest lawyers before the highest tribunals. As chief justice he made a fine reputation. As lawyer, judge and business man his career was eminently successful. It is with laudable pride I speak of him as a Georgian and an Irishman.

Judge Erskine was appointed judge of the United States court in Georgia, in 1865, by President Andrew Johnson. Of him it might well be said his wisdom enabled him to temper his justice with moderation. Honest integrity and an inflexible regard for rectitude, and the recognition of his sterling worth, made him honored even by those who opposed him politically, and won for him the love and respect of his friends. It may truly be said, “He never forsook a friend, nor forgot a favor.” After nearly twenty years of service he retired from the bench in 1883, with the universal esteem of his associates at the bar. He deservedly attained a place among the honored roll of Georgia’s worthiest sons.

There was the brilliant and lamented Henry W. Grady, journalist, orator and patriot, whose grandfather was named O’Grady and whose father died on the field of battle at the head of his company, fighting for the Confederacy. The South had no more gifted son. He was proud of his Irish blood. His untimely death was a public bereavement. His genius and his talents have won for him a lasting fame.

The Hon. Alexander H. Stephens and the Hon. Joseph E. Brown were two of the most distinguished sons of Georgia. Mr. Stephens had Irish blood in his veins and Governor Brown’s ancestors emigrated from the north of Ireland to South Carolina. These were two of the wisest and greatest of Georgians. They were proud of their Irish blood and were the life-long friends of Ireland and the Irish people. They fought intolerance and proscription and stood boldly for the great principles of civil and religious liberty.

Irish names are common in the Southern states. In many instances the people who have them are removed several generations from the immigrants, thus showing that the Irish immigrant pushed his way into the South in the early settlement of the country.

A host of Irish-Americans in Georgia during the war were true to the Confederacy, and fought for its independence. Augusta sent the Irish Volunteers into the field under Captain Harvey Hull, who was succeeded by Captain T. G. Barrett. The last captain was M. J. O’Connor. This company had 100 volunteers. The men fought gallantly in the Army of Tennessee until the close of the war. Capt. Matt. Rice, a native of Ireland, commanded the Confederate Light Guards, in the Army of Northern Virginia. He left a leg at Gettysburg. There were twenty-five Irishmen in this company. The other companies from Augusta contained Irishmen. They were in the Clinch Rifles, the Oglethorpes and the Hussars.

There are numbers of Irishmen in Augusta who illustrated Irish valor and patriotism in the Confederate army. I regret that I have not the space to mention in detail the names of the Irishmen of Augusta who served the South during the war.

Hon. A. D. Candler, secretary of state, is proud of his Irish descent. He writes:

“Col. Robert McMillan, of the Twenty-fourth Georgia Infantry, went
from Habersham county and was a gallant officer. He was born in
Ireland, as was his brother, a gallant private in a company
commanded by my father, who was himself of Irish lineage.

“Col. McMillan’s son, Garnett, was born in Elbert county, Georgia,
but was of pure Irish blood. He was major of his father’s regiment
and a splendid soldier. He was elected to congress in 1872, but died
before he took his seat.

“I am of Irish extraction on both sides, I am proud to say. I I was
first a private, then a lieutenant and then a captain, and finally a
colonel in the Confederate army.

“Captain and afterward Lieutenant-Colonel Neal, of this city, was an
Irish-American and a good officer, who died in battle. He was a
brother-in-law of Capt. John Keely, a gallant officer whom you knew.
At this moment I recall no other officers who were of Irish blood.

“There were others who were privates in the ranks, and every one
without exception was a good soldier. Indeed, I have a thousand
times thought of, and with pride endorsed, the language of the King
of Poland, who said of the Irish that ‘there is nowhere on the face
of the earth a people among whom there are so few fools and
cowards.’”

Captain John Flannery, a native of Ireland, who commanded the Irish Jasper Greens in the Civil War, writes:

“Savannah furnished to the Georgia regiment for the Mexican War one
company of volunteers, something over ninety men, a very large
majority of them natural-born Irishmen. That company was the Irish
Jasper Greens, under Captain Henry R. Jackson, who, on being
promoted, was succeeded by Captain John McMahon, a native-born
Irishman.

“In the late war I estimate that Savannah furnished about 1,000 men
of Irish birth to the armies of the Confederate states. Nearly three
fourths of these served in distinctively Irish companies, of which
there were seven. As to their services in the field, that would be
too long a story, even if I had the data, to write in a letter. The
Irish element held up their end of the line in every duty that
devolved upon them on the march, in the battlefield, or elsewhere,
during the four years of the great struggle.”

Gen. John B. Gordon writes:

“I had on my staff Major Mitchell, a son of the Irish patriot John
Mitchell, and who was one of the most gallant soldiers in the
Confederate army. He had in him the patriotic fire, the ardent love
of liberty and the devotion to principle which characterized his
distinguished father. He was desperately wounded in battle, but
recovered and served to the close. He was always at the post of duty
and in every particular an ideal soldier.”

Mr. P. J. Moran of Atlanta says:

“In answer to your question concerning the action of the Irish in
Atlanta during the war, I have obtained the following facts: The
priest here at the time was Rev. Father Hassan, a born Irishman. Of
course he took no immediate part in politics. When the agitation
came up leading to secession, the Irishmen of Atlanta were almost a
unit against it, but, after the ordinance was passed, they accepted
the command of the state. Immediately upon the passage of the
ordinance the native Georgians appeared on the streets wearing
cockades; and the _Intelligencer_ appeared next morning with the
inquiry: ‘What’s the Matter With the Irish That They are not Wearing
Cockades?’

“The answer came during the day: ‘We fight; but do not flaunt
ribbons.’

“And before the day was over the Jackson Guards, composed of
eighty-five Irishmen, was organized, made up from the clerks of the
stores of John Ryan, Meyers and Hayden. They elected as captain,
William O’Halloran, one of the bravest soldiers that ever lived. His
deafness interfered with his service, however, and James H. Neal,
brother of Capt. T. B. Neal, now of Atlanta, was elected to the
captaincy, with Dennis S. Meyers, John Keely, Peter Fenelon and John
McGhee as lieutenants. This company went through the war hardly ever
missing a battle, and when hostilities were concluded, the remnant
came back home—eleven men out of the eighty-five, who had gone to
the front. In thus directing the action of the Irish people of
Atlanta, Father Hassan was prominent. The policy was to be true to
the Union while it lasted; but when the state spoke—it then became
their duty to do what they could.”

Gen. Clement A. Evans, one of the best and bravest officers of the Confederate army, sends the following:

“It is a pleasure I have in answering your letter to say that I am
proud of my Irish blood and wish that it may flow on forever. You
are to take part in an interesting occasion at Nashville designed to
bring before our American people the value of the generous, brave,
honorable Irishmen. Your familiarity with our American history will
serve you well; much of it was made by Irish valor.

“In our Confederate war the Irish were on both sides, winning
distinction in both armies—and it is not at all strange that the two
Irish sides were both right. No other people on earth except the
Irish can espouse opposite sides and both be right. A brave and true
Confederate Irishman was captured near Manassas Junction by a
scouting party of soldiers. He chanced to be dressed in no uniform
and betrayed by no sign that he belonged to any particular side of
the pending military issue.

“The captors demanded of him, ‘Where do you belong? What’s your
command?’ ‘By me faith,’ said Mike, ‘it’s an ugly question ye are
asking and I’d be after asking ye by your leave the same thing.’
‘Well,’ said the scouts, ‘we are Lincoln’s men.’ ‘All right,’ said
Mike very warmly, ‘I took ye for gentlemen, an I’m the same.’ But
the scouts thinking they had caught him, seized him and said, ‘You
are our prisoner. We belong to Lee’s army.’ ‘Thin ye told me a lie,
just now, boys, as I thought ye would, and I told ye one meself. Now
tell me the truth, and I’ll tell ye the truth.’ ‘Well, then, we
belong to the state of South Carolina.’ ‘So do I,’ quickly and with
enthusiasm, ‘and I belong to all the other states of the country,
too; and I bate the whole of you in that one thing. Do you think I
would come all the way from Ireland to belong to one state when I
have the right to belong to the whole of them?’ Mike’s Unionism was
broader than that of nearly all the statesmen of that period.

“In the beginning of the war the Irish boys who were scattered over
the South fell in with the companies as they were formed.... One
company went from my native county, Stewart, electing for its
captain a young Irishman, Captain Mike Lynch, who made a reputation
in the 21st Georgia regiment of Dole’s Brigade for skilful courage
and kindness known throughout the command. Captain Lynch was
full-blooded Irish, with all the mellow accent of the Emerald Isle.
I do not think a braver, truer man fought in any army.

“Captain James Mitchell, son of the Irish exile, served with me
directly on my staff. He was a brilliant young gentleman, graceful
in bearing, handsome and of unsurpassed courage. His battle record
is as good as that of our bravest men. His brother (I think) served
in Charleston as captain at Fort Sumter. His father was a very
ardent supporter of secession. Capt. James Mitchell expressed to me,
at the battle of Fredericksburg, his deep regret that Confederate
Irishmen were confronted by Meagher’s brave command.

“There were a considerable number of Irish troops in Louisiana
regiments. Some of them were under me while I commanded a division
composed of Georgia, Virginia and Louisiana brigades. There were no
men ... easier to lead in battle than these Louisiana Irishmen. I
saw many examples of that superb Irish dash about which I had read
much in history and romance of European wars.

“I participated in the late afternoon and evening assault at
Gettysburg on Lee’s left, when the Irish fighters on the Confederate
side went to their death with a heroism at which I wondered. You
have, of course, looked into the history of Meagher’s Irish Brigade.

“I was in the battle of Fredericksburg on the Confederate left wing,
and engaged the same day when that brigade was led (at another part
of the field) to slaughter. I think that there was a cruelty in the
plan of Federal attack which cannot be excused. If I remember aright
the splendid brigade was nearly destroyed.

“Meagher’s Brigade was specially prominent at Gaines’ Mill (or Cold
Harbor), June 27; at Antietam (Sharpsburg), September 17, and at
Fredericksburg, December 13, 1862. The United States government has
never sufficiently recognized the services of that brigade. I wish
our friend Fleming would have a resolution passed in congress to
show that appreciation of their valor which has never been accorded.
I suppose that Burnside’s friends did not want to go too deeply into
the story of the fearful error which he made.

“Pat Cleburne is a name which is as lovingly mentioned among us who
are soldiers as the name of Stonewall Jackson. He was actually loved
by the army in the West, where he was best known. Cleburne was
killed in the Confederate assault on the desperately defended
trenches of the Federals at Franklin, Tenn., November 30, 1864.
President Davis said: ‘Around Cleburne thickly lay the gallant men
who in his desperate assault followed him with the implicit
confidence that in another army was given to Stonewall Jackson, and
in the one case as in the other, a vacancy was created which could
never be filled.’

“I write immediately on reading your letter and on the idea that you
simply want matters of my own memory. Some investigation would lead
to a very interesting story of the Irish-Americans in our American
wars, which I have been sometimes thinking of writing.

“You will not forget that Father Ryan gave us the sweetest of our
Southern poetry. I think also that the clergy in both armies should
not be forgotten in any account of the Confederate struggle.”

Col. C. C. Sanders of Gainesville, colonel of the 24th Georgia, favors me with a graphic description of the charge of Meagher’s Irish Brigade. He says:

“The writer was an eye witness to the charge of the Irish brigade at
Fredericksburg. General Lee had, at the time, the finest army in
history. Two formidable lines of battle were protected by a rock
wall and defended by Cobb’s and Kershaw’s brigades of McLaw’s
division (one-fourth of whom, I suppose, were Irishmen or of Irish
extraction), and the famous Washington Artillery. In our immediate
front one could walk on the dead for hundreds of yards. We were
pained to see the noble fellows coming up in steady columns to be
mowed down before our lines of solid flames of fire from our
entrenched position behind the rock wall and the terrible fire from
the Washington Artillery on Marie’s Hill, just in our rear and
commanding every inch of approach.

“The Irish Brigade would receive our well-directed fire steady and
firm, and when great gaps were cut through their ranks by the
artillery, would reform under the incessant fire, come again, sink
down and rise again, trample the dead and wounded under foot and
press the stone wall of liquid fire, then recede a few feet and come
again, like an avalanche into the very jaws of death, until strength
and endurance failed, having been forced back by shell and the
deadly miniè ball that no human being could withstand. The field of
battle ran great streams of blood, and the immortal Irish Brigade
recoiled before the living wall of fire in glory.

“I know of no charge upon the field of battle in history to compare
to the charge of the Irish Brigade at Fredericksburg, unless it was
Pickett’s Division at Gettysburg, or the Old Guard at Waterloo. The
immortal Irish Brigade were soldiers indeed. I have heard, but I do
not know whether it is correct, that after the Fredericksburg battle
the United States government mustered out the Irish Brigade from
service and placed all upon the pension roll. You can examine
records or see for yourself as to its correctness. I have always
felt proud of my one-fourth Irish blood. The Irish have fought the
battles of all countries. I wish you success in your address, and
three cheers for the Immortal Irish Brigade!”

Lieut. Gen. Longstreet says of the charge of Meagher’s Brigade: “The manner in which Meagher’s Irish Brigade breasted the death storm from Marie’s Heights of Fredericksburg, was the handsomest thing in the whole war. Six times in the face of a withering fire, before which whole ranks were mowed down as corn before the sickle, did the Irish Brigade run up that hill—rush to inevitable death.”

Said the adjutant-general of Hancock’s staff: “I looked with my field glasses, and I looked for a long time before I was certain of what I saw. I at first thought that the men of Meagher’s Brigade had lain down to allow the shower of shot and shell to pass over them, for they lay in regular lines. I looked for some movement, some stir—a hand or foot in motion; but no—they were dead—dead, every man of them.”

The following contribution from Mr. John L. Rapier, of the _Mobile Register_, is highly appreciated: “When you ask me for the names and deeds of glory of Irishmen and sons of Irishmen, in peace and war, ’tis like putting one in the Klondike fields and asking him to pick up the nuggets of gold that lie round about him. The field of my memory is full of them. To be brief as possible:

“Theodore O’Hara, poet, writer, one of the editors of the _Mobile
Register_, wrote the immortal poem, ‘The Bivouac of the Dead,’
adopted now by the government. The verses are cast in bronze and cut
in marble and used in every National cemetery in the country.

“The ‘Silver-tongued orator of the Chattahoochee,’ Gen. Alpheus
Baker, of Eufaula, Ala., possibly the most wonderful orator that
ever lived within the borders of our state.

“General Finnegan, the hero of Olustee, Fla. I suppose you have him
on your list already.

“General O’Neal, ‘Old Tige,’ as the boys called him, after the war,
governor of Alabama; a great old soldier and statesman.

“Every company of the Third Alabama had in its ranks a generous
infusion of Irish blood, and one company, the Emerald Guards, was
composed entirely of Irishmen. This company lost three captains
during the war: Captain Loughry, killed at Seven Pines; Captain
Branigan, killed at Gettysburg; and Captain McGrath, desperately
wounded at Williamsburg, Second Manassas, the Wilderness and
Spottsylvania, was brought home to die—perfectly shattered by the
enemy’s bullets; no hazardous or extra duty performed by the gallant
Third, but what her Irish members had their full share.

“The Sixth Alabama had an Irish company, the ‘Montgomery Grays.’
This company carried to Virginia 103 men. It is declared that but
eleven of this number returned after the war, and not one of these
eleven returned unscathed. I am not familiar with the history of the
Mississippi troops and never met many of the men from that state.

“Of Louisiana, I recall that Wheat’s Tigers, the First Regiment of
Louisiana Regulars (Gen. Gladden’s regiment); the First Regiment of
Louisiana Volunteers and the Fourteenth Regiment Louisiana
Volunteers were almost entirely composed of Irishmen and the sons of
Irishmen. Nearly every regiment from that state had a fair
sprinkling of the same blood. Even the famous Louisiana Zouaves and
St. Paul’s Chasseurs, generally supposed to be entirely French, were
more than one-third Irish. It always astonished me to see how
accurately these Celts could obey an order given in French,
especially when that order was ‘_En avant_’—i. e., ‘Forward.’ And
did these gallant battalions furnish heroic soldiers? My dear sir, I
could write a column on the subject.

“Shall I pick out one and tell you of him? Then, without effort, I
select ‘Mike Nolan’—Gen. Mike Nolan. When I was a little boy around
New Orleans, I used to collect bills for sugar at a small grocery,
right opposite the Charity hospital in that city. The owner of the
store was a young, blue-eyed, light-haired Irishman, named Mike
Nolan. Mild and polite and friendly in his manners; and I am sure it
is no shame to my foresight that at that time I did not recognize in
him the to be best, bravest and grandest soldier I ever met.

“Nolan left New Orleans as a sergeant in one of the companies of the
First Louisiana Volunteers; he quickly rose to a lieutenancy, then
captain, lieutenant-colonel and colonel. He commanded his regiment
with great bravery and ability. He was wounded at Sharpsburg, where
he assumed command of his brigade upon the death of General Stark,
who was killed in that battle. General Nolan’s commission as
brigadier had not reached him when he was killed at Gettysburg.

“Full, full of glory is the history of the Irishmen and the sons of
Irishmen in Louisiana, in every branch of life, in the press, in the
professions, in commerce, in the church and in deeds of valor upon
the battlefields of Mexico and the South.”

Gen. Wm. B. Bate, the able and distinguished senator from Tennessee, has furnished me with an important contribution with regard to the loyalty and gallantry of such Irishmen and Irish-Americans as were connected with the Confederate army.

To give the military career of such men would require a volume. There were no more loyal and gallant men in the Confederate army, both as soldiers and officers, and none was truer to our cause and stood by our little flag with its stars and bars and cross of St. Andrew, from the beginning to the ending, with more fidelity, pride and patriotism than did the Irishmen and Irish-Americans who were enlisted in the Confederate army.

The Irishman who won the most distinction on the Confederate side and gained the highest rank was Major-General Patrick R. Cleburne. He was formerly a private in the English army and when his connection with it ceased he came to this country and at the time of the breaking out of the war was a practising lawyer in Helena, Arkansas. He assisted in raising a regiment of Arkansas troops and became its colonel. His regiment was united with the Army of Tennessee, was at Bowling Green, Ky., in General Hardee’s command, under Gen. Albert Sidney Johnson, and went with it to Shiloh.

General Cleburne commanded a brigade that day composed principally of Tennesseeans, which fought in Hardee’s corps and which composed the front line of battle. General Bate’s regiment, the Second Tennessee Infantry, C. S. A., composed its extreme left. He was from that time on identified with the Army of Tennessee and its campaigns and battles. He was subsequently promoted and commanded what is known as Cleburne’s Division, was an active and efficient factor in the Army of Tennessee until he was killed in the charge on the Federal breastworks at Franklin, November 30, 1864.