Chapter M: M. Shannon, Esq., 512 Davis Street, Elmira, N. Y. Proposed by Hon (3)

Now the trouble with most of us Irish Americans—I am Irish in the first degree, having been born in Ireland while most of you are probably only second-class Irish or even third or fourth—is that when we are serious and in deep earnest we are taken to be play acting, and when we are jocose or humorous and contributing to the “gaiety of nations” we are taken to be most in earnest. It is hard for an Anglo-Saxon to understand an Irish Celt. One of the greatest difficulties between England and Ireland is the fact that the mental attitude of the two races is far apart, the intellectual agility of the one and the slow, if certain, processes of the other are obvious to any one acquainted with both countries. Let me illustrate it by a little story:

There was a party at an English country house, and they had been passing a rather dull English winter afternoon by proposing and guessing at riddles; and finally one of the guests turned to the host and said, “Sir Charles, why don’t you propose a riddle?” He said, “Really, now, I’m not half clever enough to do such a thing as that. I couldn’t really do it, don’t-cher-know.” “Well, you might try; you don’t know what you can do.” Finally Sir Charles said, “Well, it stands on one leg and it has feathers and it barks like a dog.” So they all guessed and guessed, everything in the animal and vegetable kingdom, and they finally gave it up; and Sir Charles said, “Why, really, I had no idea I was so clever; I thought you would easily guess it”; and they said, “It is impossible to guess.” And he said, “Well, that’s easy; it’s a stork.” “Well,” they exclaimed, “but surely, Sir Charles, a stork doesn’t bark.” And Sir Charles replied, “Well, that’s the cleverest part of it; I put that in to make it hard.”

And when we come to our Scotch friends we can readily understand how hard it is for a Scotchman to thoroughly comprehend an Irishman. A friend of mine was telling this story in Glasgow to the Board of Trade at its annual dinner: He said an Irishman was coming down the Bowery in New York late one night and met a policeman, and he said to him, “What time is it?” and the policeman replied, “It’s two o’clock.” And the Irishman said, “I’m a bit deaf and I didn’t hear you; would you mind repeating it?” and the policeman yelled at him, “It’s two o’clock.” “Very queer,” says the Irishman, “but really I didn’t hear you. Would you mind saying it again?” and thereupon the policeman (one of my former companions in arms) took his constitution-preserving stick and hit him on one side of the head and said “One,” and then he hit him a clip on the other side of the head and said “Two.” “Did you hear me that time?” “I did, begorra, and I’m glad I didn’t meet you at twelve.”

A friend of mine, a Scotchman by descent, told that story to the Glasgow Board of Trade, and there sat those Scotchman in solemn black around the festive board, and there wasn’t a smile in the room. And finally one old Scotchman, by way of defending the storyteller, said, “Weel, now, I dinna blame the policeman so much; it’s very aggravating to be asked the same question so often.”

Now this Society was formed, among other things, for the purpose of clearing up the underbrush in American history, or, in other words, “laying” the Scotch-Irish ghost. (Applause.)

There was a ghost in my native county of Donegal called the “Fanad Ghost.” It was said to have been raised by a free mason skilled in the “Black Art” while in an hilarious mood, but after it was up the mason couldn’t put it down and the ghost began throwing things around—the delft on the dresser, the noggins, the pots, the stones on the chimney—pulling out the scobes in the thatch on the roof, and raising Cain generally. The Presbyterian minister came in and prayed until he had corns on his knees, and the ghost took a day off. The Catholic priest was called in and did the best he could, and the ghost acted “dacintly” for two days, at the end of which time he was more vigorous than ever. Well, finally they sent to the city of Derry and got a delegation of free masons, and they labored one week, night and day—with refreshments—and at last one morning, when the refreshments were running low, the head mason came to the door with perspiration streaming off his face and his legs wobbly, and said, “Get a black cock without a white feather and another keg of Charley Oge’s poteen, and with the help of Heaven we’ll lay him before morning.” And as the last crow went of the cock and the last drop out of the keg the Fanad Ghost was laid forever with a whiff of sulphur up the chimney and a trembling of the kitchen floor. (Laughter and applause.)

And so this Society is looking for the white cock of Truth to crow soon over the Scotch-Irish ghost, for if ever there was a veritable ghost it is the Scotch-Irishman in America. (Applause.)

The “Scotch-Irishman” in America, Mr. Dooley has told us, had his historic origin about the time of the great famine period in Ireland, when almost one-half of the inhabitants of that unfortunate land, starved, diseased and in rags, were huddled in cargo ships and treated worse than any negro slaves that ever came to this country. They died by thousands and strewed the bottom of the Atlantic with their bodies.

A friend of mine in a thriving Western city the other night met a man who is today one of the leading citizens in that place, and he said to my friend, “I am the sole survivor of five of my family who came over in those diseased and hellish ships in which England sent our people in the black days of the famine. My sister and my brother lie in the unfathomed caves of the Atlantic Ocean; my father and mother followed them. Twelve thousand of our race lie beneath the monument which the Ancient Order of Hibernians have erected on Groose Isle in the St. Lawrence below Quebec.”

And these unfortunate people, libelled before they landed, without means, without education, without knowledge of the people among whom they came, were not received with open arms. The resulting Anti-Irish feeling in the United States at that period has been most delicately and diplomatically pointed out by Mr. Dooley tonight. Men and women otherwise honest and unprejudiced stood appalled at the thought of nationally assimilating this wretchedness, and in that period the bitter prejudice against the Irish in America took root.

It was at this same time that American history began to take form, and the omissions, which are as criminal as some of the things they tell, crept into the books which our children read in school. And it is due to those omissions, Gentlemen, that this grand, painstaking and justice-seeking Society was formed.

If ever you want to get the white cock of Truth to crow over the Scotch-Irishman, take a look into the history of North Carolina. There is scarcely another state in America to which so many of the Northern Irish went before the Revolution as to North Carolina, and to no other state before the Revolution did so many Scotchmen go.

After the battle of Culloden, where the Scottish clans had so valiantly fought for Charles Edward, a number of them were given the privilege of leaving Great Britain and coming to America, first taking the oath of allegiance to the English crown. A great number of these broken clansmen came to North Carolina and they were there at the outbreak of the Revolution; but they had been preceded by a large number of Protestant Irishmen from the Province of Ulster.

If the Scotchman who went to Ireland in 1610, and from that until the seventeenth century, if he still remained obdurately a Scotchman, breaking the rule of all other races in Ireland, would he not have fraternized and made common cause with the Scotch people he met in the new world? On the contrary, when the Revolution broke out the broken clansmen, the MacDonalds, the MacNeils, the MacIntoshes, and even Flora MacDonald herself, the great heroine of story and song, became the most desperate loyalists and Torys in that state. They organized armies, they fought with courage and tenacity, and their leaders were guilty of horrible atrocities in putting down the Northern Irish, who were all patriots and Whigs and who are now called the “Scotch-Irish.”

The Irishmen in North Carolina, largely Presbyterians in religion, were unanimously patriotic as Americans from the beginning, and they did not assimilate with the Scotchmen, who came direct from Scotland. Flora MacDonald, whose story we all know, her five sons and her husband, entered the British Army and continued throughout the Revolution; that is, such of them as were not taken prisoners and expatriated to Nova Scotia, where her descendants are today most vigorous supporters of English rule. Her husband was early taken a prisoner of war and confined at Halifax, Virginia, and in 1776 Flora went back to Scotland, where she was afterwards rejoined by him.

To Worcester, Massachusetts, in the early Colonial days came three hundred Irishmen from the Province of Ulster, probably many from my own county of Donegal, to dwell among those ever hospitable and warm-hearted gentlemen, the Puritans. Here was a fine combination—a “Scotch Irish” Presbyterian meeting a Puritan, a Calvinistic Reunion! But how did they act when these three hundred men and women from Ulster arrived in Massachusetts? Perhaps some of you may think they were received with great hospitality. Well, they were not. They were received, says a “Scotch-Irish” historian, with marked aversion and bitter prejudice against them as being Irish. A gentleman writing in favor of the so called “Scotch Irish” in America says the New England colonists could not differentiate these _Irish Protestants_, though they were different in religion from the mass of Irishmen. Is not that a delicious confession in the papers of the Scotch Irish Society? The Puritans could not understand that they were anything but Irish; they recognized them as such and did everything to make it unpleasant for them (and they were artists in that work), and to get them out of the community as soon as they could, short of inviting a physical controversy, for looking at these stalwart Irishmen they made up their minds if it came to a fight, they could, in the language of the Bowery, put up a “peach” of a one. (Laughter and applause.)

The first man who died on the battlefield for American liberty, south of Mason and Dixon’s line, was a great “Scotch-Irish” Anglo-Saxon named John Grady; and when Grady died the captain of his army, Thomas Gove, a family well known to any Donegal man, took off his sword and deposited it with the body of Grady as a mark of respect and love for so brave and patriotic a man.

Now our great American historians, from Bancroft and Motley and Parkman down to Henry Cabot Lodge, have quietly ignored the Irish in America, or have given all the credit for their achievements to this myth, the “Scotch-Irishman.” It is a singular thing, when you read the things this Society puts before you, the absolute facts of history, that no American historian of Anglo-American ancestry has had the fairness and the courage and the sense of justice to do for Ireland what so many of them have done for other nationalities.

Mr. Motley wrote a whole library about the Dutch Republic, constituting a standard work among the Dutchmen of today of the history of their people and achievements. Mr. Parkman’s history of the French in Canada is unexcelled. Even that good historian, Mr. John Fiske, never rose above his environment; and I say it is no credit to American historians of the highest class that they have not seen fit to do justice to the patriotism, the sacrifices, the intellectual efforts and the financial contributions which the great body of the Irish people made to secure liberty to the United States. (Applause.)

Wouldn’t it have been a splendid and a generous thing if Motley had written a little of Ireland as he wrote of the Dutch Republic and the New Netherlands; if Parkman had done for Ireland in this country what he did for the French in Canada? And yet, from the earliest times, there came an unending stream to this country from Ireland of the cream of its chivalry and virtue, courage, industry and intellect, and sacrificed it most generously and without hope of reward at the altar of American liberty. (Applause.)

But the “Scotch-Irishman,” as considered, let us look at him. Now we will never understand the history of the Irish in America unless we go back to Ireland. I have a lot of friends among Americans of other stocks who undertake to appreciate the part the Irish have played in the upbuilding of this nation, but they can’t estimate it correctly unless they know something of the history of Ireland itself.

Every race that came to Ireland was assimilated. The Danes came, and those not driven to sea quickly became converted to Irish ideas. The Normans came, and they, too, became assimilated; and the Scotchmen came to Ireland, to the Plantation of Ulster, a subject too broad to be discussed now.

Commencing in 1610 and from that on to the end of the seventeenth century, the Scotchman came to Ireland, and he hadn’t been there long before he became civilized, smoothed, rounded, the heart of him given free play—in equality with the head; he joined the revolutionary societies such as the Irish had in those days, took pot shots at the landlord, and cultivated a sense of humor, conspired against English rule, and, coming to America, became a most bitter Rebel and a valiant soldier in Washington’s army.

Now I intend, at the request of your worthy Ex-President, Mr. Crimmins, who has done so much for this Society, to prepare some facts with reference to the settlement of Ulster, and what the immigrants from Ulster did in America, especially in the Revolutionary War. And I assert tonight, without fear of contradiction from any historian, American or English, that the blundering, unjust and criminal acts of England in Ireland, and especially in the province of Ulster, did more to fill the armies of George Washington with brave soldiers than almost any other cause. (Applause.)

If I were asked to point out one single thing that did more to make sure American liberty than any other, I would speak of the tithing of the Presbyterians in the province of Ulster. When this colony had been planted in Ulster on the “confiscated” lands of the O’Donnells and O’Neils and other septs, when these brave, intellectual, industrious, independent Scotch Celts (for that is what the large majority of them were) brought over to settle this province under promises not kept—and in this connection it should be remembered that these settlers had no part in the conspiracy of Sir Arthur Chichester and Sir John Davies and other English “Civilizers” and land grafters in despoiling the O’Donnells and O’Neils and minor Irish septs of 3,000,000 acres of the best land in Ulster—were confronted with the test oath of Queen Anne applied to Catholics and Presbyterians alike, when they were compelled to pay tithes, the same being taken from their fields of wheat or the corn from their barn, to support a church into which they would not enter in common with their Catholic fellow countrymen, upon emigrating to this country they became American Rebels on every battlefield in the United States. They came to the States before the Revolution in such numbers that in one year twelve thousand Ulster Presbyterian Irish left that province for American ports. The flow of immigration was so continued and so great in volume that it is a matter of record, which anyone can read in the State Papers, that the Presbyterian ministers of the province of Ulster petitioned the King to stop the immigration by repeal of obnoxious laws and alien injustice, or they would have no congregations left in Ireland.

You can trace them today from Londonderry, N. H., and Dublin in the same state, to Donegal in Pennsylvania, and down the whole Appalachian chain into Florida; and everywhere you will find settlements and towns bearing the good old Irish names and founded by these patriots, who stood by Washington and whose motto was, “No surrender to the British Government.” (Applause.)

On that subject alone I hope to be permitted, Mr. President, if I can find the leisure, to present to this Society, with due historical references, the truth of history as regards that period.

During the famine period that I spoke of there was a Cunard ship called the “Cephelonia.” The “Cephelonia” was one of the most celebrated ships of the Cunard line, and, during the famine period, she brought great numbers of Irish immigrants to Boston. One day not many years ago I was talking to a couple of Irish American friends of mine in Boston, when a third man came up and gave the time of day to my friend and passed on. One of my friends turned to the other and said, “Is he a ‘Mayflower’?” and my friend replied, “No, he,” said he, “is a ‘Cephelonian.’ The ‘Cephelonians’ now outnumber the ‘Mayflowers.’”

Now, my friends, I am really trespassing on your good nature because I am keeping you from a great treat. I came here tonight and found my countryman, McManus of Donegal, and then I found I had the honor of sitting next to a good man from County Tyrone (and next to Donegal Tyrone is a good substitute), the Rev. Dr. Sheppard.

All I have to say in conclusion is this: I say to my American friends, we are not seeking to inject a foreign story with foreign prejudices and old world bitterness into your history; we are not asking for any place in that history which we do not deserve; we are not asking you to subvert the facts of American history; we are making no special plea for our nationality or our race; but we are demanding justice and we are going to get it.

You younger members will live to see the time when, a convention of historians being called in the city of New York, as was the other day, your honored President will be invited to fill an enviable place in that convocation; and when the heads of our great universities, when the men who stand for the most learned in America, undertake to pass upon the historical phases of that period of our history from the beginning up to 1860, Ireland and Irish men and women will be given their proper place. (Applause.)

We need no vindication after 1860. We vindicated our place in American history on every battlefield of the Civil War. We were at Bull Run, at Fredericksburg, at Gettysburg and Appomattox. They cannot rub the Irish names off the records of the Civil War because they are too numerous. There was scarcely a home in Ireland in any county or parish which had not its representative under that flag when it was embattled and endangered on the fields of the South. (Applause.)

And I repeat it now; I have said it before and I repeat it now, that that horrible, fratricidal, prolonged and bloody conflict did as much for the Irish in America as it did for the negro whom it freed. It vindicated the patriotism and gratitude and loyalty of the Irishman, and the valor and chivalry of his race displayed by him under that flag, from the beginning to the close of the war, was second to none. And in every sacrifice that has been made to found or perpetuate this nation, Irish men and Irish women, Irish courage and Irish conscience, a never changing faith in God, a high Celtic idealism, which is the salt that gives savour to the gross materialism of the age, a firm belief in the divine and national mysteries, sound morals and gratitude, and devotion to American ideals, have played a most prominent part in the history of this, our beloved country. (Applause.)

PRESIDENT-GENERAL QUINLAN: I will be most grateful to Mr. McAdoo, if, before the next annual meeting of this Society, he will have the time and inclination to pen down the beautiful remarks that are in his brain tonight regarding the Irish in North Carolina.

His magnificent speech gives me a cleavage in my continuity of thought. There is a Society in the history of the city known as “St. Andrew’s.” This Society has $250,000 in its treasury. The illustrious Scotchmen have sought, by money, by force of will and by power, to perpetuate the traits and achievements of their race and they have done so.

Now I would appeal to all of you that when you feel the desire or when an occasion presents itself, you will aid us in the way the Scotchmen have aided their Society, by making a contribution to the American Irish Historical Society in order that we, too, may have an opportunity of exploiting our literary geniuses. This matter, ladies and gentlemen, I lay before you for your consideration and hope it may receive from you assimilative thought.

The most famous Irish societies in this country, the Hibernian Society in Boston, the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick in Philadelphia and the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick in this city, were all founded and brought about by the intense patriotism and zeal of Irish Protestants. It has been most gratifying for us to hear tonight that force and eloquence from one who came from the Province of Ulster. Now we will hear a re-echo, probably equally as eloquent, from one who came from a neighboring county in Ireland and settled within the borders of New York State. I have much pleasure in presenting to you the Rev. J. Havergal Sheppard, D. D., a member of our Society and the next speaker on the program, whose subject is

THE IRISH IN PROTESTANT DENOMINATIONS IN AMERICA.

_Rev. J. Havergal Sheppard, D. D.:_ Mr. President-General, Ladies and Gentlemen, Honored Guests and Fellow Members of the American Irish Historical Society: I esteem it a very great honor that you have conferred upon me tonight in asking me to speak at this, your annual gathering. I must confess that I feel somewhat embarrassed in facing such a body of distinguished Irishmen and their friends. It has not often been my lot to meet so many “Sons of the Ould Sod” or those whose Sires settled on these shores in the passing years as it is tonight. Nevertheless I am proud to be one of you on this occasion; in fact, I feel like a fellow countryman of mine, who was in the company of an Englishman and a Scotchman. They were complimenting each other, when the Englishman asked the Scotchman if he were not a Scotchman what would he be, and he answered, an Englishman. Then the Scotchman, not to be outdone, asked the Englishman if he was not an Englishman what he would be, and, of course, he answered a Scotchman. Then they turned to Pat, who had been listening to their expressions of friendship, and they asked him, “Pat, if you were not an Irishman, what would you be?” And he, in turn, in true Celtic fashion, answered, “If I was not an Irishman I would be ashamed of myself.” So if I was not an Irishman, after this gathering and greeting and what the Irish have done for this country, I would be ashamed of myself.

An old philosopher once said, “Let us give the past to oblivion, the present to duty, the future to Providence,” and I am sure we agree with him in two of his propositions, but we differ with his first. We are willing to give the present to duty and trust the future to Providence, but never give the past to oblivion; not until, at least, every true American knows the Irish chapter in American history. And it is such a body as this that will hasten that glad day for the Irish race, when men will know that we have as much right to these shores as any race that ever landed here. That starry flag, with its red for love and its white for law and its blue for the hope that our fathers saw in a larger liberty, has been consecrated with the blood of the liberty-loving sons of the sod.

There has never been a battle for right against wrong but “That rascal, Pat,” has been to the front, not only to fight as a private soldier, but to often lead the van as a commanding officer. We find him on the bench and at the bar pleading as an able lawyer; before the altar or in the pulpit, performing the sacred duties of religion. In fact, wherever you go or whatever profession or trade you enter you will find “That Rascal, Pat.” They are no newcomers to these shores, for shortly after that memorable landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock they made their way across the trackless main for this new land.

It was not the lure of gold but the love of liberty that brought them. Down-trodden and oppressed in the land of their birth, whether Roman Catholic or Non-conformist, by unjust and tyrannical laws passed by a government that had no sympathy with the suffering Irish, every possible means of culture were denied them, until life in the land they loved became unbearable; so those who were able to muster enough money and courage crossed the briny deep, with many sad farewells and heartbreaking partings.

It is true that many of those early settlers were from the north and had, undoubtedly, been descendents of men who settled there from Scotland and other parts of Britain and Europe; but they had been residents of Ireland for several generations before they emigrated here, and by the right of birth were “Sons of the Sod.” Many Americans of later days, as well as British historians, have given the glory to Scotland for what they did for America, and they always speak of them as Scotch-Irish, and when you ask the reason this is done they will tell you it is to distinguish between them and the Roman Catholic Irish, but supposing we follow that method in our historic research. We would have to say that every Episcopalian was an Englishman, that every Presbyterian was a Scotchman and every Roman Catholic was an Italian. But again they answer: These people came originally from Scotland, hence they are Scotch-Irish; but taking that for granted, which is not the whole truth, as we have many other races in Ireland, most of those early Scotch settlers bear Highland names and were not the Scotch Highlanders, the same race by blood, as the original Irish, and the only thing that made them Scotch was the fact of birth in Scotland; hence when they arrived back in Ireland they became Irish by the same right that they were Scotch, that of birth. In fact, they became more Irish than the Irish themselves. I think enough has been said to introduce my subject tonight.

It is my purpose to put on record a few facts in regard to the great part our fellow countrymen played in the Protestant denominations, in America. As I have already stated, most of the early Irish settlers on these shores came from Ulster and were of the Presbyterian faith. Cotton Mather says that previous to 1640 four thousand Presbyterians had arrived in New England, and there is no doubt that many of these came from Ireland. As early as 1662 a group of Irish and Scotch Presbyterians worshipped in Jamaica, Long Island, and it is claimed that this was the first church of that denomination on this continent.

Between 1670–1680 a body of Presbyterians settled on the eastern bank of the Elizabeth River in Virginia, who had with them their pastor from Ireland, who continued to labor among them until his death in 1683. Later one hundred families from Ireland settled Londonderry, New Hampshire, bringing their pastor, Rev. James McGregore, who faithfully and affectionately labored for their good.

As early as 1680 several families of Irish Presbyterians settled in the lower counties of Maryland and erected several houses of worship, as a letter from one of them, Colonel William Stevens, was presented in 1680 to the Laggan Presbytery in Ireland, requesting that a minister by sent to labor in Maryland, and in 1683 the Rev. Francis Makemie arrived by the way of Barbadoes and founded the church at Snow Hill. For several years he labored as an itinerant preacher or missionary, founding churches or strengthening those already started.

“This pioneer of the church,” says a Presbyterian authority, “was born in County Donegal, Ireland, and was so earnest, fearless and indefatigable that he persevered so well in obtaining fellow laborers, though he must cross the ocean for them, and in 1704 brought out two young men, one being John Hampton, a fellow countryman. He was instrumental in organizing the first classical assembly of the Presbyterian church in America, 1706.”

Under the name of the “Presbytery of Philadelphia,” with the Presbytery of Dublin as a model, Makemie being elected moderator and thus logically becoming the founder of organized Presbyterianism in America.

In 1716 there arrived in New York the Rev. William Tennent with his three sons, Gilbert, William, Jr., and John, from the County Armagh. After a period of labor in New York State he was called to the pastorate of the Presbyterian church at Neshiminy, Penn., where he established “The Log College” in 1726, himself an eminent scholar. He trained a number of godly and useful young men for the ministry, among who were Samuel Blair and his own three sons. This college was the foundation of which the present Princeton University was built and all those whom I have mentioned, as well as others who graduated, became leaders in the denomination. It would be superfluous for me to weary you with an account of all the great Presbyterian ministers who came to our shores from the Emerald Isle. Suffice to say that the names of Makemie, Mackie, Hampton, Tennent, Blair, Drs. Neill, Junkin, Elliott, Murry, Allison, Potts, Patterson and Hall stand out in letters of gold in the successful history of that church.

1760. A party of Irish emigrants might be seen at the Custom House Quay in Limerick, preparing to leave their native land for these congenial shores. One of the company, a young man with thoughtful look and resolute bearing, entered the vessel and from the deck preached a farewell sermon to those friends who were to be left behind. This was no other than Philip Embury, who was destined to play a prominent part in the Methodist denomination in America. It was in 1766 that he first conducted services in New York in his own house to five people. As the congregation increased he removed to a rigging loft, then building with his own hands the first Methodist church in the new world, which was called “Wesley Chapel” after the founder of the denomination in the old land. It was situated on John street, and on Oct. 30th, 1768, Embury preached the sermon of dedication.

Sometime in 1770, after Rev. Robert Williams, another fellow countryman arrived in New York, he removed to Camden Valley with several Irish families, then a vast wilderness, and organized the Methodist society at Ashgrove, which was named after another Irishman, Thomas Ashton, and there he labored until his death in 1773. At the age of 45 years his remains, after several removals and not even a stone to mark the spot where slept the silent dust, now rests under a marble shaft erected by the National Local Preachers’ Association of the Methodist Episcopal church in the village cemetery at Cambridge, N. Y., on which the following inscription appears: “Philip Embury, the earliest American minister of the Methodist Episcopal church, here finds his last resting place.” Born in Ireland, an emigrant to New York, Embury was the first to gather a little class in that city to set in motion a train of influences which resulted in the founding of the John street church, the cradle of American Methodism, the introduction of a system which has beautified the earth with salvation and increased the joys of heaven.

It is worthy of note that this inscription was penned by a famous fellow countryman of Embury, the Rev. Dr. John Newell Maffitt, the silver-tongued orator of southern Methodism.

HONORABLE CHARLES ALEXANDER,

Of Providence.

Vice-President of the Society for Rhode Island.
]

Simultaneously with Embury’s ministry in New York another Irishman, Rev. Robert Strawbridge, who was born at Drumsnagh, County Leitrim, and who, like Embury, had been a preacher in Ireland, settled at Sams Creek, Frederick County, Maryland, where he organized several Methodist societies. He had all the characteristic traits of his fellow countryman. He was generous, energetic, versatile and somewhat intractable to authority. During his life he was poor and his family were often straitened for food. His members appreciated his genuine zeal and self-sacrifice, so they took care of his little farm gratuitously in his absence.

Strawbridge founded Methodism in Baltimore and Hartford counties, where he raised up several preachers, among who were numbered Owen, Stephenson, Perigau, Webster, Watters, Gatch, Haggerty, Durbin and Garrettson. We discover him penetrating into Pennsylvania and then arousing the population of the eastern shore of Maryland. We trace him at last to the upper part of Long Green, Baltimore County, where an opulent and generous public citizen, who admired his character and sympathized with his poverty, gave him a farm free of rent for life. It was during one of his visiting rounds to his spiritual children that he was taken sick at the home of Joseph Wheeler and died in the summer of 1781. His grave may be seen today in the Mount Olivet cemetery at Baltimore, where his greatest success was achieved.

Robert Williams, with whom we became acquainted on his arrival in New York and whose passage was paid from Ireland by his friend, Thomas Ashton, and who took charge of the John street church, New York, after Embury, was the pioneer Methodist in Virginia, forming a society in Norfolk, 1772, which was the germ of the denomination in the state. In 1773 he traveled in various sections of the state, preaching and forming societies, then extending his ministry into North Carolina, where he also was the first to plant Methodism. A signal example of his usefulness was the conversion of Jesse Lee, the heroic founder of Methodism in New England. He died on the 26th of September, 1775.

“He was a plain, pointed preacher, indefatigable in his labors,” says a historian of the church, and another says, “His grave is unknown but he will live in the history of the Methodist church forever.”

Time would fail me to tell of all the Sons of Erin who labored in those early days for the success of the Methodist cause, but enough has been said to prove, at least, that Irishmen can claim a large place in the founding of that denomination on these shores.

In the year of 1809 there came to America from Ballymena, County Antrim, Ireland, Thomas Campbell and his son Alexander. They were men of sterling character, marked ability and decided convictions. For several years they were active and successful workers in the Baptist denomination and in 1823 Alexander Campbell established the _Christian Baptist_ and continued as its editor until his break with that denomination on doctrinal grounds, and in 1827 he organized the Church of the Disciple of Christ. So successful became his ministry that a college was demanded for the training of young men for the ministry and in 1840 he established Bethany College at Bethany, West Virginia, which has sent out in the world more than eleven thousand graduates in the past seventy years, and the denomination which he founded ranks fifth in the protestant denominations in America, with a membership of over one million and a half.

He died March 4th, 1866, and his remains rest in Bethany, West Virginia.

I wish I had time to tell you of those of Irish birth who filled prominent positions in the pulpits of these denominations in later years. At one period three of Erin’s sons adorned the pulpits of New York City: Rev. Dr. George S. Rainsford, of St. George’s Protestant Episcopal Church; Rev. Dr. John Hall, of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, and Rev. Dr. Henry M. Gallagher, of the Hanson Place Baptist Church of Brooklyn.

I have presented these facts, not to arouse religious strife, but rather to give glory to the land of my birth for what her sons have done on these shores, in peace as well as in war.

I am happy to say we are not here representing any sect but a country; in fact, we are all Irishmen tonight.

We have done much for America and well may we be proud of it, but never forget that America has done much for us.

When it was impossible for us to develop the latent powers born in our race in the land we loved we found the opportunities so badly needed under the folds of that starry banner, to the joy of every true Irish heart in this and the old land.

I hope that we will get to know each other as the years go by and that this organization will grow and flourish to the true glory of “Dear Old Ireland.”

God bless you, I say, however you pray;
Your faith will ne’er meet my derision.
Can’t we kindly talk o’er this matter, asthore,
And band curse, strife and division.
And we’ll love one another, my Catholic brother,
Like loyal-souled Irishmen ever.
And the heathenish strife that’s consuming our life,
We’ll bury it forever and ever.

PRESIDENT-GENERAL QUINLAN: Ladies and gentlemen, tomorrow will soon be here, when we can all rest, but an intellectual treat such as you have tonight is seldom offered this assemblage to participate in. One of the great features of this Society is to have annual meetings, and these are prefaced by holding Executive Council meetings at different places. Last summer the Executive Council met in the city of Providence, and while there one of our number entertained us with that pure Celtic hospitality. This gentleman is one of the few who has participated in every event since his advent into the Society, and it is he, Alexander, who entertained the Executive Council in his princely style at Macedonia. I now present to you, Ladies and Gentlemen, Colonel Charles Alexander of Providence, Vice-President of the Society for the State of Rhode Island.

HON. CHARLES ALEXANDER: Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, it is indeed a privilege and an honor for me to meet you tonight for the first time as a new member.

I met one of the gentlemen of this association a few days ago, and calling him by name I said, “Do you know that I have been railroaded to the speakers table January 8th?” He said, “That is good,” but I said, “No, that is bad, for I don’t know what to say.”

It reminded me very much of the story of two men who met. One said to the other, “I have been married since I met you last.” “That is good.” “Not so good; my wife has a temper.” “That’s bad.” “Not so bad; she’s got some money.” “That’s good.” “Not so good; I put the money into sheep and they all died.” “That’s bad.” “Not so bad; I got the wool.” “That’s good.” “Not so good; I put the proceeds of the wool into a tavern, and the tavern burned to the ground.” “That’s bad.” “Not so bad; my wife burned with it.”

Mr. Toastmaster, I am from Rhode Island, and you know what that means, Ladies and Gentlemen. It means that the hand of good cheer is always extended to anyone visiting our shores. (Applause.)

I will take but a very few moments of your time.

The first tablet to be placed in the State House of Rhode Island in honor of an eminent Rhode Islander is that of John Sullivan. It occupies a conspicuous niche near the main entrance, and was placed there by this Society. Our State House has ample provision for many more such memorials, but this is the only one which has been erected at the present time.

The American Irish who are making history today will be memorialized by the descendants of some of the present gathering because of their achievements, many of whom, I trust, are at this hour here assembled. This Society has reason to be proud of the exploits of those whose worthy deeds it celebrates on every such occasion, and the whole country should share with it such pride. In all the wars in the country’s history, they have occupied a position to be proud of, throughout the peaceful periods, in the halls of legislation and in public life; but the honors to be celebrated are not as yet all achieved.

Americans of Irish descent are making new names every day, contributing new achievements to the record of the country’s service, which future meetings of this organization in years to come will surely celebrate. The achievements of the past will be a stimulation in the future to every member to become worthy of the tribute of this Society; and from this fact will be no small incentive to exalted service. So I say—from the present generation—right from around this board, history will select for remembrance and fame more honorable names to add to the roll, which it will be the privilege and the duty of this Society to preserve.

Ladies and Gentlemen, you are a friend to man, and this association means something. You are a friend to man, and may I be permitted to recite just two or three verses in that line? They emanate from the pen of a gentleman who has the ability to put splendid thoughts into words.

There are hermit souls that live withdrawn
In the place of their self-content;
There are souls, like stars, that dwell apart,
In a fellowless firmament;
There are pioneer souls that blaze their paths
Where the highways never ran;
But let me live by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

Let me live in a house by the side of the road,
Where the race of men go by—
The men who are good and the men who are bad,
As good and as bad as I.
I would not sit in the scorner’s seat,
Or hurl the cynic’s ban—
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I see from my house by the side of the road,
By the side of the highway of life,
The men who press on with the ardor of hope,
And the men who are faint with the strife.
But I turn not away from their smiles or their tears—
Both parts of an infinite plan;—
Let me live in my house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I know there are brook-gladdened meadows ahead
And mountains of wearisome height;
That the road passes on through the long afternoon
And stretches away to the night.
But still I rejoice when the travellers rejoice,
And weep with the strangers that moan,
Nor live in my house by the side of the road,
Like a man who dwells alone.

Let me live in a house by the side of the road,
Where the race of men go by—
They are good, they are bad, they are weak, they are strong,
Wise, foolish—so am I.
Then why should I sit in the scorner’s seat,
Or hurl the cynic’s ban?—
Let me live in my house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I thank you, Ladies and Gentlemen. (Applause.)

PRESIDENT-GENERAL QUINLAN: We have been entertained by many distinguished orators in the past and even on this great occasion in our Society’s History—the classic prose is every-day work but poetry seems almost a gift of inspiration. One of our number has again drawn his pen, called upon the Muse, and how readily she has answered him you soon shall know. I will only mention our Poet’s name, Mr. John Jerome Rooney, who will read a poem which he has composed and dedicated to our Society.

MR. JOHN JEROME ROONEY: Mr. President, “Ballad of Saucy Jack Barry.” The incident which is the subject of these lines is one of the picturesque incidents in the life of John Barry, the father of the American Navy.

The incident occurred in the winter of 1778, February 26, and the scene was the Delaware River. The British were occupying Philadelphia at the time, and a British fleet was anchored in the Delaware, opposite the city of Philadelphia. John Barry, with his ship, “Effingham,” and two or three smaller boats, had been compelled to take refuge, in the presence of a superior fleet, in the upper waters of the Delaware at Burlington; but it was not the intention of John Barry to sit still while there was a possibility of adventure of any kind, and he petitioned Congress, after he had been there only three or four weeks, to be allowed to make an attack upon a British war vessel that was anchored in the lower Delaware, by name the “Alert,” that was convoying two transports filled with food and forage for the sustenance of the British in Philadelphia. The request was granted, and the story that I have tried to tell is the story of how John Barry went down the river; the result I will leave to the fortunes of the rhyme.

BALLAD OF SAUCY JACK BARRY.

(Episode of February 26, 1778.)

They have taken the old rebel city of Penn;
Lord Howe, he has filled it with red-coated men.
“What terror,” said he, “has the winter for me,
Since I hold the town and my ships hold the sea?”

But it never is safe, in making a boast,
To reckon too easy, not counting your host;
Or is it quite prudent to count on your boat
When saucy Jack Barry is up and afloat?

There were banquets for Captains and plenty for all;
The horses had forage, too much for the stall;
Double rations were served—in truth ’twas a feast,
And prospects were cheery for man and for beast.

But bins have a bottom and larders grow thin
When plenty comes out and nothing goes in;
But his Lordship smiled blandly such trifles away—
“The ‘Alert’ and two transports are down in the Bay!”

But it never is safe, in making a boast,
To reckon too easy, not counting your host;
Or is it quite prudent to count on your boat
When saucy Jack Barry is up and afloat?

The Delaware waters come down with a sweep
Past Burlington town, snow-clad and asleep,
And there lay our “Effingham,” silent and stark,
A ghost of the sea, looming up thro’ the dark.

Then, sudden, four boats sweep out from her side,
With oars swift and muffled swing down in the tide;
The moon has gone black, the wind whistles high,
And the scud of the thunder-storm darkens the sky.

Down the river they went, like the flight of a bird;
The twenty and seven said never a word—
They are after the fox of the ocean again,
And they’ll make not a stir as they enter his den.

It was three o’ the clock when, faintly ahead,
The lights of the city flashed yellow and red—
Then, sudden, a gleam, a cannon’s dull roar,
A challenge and halt from the river and shore.

But, surely, no need then to speak to them twice—
Four nautical heels were shown in a trice;
Down thro’ the night, like a hound, they’re away
To the lair of their quarry in Delaware Bay.

The sun had come up when they rounded Port Penn.
And O what a sight there for gods and for men!
A schooner (ten guns pointed out from her side,
With the flag of the Briton) swung free in the tide.

With a leap like a tiger the boats swung around,
Then straight for the Briton, with bound upon bound.
“Grapple tight!” cried the Captain, and guiding his band,
Up the side went Jack Barry, with cutlass in hand!

He is over the rails in the flash of an eye,—
“Strike, strike yonder flag or, by heaven, you die!”
But never a hand or a foot there did turn;
They were frozen with terror from stem unto stern.

With a yell the bold Britons their weapons let go,
Then, like mice in a pantry, they scurried below.
“Boys, batter the hatches,” called Jack to his men;
“We have got the red fox, at last, in his den.”

The “Kitty” and “Mermaid” awoke, with a start,
With the guns of their gallant trained straight at their heart.
Their “Alert” was caught napping (drowsy lovers, beware!)
And saucy Jack Barry had captured the fair.

“Ho, run her in shore to yonder good pier;
We’ll see how the foxes are burrowing here.
Now loosen the hatches! Come foe or come friend!
You’ll find Yankee sailors will take either end!”

Then up came a Major; forsooth, he was glum;
Two Captains, lieutenants, a man with a drum;
Ten soldiers paced out, then a hundred marines,
Like a troop in a play, strode out from the scenes!

O the twenty and seven who came down thro’ the night
Were as proud as the Cæsars to see such a sight;
Three cheers, and three more boomed up, like the seas,
As the flag of the Stars broke out on the breeze!

O it is never safe, in making a boast,
To reckon too easy, not counting your host;
Nor is it quite prudent to count on your boat
When saucy Jack Barry is up and afloat!
JOHN JEROME ROONEY.

PRESIDENT-GENERAL QUINLAN: Owing to the absence of Hon. W. A. Prendergast, who has been kept away by illness, we will proceed to the next speaker. I will ask you all to remain seated for a little while longer. I introduce to you one of the most distinguished Irishmen in our great city,—the man who, on every occasion where the cause of Ireland could be voiced, has stood in the foremost ranks; and, although he has petitioned me tonight to let him off, it would be like the play of “Hamlet” without Hamlet. I will ask Hon. John W. Goff, one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, to say a few words to this assemblage. (Applause.)

HON. PATRICK F. McGOWAN.

President of the Board of Aldermen and Acting Mayor
of New York. 1906, 1907, 1908, and 1909.

Life Member of the Society.
]

HON. JOHN W. GOFF: The hour is late. I beg of you to excuse me tonight and grant the privilege of allowing me to speak at some other time, when I shall have the advantage of being better prepared. (Applause.)

PRESIDENT-GENERAL QUINLAN: We have at our table a dark horse in the Lists of Orators, and one who has often entertained, edified and educated his auditors, not only by easy rhetoric, show of measured eloquence, but also by the erudition of his thoughtful words. I take the privilege of introducing to you Mr. Edward M. Tierney.

MR. EDWARD M. TIERNEY: Mr. Toastmaster, Ladies and Gentlemen, it would be most ungenerous for me to make a distinction of a different character from that already presented by the honorable gentleman who has just sat down and attempt, at this late hour, to give you the speech that I had prepared for this evening.

You have been regaled with oratory sublime; all that is great and glorious to the Irishman has been brought down deep into the recesses of his heart tonight by the preceding speakers. I have a speech that I may twist and distort, perhaps, to suit the hour without making it too lengthy, and, if you will bear with me for a few moments, I may interest you before I sit down.

When your President-General invited me to make this speech he was full of prescience, if I may call it so, for he limited me to ten minutes. Why he placed this restriction on me some two weeks ago I was then at a loss to understand; but it is very plain to me tonight, Ladies and Gentlemen, the object being to give the President-General an unbridled opportunity to furnish all the hot air for this occasion himself. That’s all right, for he belongs to a profession that understands the symptomatic temperament of an audience, and can tell just when to administer the anæsthetic. It’s about time to do it now, Doctor.