[Janalyn Voigt] The Irish in America

On St. Patrick’s Day, Americans of Irish descent have something to boast about. A smidgeon of Irish blood is all it takes. How times have changed. Attitudes toward the Irish were quite different in Wild West days.

Writing about an Irish family surviving in the Wild West, as I did with Montana Gold, automatically brings up the topic of prejudice. The series opens during 1863, a time of upheaval in America. The War Between the States raged in the East. Conflicts between Indians and settlers took lives. Lawlessness dominated towns and mining camps. Road agents lay in wait for travelers carrying gold.

Into this historical setting, insert Shane Hayes, an Irish circuit preacher. He arrived in America during the potato famine that decimated Ireland for seven years, beginning in 1845. As an orphan cast upon the mercies of his alcoholic uncle, Shane survived in the slums of Manhattan. Ports of entry were overwhelmed with not only the Irish, but also immigrants from other countries. Jobs and adequate housing were both scarce. Many of the Irish who fled to America wound up in lower Manhattan’s Five Points Slum. The immigrants crammed into rickety tenements perched above a toxic landfill. The conditions gave rise to diseases, and the desperate situation gave rise to gang activity, violent crime, prostitution, and child mortality. Shane managed to escape the slum by accepting help from a circuit preacher. The slum left an indelible mark on him, however. Shane felt he had something to prove.   

Starving woman with children during the Irish Potato Famine. Image from the Illustrated London News, December 22, 1849 / Public domain

During the Great Hunger, many of Ireland’s poor left by way of Liverpool for America. Crammed into the steerage compartments of ‘coffin ships,’ they endured rotting food, inadequate sanitation, cramped quarters, and foul air below decks. Cholera, typhus, and other sicknesses took a toll. Thousands succumbed. Those who survived the journey had to pass a doctor’s inspection at the debarkation stations in Boston and New York. Anyone who exhibited poor health was quarantined. Inadequate facilities and overcrowded conditions resulted in even more deaths.

Bry, the heroine of Cheyenne Sunrise (Montana Gold, book two), struggles to accept the loss of her mother and young brother, who died aboard the ship that brought her family to America. When Bry travels West with her brother, she is drawn to Nick Laramie, her wagon train’s half-Cheyenne trail guide. Her brother objects to any attachment between them. He bases his opinion on the fear that marrying Nick would cause her to suffer prejudice. I wanted to show that prejudice itself is not defined by skin color.

A street in the Five Points Slum: Jacob Riis / Public domain

A British stereotype that targeted the Irish painted them as ignorant and lazy ‘bog-trotters.’ This prejudice unfortunately followed the Irish to America. Men, regardless of their names, were dubbed ‘Paddy,’ depicted as an ape-like caricature. Women were ridiculed as ‘Bridget.’

Con Walsh, Shane’s cousin and hero of Stagecoach to Liberty (Montana Gold, book 3), feels he brings the slum with him wherever he goes. Shane doesn’t voice this thought, but his actions reveal his agreement.

Upper-class women being led by police through the Five Points slum: Public domain

I wanted to show the very real damage that prejudice inflicts. Freeing ourselves from the opinions of others is never easy. Con and Shane must both learn in different ways to rely on God to free them from low self-esteem and the pain of their pasts.

Prejudice stems from beliefs about others that are often untrue. The Forever Sky (Montana Gold, book 4) demonstrates the power of false beliefs. Con and Bry’s brother, Rob feels that the woman he loves will never love him in return. His struggles, as Shane did, with the need to prove his worth.

Liberty, heroine of The Promise Tree (Montana Gold, book 5), is a pastor’s daughter who believes she should marry an upstanding man. She embraces this desire despite being in love with her misunderstood childhood sweetheart. Jake has a reputation as a troublemaker. Liberty’s choice of husband leaves out one important fact. Not one of us truly worthy. Jesus died on the cross to bridge this gap for all of us. Elevating one person, or one group of people, over another, denies His sacrifice.

The way to overcome prejudice, is to follow the two great commandments (found in Matthew 22:36-40). The first and greatest is to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, soul, and mind. The second is like the first—to love your neighbor as yourself.