Finding Home

Cleveland's population exploded after the Civil War. In the 1860s, Bishop Amadeus Rappe--the French-born clergyman in charge of the fledgling Cleveland Diocese--began subdividing old parishes and designating new ones to accommodate the city's rapid growth. However, Bishop Rappe was resistant to Catholic immigrants over-investing in their ethnic heritage. Believing that they should identify as Catholics first and foremost, he often tried to mix and match French and German priests with Irish flocks. However, Irish-born priests and parishioners increasingly made clear that they wanted parishes that harbored and protected tight-knit Irish immigrant communities.

Irish-born Civil War veterans returned to Cleveland with a new-found confidence. They had just helped to win a war. Some Irish veterans began to think about advancing another just cause -- freedom for their native country. Returning veterans joined the Fenian Brotherhood -- which aimed to stir up American support for overthrowing British rule in Ireland. Plans coalesced around a proposed (and ill-advised) invasion -- of Canada! Cleveland was in the thick of Fenian activity, serving as a rendezvous point for Fenians headed toward Canada from points west and south. But unsurprisingly, the US government did not want war with Britain in Canada, and squelched the short-lived Fenian movement.

The Confederate army attacked Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861. Five days later, forty-nine of Cleveland’s Hibernian Guards--an "all-Irish" local militia company--volunteered for the Union war effort as a group. They were absorbed into Company B of the 8th Ohio Volunteer Infantry and fought at Antietam, Fredericksburg, and many other battles, playing a pivotal role during the Battle of Gettysburg. After the war, returning veterans filled Cleveland's newly organized police and fire departments. An Irish-born veteran championed the cause of the Soldiers and Sailors Monument on Cleveland's Public Square.

The Famine Irish in Cleveland were quick to heed the anti-drink message being popularized in Ireland and America by Fr. Theobald Mathew. The  "Apostle of Temperance" visited Cleveland in 1851, and thousands of Fr. Mathew's countrymen "took the pledge" to refrain from alcohol.  "Cold  Water Men" they were called, the followers of Fr. Mathew.  The "Fr. Mathew Total Abstinence Society" was first mentioned as marching in a Cleveland St. Patrick's Day Parade in 1854. As parishes for Irish congregations grew in number, Temperance Societies proliferated and assumed a larger part in Parade planning and marching. The Cold Water Men were as proud of their heritage as the Hibernian Guards--and both strove to prove that they belonged in their new home.

The Hibernian Guards were a local militia group who came on the Cleveland scene in about 1847--just as Famine immigrants were arriving here in growing numbers.  Militia companies were a holdover from the War of 1812--part army reserves, past local police force, and even larger part ceremonial parade unit. The Hibernian Guards took their place among other local militia companies such as The Cleveland Grays, and the Cleveland Jaegers. The Hibernian Guards began taking the lead on the St. Patrick's Day Parade and launched an annual banquet. Find out about how the Hibernian Guards conveyed the pride of Irish immigrants in Cleveland and supported the cause of Irish nationhood.

Once the Famine Immigrants arrived in Cleveland, they started putting down roots. Many early immigrants practiced what today we'd call "chain migration." The initial immigrants who came in search of work were eventually joined by family members from Ireland, leading to whole extended families transplanting their lives, their loved ones, and their old communities into the new city. 

Many of these immigrants became laborers. A few eventually started their own businesses. Rooting themselves in their new American place, the Famine immigrants found many different paths to success as they pursued the American Dream and created a new home.

The Irish who immigrated due to the Famine in the late 1840's and early 1850's faced a harrowing journey across the Atlantic Ocean -- crammed  into overcrowded "Coffin Ships" with little food, and even less sanitation.

Once in the United States, they often experienced discrimination.

A xenophobic political movement sprang up called the "Know Nothings" – the “Know Nothings” were American-born Protestants who harassed Irish  immigrants and burnt down Catholic churches. Irish immigrants were met with “No Irish Need Apply” signs. Without acknowledging the discrimination that the Irish faced, Protestant abolitionists chided them for not embracing the anti-slavery movement.

The hardships faced by early Irish immigrants reveal an ugly nativist impulse that shows up again and again in United States history, as each fresh wave of "others" is vilified. The Irish refugees of the 1850's -- fleeing a decimated and depleted land in search of safety and opportunity -- are not so very different from today's Syrian refugees or Central American immigrants. And the alienating discrimination Irish immigrants initially faced was just a tiny fraction of the relentless discrimination Black people faced and continue to face to this day.

Perhaps by remembering the Irish experience, we can learn not repeat it.

By the way, in this episode mistakenly cites the magazine Harper's Bazaar. The periodical should have been cited as Harper's Weekly.

The Catholic Diocese of Cleveland formed in 1847, just as both Irish Catholics fleeing the Famine and German Catholics fleeing a failed revolution converged on the banks of the Cuyahoga River. These immigrant groups both formed their own ethnic neighborhoods, and petitioned the Diocese to form distinct ethnic parishes, as well. Soon, English speaking churches for the Irish, and German speaking churches for the Germans dotted the lands around the Cuyahoga, all anchored by a grand new Cathedral in what would become downtown Cleveland. 

The first Catholic church in the area was St. Mary's on the Flats (the congregation was founded in 1826, but the church structure itself wasn't built and dedicated until 1840). It served all Catholics, regardless of their ethnicity. The first specifically Irish parishes were St. Patrick's on Bridge (founded in 1853), and Holy Name (founded in 1854).

The first resident pastor of St. Patrick's on Bridge - Irishman Fr. James Conlan - became a beloved figure in the Irish community and the city of Cleveland at large. He was described as a steady and sympathetic shepherd for those who had endured the trauma of the Famine. He had such a big impact on his fledgling congregation of immigrants that his funeral procession stretched for more than three miles. 

The immigration wave caused by The Great Irish Potato Famine coincided with the coming of the railroad to Cleveland.

But those fleeing the famine were ill-equipped to hit the ground running in this rapidly industrializing trade nexus.

Instead, immigrants who'd left Ireland before the Famine and were already in the United States were better positioned to take immediate advantage of the railroad boom--Examples include a railroad and ore dock contractor, a brass foundry owner, and an iron works owner.

Irish immigrants in the 1830s and 1840s take advantage of the boomtown economy resulting from the Ohio and Erie Canal--transitioning from transient laborers to settled entrepreneurs in a fledgling city. This episode follows a farmer, a grocer, a teamster, and a a tug-boat titan, all forging their own paths in a new city within a new world.