While supplying this missing chapter in American history, you are at the same time helping to supply a missing chapter in Rhode Island history. The Irish chapter in the history of Rhode Island has its roots away back in the days of Roger Williams. But it is little known by this generation. In the old colonial days men of Irish blood figured prominently in this land of refuge. Like Williams and his colleagues, they found here a haven of peace, found rest and freedom. Many soldiers of Irish birth or extraction battled during King Philip’s War, 1675–76, in defense of the homes and lives of the settlers. Not a few of them participated in the Great Swamp Fight in Southern Rhode Island, and settled here when that war had ended. We may mention as an interesting fact that an Irishman, Robert Beers, was killed by the Indians in 1676 within a few miles of where you meet to-night. Another Irishman, Charles Macarty (McCarthy), was one of the founders in 1677 of our town of East Greenwich. The town of Warren in this state was named in honor of an Irishman, Sir Peter Warren, whose deeds of valor no word of ours need chronicle. Irish Rhode Islanders are heard from in the capture of Louisburg, and there the bones of some of them repose to this day. The Revolution found among its most ardent supporters in Rhode Island men of Irish lineage. The Blacks, the Dorrances, the Sterlings, the Larkins, and a host of other people of Hibernian origin are evidence of this. General Knox, a member of the Boston Charitable Irish Society, was here during the early part of the Revolution; Gen. John Sullivan, son of the Irish schoolmaster, commanded the Rhode Island Department for a considerable period, and was in command of the patriot forces at the siege of Newport and the battle that ensued. His brother James, the Governor of Massachusetts, received in after years the degree of LL.D. from Brown University. You see, therefore, gentlemen, that Rhode Island is rich in historic material for your society. The shaft needs but be sunk to bring the treasures to the surface. Your coming here on this occasion helps to sink it. We Rhode Islanders are very proud of our little state. That much of the Irish chapter in the history of this state is but little known we acknowledge and regret. Yet some of it we do know. We recall many noble men that Ireland has given us—Berkeley, McSparran, Brown, Jackson, and the rest. We recall the Irishman Wilson, who was head of one of the first free schools opened in Providence, and of those other Irish schoolmasters here at an early day—Kelly, Reilly, Knox, Phelan. May their memory be in benediction!