This is the brief story of an humble Irish emigrant. No diarist has recorded his doings, no writer has extolled his virtues. He lived the quiet life of the ordinary man and performed his duty faithfully. His character as pictured in the affairs and acts of his life shows the man—true and noble-hearted. THE IRISH SETTLERS OF PELHAM, MASS. BY MARY LESSEY LINEHAN, HARTFORD, CONN. Almost every civil war, rebellion, insurrection, and outbreak in Ireland, from the time of the Tudors downwards, arose more or less directly from questions connected with the possession of lands. It was the land question which helped to drive the Presbyterian Irish out, to become pioneer Irish settlers in America. Whole villages of Irish people were depopulated. These clearances gave vast numbers of Irish settlers to America before the Revolutionary War, and supplied the American army with a body of brave, determined men. Massachusetts received a very large proportion of the Irish in the eighteenth century, and being far the most important of the old colonies, the history of its early settlement is, consequently, interesting. One of the most interesting inland settlements in the state of Massachusetts is the town of Pelham, situated in the northwestern part of Hampshire county, settled by Irish immigrants in 1738‒9. An historical spot, as it was the dwelling place of that patriotic soldier, Daniel Shea, who, after the Revolution, was one of the leaders in “Shays’ Rebellion.” In 1738 Robert Peibles, blacksmith, and James Thornton, yeoman, two Irish immigrants, made a contract with Col. John Stoddard of Northampton, Mass., for the purchase of his section of “Equivalent Lands,” with the purpose of establishing thereon a colony of settlers “who shall be such as were inhabitants of the Kingdom of Ireland or their descendants.” This contract having been carried into effect, Colonel Stoddard sold the land to Robert Peibles, Patrick Peibles, James Thornton, Andrew McFarland and others named in the deed. These with their families became the first settlers of Pelham. Among the early settlers are the familiar Celtic names, McCullough, McCullom, McConkey, Dick, Taylor, Gray, McClain, Breckenridge, Gilmore, Macklan, McLachay, McNutt, McConnell, Cochran, Savage, Hamilton, McMullen, McCartney, Joyce, Rankin, White, McFall, Butler, Felton, Hoar, Griffin, Kelley, McNiell, McLallen, McClintock. The new settlement was called New Lisburn, after the town of Lisburn in the southern part of County Antrim, on the banks of the Lagan, in Ireland. Some of the settlers coming from Lisburn wished to call their new home after the mother town, and until 1743 the settlement was called New Lisburn, when it was changed to Pelham.