The journal of the American-Irish Historical Society, Vol. VI, 1906Various
History
The journal of the American-Irish Historical Society, Vol. VI, 1906
Various
American-Irish Historical Society -- Periodicals; Ethnology -- United States -- Periodicals; Irish Americans -- Periodicals
William Findlay, who was born in Ireland in 1750, came to Pennsylvania
in August, 1763, and taught school in Westmoreland County for several
years after his arrival. He was elected to the state Legislature from
Westmoreland County, and was a member of Congress from 1791 to 1799, and
again from 1803 to 1817. He was a prominent writer and pamphleteer on
subjects devoted to the public welfare. He was a member of the Hibernian
Society.
Among the members of the Hibernian Society who were elected in 1790,
Francis Donnelly, John Barry, John Heffernan and James Kidd are
described as schoolmasters in Philadelphia.
Patrick Farrall, who joined the Society in 1792, and who is described as
“the first clerk in the office for settling accounts between the United
States and individual states” after independence had been won, is
thought to have been a Pennsylvania schoolmaster.
Andrew Porter, a member of the Hibernian Society, opened “an English and
Mathematical School” in Philadelphia in 1767, in which he taught till
1776, when he was appointed a captain of marines and ordered to the
frigate _Effingham_. He was a son of Robert Porter, who emigrated from
Derry to New Hampshire in 1720, and who afterwards removed to Montgomery
County, Pa. He was transferred from the marine corps to the command of
the Fourth Pennsylvania Artillery, which post he held until the close of
the war. He fought in several battles of the Revolutionary War at the
head of his gallant regiment, and is said to have been personally
commended by Washington for his conduct at the battle of Germantown. He
became general of Pennsylvania militia, and took a prominent part in all
movements for the welfare of his native state. Gov. David R. Porter of
Pennsylvania, Gov. Bryan Porter of Michigan, and James M. Porter,
secretary of war under Tyler, were grandsons of the exile from Derry,
Robert Porter.
EARLY IRISH IN ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI.
BY FRANCIS J. WARD, ST. LOUIS.
In 1815 the population of St. Louis was 2,000. _Billon’s Annals_ for
1817–’20 states: “The adult male population of that day was about 700.
Of American birth 400, French and Spanish 150, and of foreign birth 150.
Of these, fully two thirds, or about 100, were Irishmen, some fifteen or
twenty European Frenchmen, about the same number English and Scotch, and
some ten or twelve Germans.”
The tax list for 1811 shows Auguste Chouteau as the largest taxpayer,
the Irish-American firm, McKnight & Brady, second. The first directory
of St. Louis (1821) contains 749 names. Of these but few are Germanic.
As late as 1827 there were but twenty-seven German families here.
In 1663 Marquis de Tracy was governor-general of all the French
possessions in America, and another Franco-Irishman, Chevalier McCarthy,
in 1751, was commandant of the French settlement of the Illinois
territory, and in 1769 a native Gael, Alexander O’Reilly, had command
under the Spanish.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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