Part 18 (1/2)
In 1830 some survivors of an Irish colony of 300 persons in Brazil made their way to Buenos Ayres. They had come out from Europe in the barque _Reward_ in 1829.
The banker, Thomas Armstrong, who arrived in Buenos Ayres in 1817, occupied the foremost place for half a century in the commerce of that city. He was of the ancient family of Armstrong in the King's county, one of whose members was General Sir John Armstrong, founder of Woolwich a.r.s.enal. Having married into the wealthy family of Villanueva he became intimately connected with all the leading enterprises of the day, such as railways, banks, loans, etc. He took no part in politics, but interested himself in charities of every kind.
In 1865 another Irishman, James P. Cahill, introduced into Peru from the United States the first complete machinery for sugar growing and refining.
Still another Irishman, Peter Sheridan, was one of the chief founders of the sheep farming industry in Argentina. His family claimed descent from the same stock in Co. Cavan as Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the great statesman and dramatist. Sheridan died at the age of 52, in 1844, and was succeeded in the _estancia_ or sheep-farming business by his nephew, James, whose brother Dr. Hugh Sheridan had served under Admiral Brown.
The number and wealth of the Irish _estancieros_, or sheep-farmers, in Argentina have never been exactly ascertained, but after the old Spanish families they are the most important. It would be impossible to give all the Irish names to be met with. Some of them own immense tracts of land. Men whose fathers arrived in Argentina without a s.h.i.+lling are today worth millions. Their _estancia_ houses display all the comforts of an American or English home; their hospitality is proverbial; and most of them have built on their land fine schools and beautiful little chapels, in which the nearest Irish priest officiates.
Many of the _partidos_ or districts of the various provinces of Argentina may be compared to Irish counties, the railway stations being called after the owners of the land on which they are situated.
Among the earliest families settled in Argentina in the farming industries, we find Duggans, Torneys, Harringtons, O'Briens, Dowlings, Gaynors, Murphys, Moores, Dillons, O'Rorkes, Kennys, Raths, Caseys, Norrises, O'Farrells, Brownes, Hams, Duffys, Ballestys, Gahans, and Garaghans. Dr. Santiago O'Farrell, son of one of the earliest Irish pioneers, holds a foremost position among the distinguished lawyers of the present day. An Irish engineer, Mr. John Coghlan, gave Buenos Ayres its first waterworks. The British hospital has at present for its leading surgeon a distinguished Irishman, Dr.
Luke O'Connor. A son of Peter Sheridan, educated in England, has left the finest landscapes of South America by any artist born in America.
He died at Buenos Ayres in his 27th year, 1861. Among the public men of Irish descent, fifty years ago, in Buenos Ayres, are to be mentioned the distinguished lawyer and politician, Dalmacio Velez Sarsfield, and John Dillon, commissioner of immigration. Dillon was the first to start a brewery in Buenos Ayres, for which purpose he brought out workmen and machinery from Europe. All of his sons occupied distinguished positions. Richard O'Shee, president of the Chamber of Commerce in Buenos Ayres, was born at Seville of an old Irish family banished by William III. Among the many valuable citizens of Buenos Ayres who perished during the cholera of 1868 was Dr. Leslie, a native of Cavan, whose benevolence to the poor was unceasing. Henry O'Gorman, for some years chief of police in Buenos Ayres and afterwards governor of the penitentiary, was descended from an Irish family which went to Buenos Ayres in the eighteenth century.
His brother, Canon O'Gorman, was one of the dignitaries of the archdiocese, and director of the boys' reformatory. General Donovan, son of an Irish Dr. Donovan of Buenos Ayres, had command of one of the sections of the new Indian frontier.
The first Irish chaplain was Father Burke, a venerable friar mentioned by Mr. Love in 1820 as over 70 years of age and much esteemed. When Rivadavia suppressed the Orders in 1822, he allowed Father Burke to remain in the convent of Santo Domingo. After his death the Irish residents, in 1828, pet.i.tioned Archbishop Murray of Dublin for a chaplain. Accordingly the Rev. Patrick Moran was selected, and he arrived in Buenos Ayres in 1829. He died in the following year, and was succeeded by the Rev. Patrick O'Gorman from Dublin, who continued as chaplain during 16 years till his death in 1847.
The year 1843 is memorable for the arrival of Rev. Anthony Fahy, with whose name the advancement of the Irish in Argentina will be forever identified. This great patriarch was born at Loughrea, Co. Galway, in 1804, and made his ecclesiastical studies at St. Clement's convent of Irish Dominicans at Rome. Being sent to the western states of America, he pa.s.sed ten years in Ohio and Kentucky, after which, on the invitation of the Irish community of Buenos Ayres and by permission of the superior of his Order, he came to the river Plate at a time when the prospects of the country and of the Irish residents were far from promising. The history of the Irish community since that time is in some measure a recital of the labors of Father Fahy. He it was who helped his countrymen to choose and buy their lands which now are of such enormous value. Their increasing numbers and prosperity in the camp districts obliged him to endow each of the provincial _partidos_ was a resident chaplain. Most of these clergymen were educated in Dublin, and soon showed their zeal not merely in religious, but also in social spheres. Irish reading-rooms, libraries, and schools sprang up and laid the foundation for the refined Irish life of the present day in those districts. Among other services, Father Fahy founded the Irish convent, bringing out some Sisters of Mercy under Mrs. Mary Evangelist Fitzpatrick from Dublin, to whom he gave it in charge. Father Fahy died in harness in 1871 of yellow fever; he attended a poor Italian woman and on returning home was at once taken ill. He lasted only three days and expired peacefully, a martyr to his sacred calling. He died so poor that Mr.
Armstrong had to discharge for him some small debts, and five others of his countrymen paid his funeral expenses. A fitting memorial of the deceased priest, the Fahy College for Irish orphan boys in Argentina, has been erected in Buenos Ayres, and a magnificent monument of Irish marble, carved in Ireland, also perpetuates his fame.
The priests, still living, who were co-workers with Father Fahy and appointed by him to various _partidos_, are Monsignor Samuel O'Reilly, deservedly beloved by his paris.h.i.+oners, and the Rev. Father Flannery, whose appointment to San Pedro brought a great influx of Irish farmers into that district. Among those who have gone to enjoy their eternal reward are the brothers, Rev. Michael and Rev. John Leahy, both of whom were indefatigable during the yellow fever in Buenos Ayres. Rev. Father Mulleady, Rev. Patrick Lynch, Rev. James Curran, and Monsignor Curley were also among the Irish priests of that time.
The Fahy College is entrusted to the care of the Marist Brothers, who are largely Irish. The community of Holy Cross of the Pa.s.sionist Fathers, who have as provincial the distinguished North American scholar Father Fidelis Kent Stone, is almost entirely composed of Irish and Irish-Americans. They have several establishments in various provinces of Argentina. Irish priests are to be met with all over the country. In Patagonia and the Chaco we also find a number of Protestant missionaries sent out by the Irish branch of the South American Missionary Society.
Archdeacon Dillon succeeded Father Fahy as Irish chaplain in Buenos Ayres, and, although by birth and education an Irishman, he became one of the princ.i.p.al dignitaries of the archdiocese. He was for some time professor of theology in the ecclesiastical seminary of Buenos Ayres, and accompanied Archbishop Escalada as theologian to the Vatican Council in 1869. He was the founder of the _Southern Cross_ in 1874, the Irish weekly paper which is now so ably edited by the gifted Irishman, Mr. Gerald Foley.
The first daily paper to appear in English in South America was the _Standard_, founded in 1861 by Michael G. Mulhall, the distinguished statistician, and it is still one of the leading papers in the country. In conducting it Michael G. Mulhall was joined by his brother, Edward T. Mulhall, in 1862, and for many years it was continuously under their care. The _Standard_ still remains in the Mulhall family, and has for its editor a cousin of the former editor's, Mr. John Mulhall, who wisely directs its course. The _Argentina_, an important paper in Spanish, was founded a few years since by Edward T. Mulhall, Jr., a brilliant son of the late Edward Mulhall of the _Standard_. The _Hyberno-Argentine Review_, a new Irish weekly, is edited by another able Irishman, James B. Sheridan.
In Rio Janeiro the _Anglo-Brasilian Times_ was founded in 1864 by an Irishman, Mr. Scully, who also wrote an important book on Brazil.
Ireland had also its representatives in South American diplomacy and the making of treaties. As early as 1809 Colonel James Burke was sent by Lord Strangford, British minister at Rio, on a confidential mission to Buenos Ayres to negotiate the establishment of a separate kingdom on the river Plate, with the Princess Charlotte as queen. In 1867 Mr. Gould, an Irishman, British charge d'affaires, endeavored to mediate between the allies, Brazil and Argentina, and President Lopez of Paraguay, but without success. Stephen H. Sullivan, British charge d'affaires for Chile, signed the treaty of commerce and navigation between England and Chile on the 10th of May, 1852. He was afterwards appointed British minister at Lima, where he was murdered. The late Chilian ministers to Buenos Ayres and London, William Blest Gana and Albert Blest Gana, were the sons of an Irish Doctor Blest from Sligo, who settled in Chile. In 1859 George f.a.gan signed a treaty with General Guido for compensation of losses to British subjects during the civil wars after the Independence.
The mining industry had among its pioneers brave sons of Erin. J. O.
French went to Buenos Ayres in 1826, and after an arduous mountain journey arrived at the foot of the Cerro Morado, where he found auriferous ores. Chevalier Edmond Temple, an Irish gentleman who had served in Spain in a dragoon regiment, also landed in Buenos Ayres in 1826, and started across the Pampas, then almost uninhabited, until he came to the mountainous country where the Potosi mines were situated. In one of the defiles he lost his favorite horse, and in his book he bids a touching farewell to the friendly steed which had shared with him so many toils and dangers. Temple's successor in the Argentine mining provinces was Major Rickard Seaver, a member of an old Co. Dublin family.
Several books of travel in South America have been published by Irish writers during the last fifty years. MacCann's _Travels in the Argentine Provinces_, 1846-49, contains much that is valuable concerning the history and manners of the country. Major Rickard Seaver issued in 1863 an interesting narrative of his crossing the Andes. Consul Hutchinson, an Irishman, published in 1864 his book _Argentine Gleanings_, which was followed by another in 1869 called _South American Recollections_. Robert Crawford, an Irish engineer, led an expedition from Buenos Ayres in November, 1871, across the Indian Pampas and over the pa.s.s of the Planchon in the Andes, to survey an overland route to Chile, and subsequently published an interesting account of his journey. The first book printed and published in English, in South America, was the _Handbook of the River Plate_, written by Michael G. Mulhall and published by the _Standard_, in 1861. The same author also published the _Rural Code of Buenos Ayres_ in 1867, and the _Handbook of Brazil_ in 1877. In 1871 he published an account of his travels among the German colonies in Rio Grande do Sul. Twenty years ago the writer of this sketch published _Between the Amazon and the Andes_ and the _Story of the Jesuit Missions of Paraguay_. These books derive special interest from the fact that she was the first foreign woman ever seen in Cuyaba, the capital of Matto Grosso, whither she accompanied her husband, 2500 miles from either the Atlantic or the Pacific seaboard.
They arrived as far as the Diamantina Mountains, beyond Cuyaba, and saw the little rivers which form the sources of the mighty Amazon.
Casting a glance over South America, we see in every country and province evidences of Irish genius employed not only in fighting but in the development of natural resources. To quote Consul Cowper's report to the Foreign Office in London: ”The progress of Buenos Ayres is mainly due to the industrious Irish sheep farmers.” No other nationality contributed so largely to the export trade of the country. At one time it was shown by the tables of Mr. Duggan and other wool exporters that the quant.i.ty of this staple industry yearly sold by Irishmen in Buenos Ayres exceeded that sold by all other nationalities. In later years the Irish sheep farmers in the province of Buenos Ayres have turned their lands into wheat lands, and the great industries of the country, sheep and cattle, have been moved to the outside camps, especially to that wonderful grazing region in the Andine valleys recently visited by Col. Roosevelt and his party. It may be interesting to mention that at the first English races ever held in South America, on November 6, 1826, the princ.i.p.al event, in which ten horses ran, was easily won by an Irish horse with the appropriate name of ”Shamrock.”
REFERENCES:
Beaumont: Travels In Buenos Ayres (1828); Wilson: Travels In South America (1796); Pinkerton: Travels (1808), Captain Weddell: Cape Horn and South Atlantic Surveys; Major Gillesple: Buenos Ayres and Provinces; Mrs. Williams, on Humboldt's Travels (1826); Captain Master: At Home with the Patagonians (1891); Hadfield: Notes of Travel in Brazil and La plata (1863); Hinchcliff: South American Sketches (1862); Captain Burton: Highlands of Brazil; Ross Johnston: A Vacation in the Argentine Alps (1867); MacCann: Travels in the Argentine Provinces (1846-1849); Hutchinson: Argentine Gleanings and South American Recollections; Major Seaver: Crossing the Andes; Crawford: Across the Pampas; V. MacKenna: Life of O'Higgins; Life of Diego Rimagro; History of Santiago; History of Valparaiso; MacKenna: Archives of Spanish America, 50 vols.; Miller: Memoirs; Lives of Belgrano and San Martin; Mulhall; English In South America.
THE IRISH IN AUSTRALASIA
By BROTHER LEO, F.S.C., M.A.
Should one be called upon to give in brief the history of the Irish in the land of the Southern Cross, he could do nothing more to the purpose than to relate the story of the ”Holy House of Australia.”
The episode, indeed, is characteristic, not merely of the Irish in Australia, but of the Irish in every land and clime where they have striven and conquered.