Like many of you — the roots that brought my family to Philadelphia generations ago was from old Ireland. My great, great grandmother was born among the rolling hills in a little village between Ballinasloe and Loughrea named Aughrim. With no prospects of a livable future in Ireland, she boarded a ship for America with only fond memories of her home country and a ripped photograph of her mother. Both of which — she would never see again.
It’s been just over 180 years since the Nativist Riots erupted in the neighborhoods of Southwark and Kensington in May and July of 1844 in Philadelphia. The violence began due to anti-catholic sentiment against the expanding number of Irish Americans in the city. By the time that the riots were suppressed — two churches were burned, some 20 people were killed and another 100 were injured. By the end of the violence — General George Calwalader has placed cannons around St. John the Evangelist Roman Catholic Church in Center City to protect it — just a stones throw away from the Wanamaker Building and the location of a theft of a 19th century golden crown last month.
Philadelphia’s first documented St. Patrick’s Day parade occurred before the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1771. It’s approximately 20,000 participants make it one of America’s largest to this day and the second oldest in the United States. This year’s parade began with a mass service on 20th and Locust at St. Patrick’s Church.
Approximately two million Irish emigrated to America during the Great Famine, my ancestors were among them. For those who would make it on the six-week voyage from Ireland to America — avoiding rampant disease — Irish immigrants settled the Philadelphia neighborhoods of Moyamessing, Southwark, and Spring Garden. The ghetto-like living conditions were nothing short of atrocious.
After the riots of 1844 — Philadelphia’s Irish were forced to take any jobs that they could in the 19th century. The Irish were employed in everything from domestics in Rittenhouse Square to various factories in and around Philadelphia.
But the determination of the Irish would eventually pay dividends. As generation after generation of Irish families slowly made in-roads in America as the sons and daughters of Irish immigrants began to rise in American society. As the years go on and decades pass, increasingly less on our modern observance in March has to do with a fifth century Saint. What does remain is that the City of Philadelphia is better and richer not because of St. Patrick — but because of the millions of Philadelphia-based Irish immigrants and their descendants who for centuries have observed a day in his honor. I am humbled to be one of them.
Michael Thomas Leibrandt is member of the York Road Historical Society and lives and works in Abington Township.
