NEWSPAPER INFORMATION FOR BURLINGTON AREA
About Ireland Issues thanks to Cathy Joynt Labath
Burlington Hawkeye
Burlington, Des Moines Co, Iowa
July 17, 1851
IRELAND- It appears, from an official account, that a number of troops
serving in Ireland have, in consequence of the quiet and improved condition
of that country, been reduced from about 26,000 to the present strength of
18,000 men.
The Cork Constitution says: "There is a great diminution in the number
of emigrants proceeding to America. Only four or five vessels are not at the
quays preparing to leave. It is with difficulty the requisite number of
emigrants can be made up, many preferring to go by Liverpool."
The Irish people have drunk, in the ten years from 1841 to 1850
inclusive, 66,822,720 gallons of spirits. The following are the quantities
annually consumed:-1841, 6,435,443, gallons; 1842,5,290,650; 1843,5,546,483;
1844, 6,451,137; 1845, 7,605,196; 1846, 7,952,076; 1847, 6,037,383; 1848,
7,072,933; 1849, 6,973,333; 1850,7,408,086.One Week's Immigration-Eight thousand seven hundred and thirty-nine
foreign immigrants arrived at New York during the past week.
As a kind of history project I have gathered together several news items on
temperance/prohibition in re Iowa that I will be posting from time to time.
Perhaps we shall see how the Irish fared on the issue!
Burlington Hawkeye
Burlington, Des Moines, Iowa
March 12, 1874
Prohibition in the Senate
The following is the vote by which the prohibitory liquor bill was defeated
in the State Senate. We have not the bill before us but, as we understand, it
was simply to include wine and beer with the stronger intoxicating drinks whose
sale is now prohibited by law. A similar bill has already passed the House and
will come up in the Senate hereafter. Whether there is any material difference
in the two bills, or whether the Senate is likely to treat the house bill
differently from what it did its own, we have no data upon which to found an
opinion. The Senate bill was lost by the following vote:
Yeas: Senators, Bailey, Bemis, Boomer, Campbell, Chambers, Conoway,
Converse, Dague, Dashiell, Fitch, Howland, Jessup, Kephart, Maxwell, McCoid,
Miles, Miller, Mitchell, Selby, Smith, Thornburg, West, Wood and Young of
Cass-24.
Nays: Senators, Cooley, Crary, Fairall, Gault, Kinne, Larrabee, Lovell,
McCormack, McIntyre, Merrell of Clinton, Merrill of Wapello, Murphy, Newton,
Pease, Perkins, Rothert, Rumple, Russell, Shane, Stewart, Taylor, Willett,
Williams, Wonn, and Young of Mahaska-25.
Cathy Joynt Labath
The Irish in Iowa
http://www.celticcousins.net/irishiniowa/index.htm
Burlington Weekly Hawkeye
Burlington, Des Moines, Iowa
Dec 16, 1857
At a Meeting of the Irish Volunteers, held at the City Hall on Friday
evening, December 4th, HENRY H. SCOTT, Chairman, FRANK LEIGH, Secretary.
The Company proceeded to an Election, when the following Officers were duly
elected.-
NATHANIEL SCOTT, Captain.
FENTON DORAN, 1st Lieutenant,
PATRICK RYAN, 2d do.
JOSEPH GAVAN, 3d do.
On Saturday the Officers waited on His Excellency Governor GRIMES, who, in
a most gracious manner gave them an Order on the Adjutant-General for fifty
stand of arms and their commissions.
Cathy Joynt Labath
The Irish in Iowa
http://www.celticcousins.net/irishiniowa/index.htm
Burlington Hawkeye
Burlington, Des Moines, Iowa
Wednesday, June 22, 1864
The most singular fact of the day is the wonderful increase of
immigration.- While we are in the midst of a terrible and exhaustive civil war,
while native croakers are complaining of their trials and constantly predicting
overwhelming calamities, men of foreign countries-countries now enjoying peace,
are flocking to our shores in numbers almost beyond precedent. If any comment
were necessary on the folly of those who predict nothing but evil, evils, too,
which can only come as a consequence and result of their predictions, it is
supplied by the tide constantly swelling, the best that can be made. A country
can hardly be deemed on the verge of ruin, which even in the midst of the
greatest of civil wars, attracts the people of others to its borders and
furnishes them with a better home than they can find in their native lands while
in the enjoyment of peace.
A few figures will indicate how enormous this emigration is. At the port of
New York, from the 1st of January to the last day of May, 68,078 immigrants were
landed. Of these, 41, 238 were from Ireland, 15,346 from Germany, 8,114 from
England, 1,186 from Scotland, 214 from Wales, and 1,933 from all other
countries. If they should continue to come in the same ratio throughout the
year, the total number at that port will be 214,876. This will exceed the number
for 1863 nearly sixty thousand, and is more than double the number for any year
since 1857.
Much the larger portion of the immigrants land at New York. They come in
steamers and sail vessels. The trouble on the other side is that both classes
prove insufficient. Passages are engaged to the full capacity of all a month in
advance.- Those whose passage is secured refuse double the price for it. They
are bent upon crossing and nothing can bribe them to lose the speediest chance.
Another feature is that fully two-thirds of the Irish emigrants have their fares
prepaid by friends and relatives in this country.
A much larger proportion than usual of the present immigration is of the
more thrifty and industrious classes, and it includes a very large number of
skilled mechanics and workmen, who come prepared to become at once useful and
self-supporting residents among us. Those whose possessions enable them to form
a pretty exact opinion, estimate the amount of coin in the hands of each
immigrant this year at eighty dollars.
In 1856 the number landed from steamers at New York was only about 5,000
and three per cent of the whole. In 1863, the number from steamers was 63,931
and forty per cent of the whole. And all the steamers which brought immigrants
last year were foreign. Not one American vessel among them! There is another
illustration of the effect of England's professed neutrality! The fare by
steamers is about double that charged by sail vessels. But the time occupied is
much shorter, sail vessels occupying three or four times as much, and the risk
of disease being multiplied many times over.
Such are a few of the facts relating to the existing phase of immigration.
They indicate that the people of other lands do not find their condition at home
desirable and that they still believe it will be improved by coming to us. They
have faith in our institutions still, though rebels and traitors insist that
they are a failure, and seek to destroy them. And we have room for all who have
this faith and who are determined to prove it by their acts. Those who are
resolved to make their own way among us, the thrifty and industrious sons of
toil, are just what we want. We shall mutually aid each other. So long as this
class comes we shall bid them welcome. There is ample room and abundance of
employment for all who choose to make this their home and their country. Does
not their conduct put us to shame those among us who would consent to the
overthrow of the Republic ,and are too faint-hearted to make a single effort to
sustain and defend it.!
Cathy Joynt Labath
The Irish in Iowa
http://www.celticcousins.net/irishiniowa/index.htm