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Hands
across the Atlantic
By John
Graham
The area around the Bay of Saint Laurence in Canada is one
that has many far-flung connections and is an area that
was the new home to tens of thousands of emigrants particularly
from Ireland and Scotland in the last two hundred and fifty
to three hundred years.
The fact that one part of the area is referred to as Nova
Scotia is testament to its connection with Scotland but
there is strong evidence too of an Irish presence over the
centuries as in 1780 the name of the island of St. John
was changed to that of New Ireland by an act of the Assembly.
It had been generally believed that the Irish Diaspora to
that part of the word was something relatively recent and
in some ways had been planned but recent research would
show that even references in the Algonquin Micmac legends
support the belief that the Irish came to that region several
centuries before they were even known to have been there.
The fact that people may have travelled from Ireland to
that part of the world was shown to have been possible when
in 1977 Tim Severin and his crew brought a reconstructed
medieval Irish curragh ashore in Newfoundland following
a two-year journey from Ireland. More recently too studies
of the 13th century Book of the Settlements show both a
Norse and an Irish presence in that part of the world even
as far back as then. “Some of the people in that ancient
account are referred to as “papars” which is a
word for monks, and accounts show that when they left people
found Irish books, bells and croziers and many other things
from which it could be discovered that they were Irish”.
One account shows that the Norse settlement followed an
earlier one made by Irish monks and explains how nearly
all of the “Norse” Islands, islands settled by
the Norseman, were known to the Irish before the Norse men
arrived.
The monks of course were generally forced to move on as
they did not wish to be with heathen men because of their
grim experiences in Ireland at the hands of the Vikings.
Other accounts of parts of that country and others areas
of that country have references to people coming from various
parts of Ireland but the big Monaghan presence particularly
in Prince Edward Island is the one that has caused most
interest of late. The first Irish arrived in Prince Edward
Island in 1820 and took up residence in a part that was
known as Lot 7. However of the several thousand emigrants
from Ireland who came to that part of the word in the first
half of the 19th-century and of the two dozen Irish counties
known to have been represented, the largest group originated
in County Monaghan mostly from the parishes of Donagh, Tydavnet,
Clontibret and from the villages of Emyvale, Glaslough and
Tyholland as well as some from Monaghan town.
The spread of the Monaghan connection in Nova Scotia can
be explained by the fact that some of these emigrants and
many of their descendants later moved on to Western Canada
and even the United States but those who remained to make
their life there found great similarities between their
new home and their original county of Monaghan. The circumstances
which led people to emigrate at that time included periodic
crop failure, the decline in the linen industry and general
poverty as a result of the original inhabitants having been
dispossessed of their land. There is one other major factor
however that influenced the Monaghan Diaspora to that part
of the world was, organised migration.
There is evidence too however of more than a few individuals
from Monaghan who came to Prince Edward Island even prior
to the 1800’s as some of the names would suggest, a
Thomas Duffy was listed in Lot 5 and Peter McMahon was listed
in Lot 65 from the 1798 Census of the island.. However the
Monaghan settlers who were to contribute most to the social
progress of the island began to arrive in 1830 due to the
work of the Reverend John MacDonald and it was his contact
with the parish priest of Donagh, Fr. Moynagh, that led
to the planned migration on the promise that the people
would be able to lease land on the Revd. John MacDonald's
estate. Later Father MacDonald sent his agent, a James Trainor,
back to Ireland to recruit mainly Monaghan settlers and
two ships arrived in May of 1839 with a total of six hundred
and twenty two passengers on board, people who settled mainly
in Fort Augustus and Johnston’s River areas of the
island. Having picked their place to settle on the island
these people then came to apply local place names from Monaghan
to their new homes so that we have places like Kelly's Cross
and Emyvale, the latter first introduced as a postal district
on the island. The Irish presence may have been somewhat
neglected in earlier times, something that is referred to
by leading historian Doctor F. W. Bolger who maintained
that “the Irish have been a neglected and neglectful
minority on Prince Edward Island” and we can consequently
assume that a similar situation applied in other parts of
Canada at that time. Writing about this he maintains though
that the Irish themselves have contributed to this state
of affairs in that they have been “most uncharacteristically
reticent about telling their own story”. However it
must also be said that even with that reticence Monaghan
people can claim to have played their part in the social
and religious development of the areas they settled in and
a major part in the development of Prince Edward Island
from an inauspicious colony to a Province of Canada.
This whole area has now been addressed with the setting
up in 1977 of the Prince Edward Island Irish Heritage Society.
This movement has been to the forefront in counteracting
such indifference by encouraging serious research, discussion
and writing. That initiative produced a number of works
by eminent historians particularly Brendan O’Grady
who almost single-handedly re-established the connection
between Prince Edward Island and North Monaghan and the
Irish connection was the subject of three volumes of the
Abegweit Review between 1983 and 1988.
It took some time however for things to filter through and
it wasn't until 1990 that formal connections were established
and the bond is growing stronger. News of this new development
of course got through to other communities in Canada and
it emerged that there were strong Monaghan connections in
both Peterborough and Miramichi and they too have now become
involved in the wider Monaghan twinning with those parts
of Canada. Even a cursory look at place names in both of
these communities suggests there are strong Monaghan influences
with Monaghan place names and indeed the name Monaghan itself
used extensively. The new-found connections with such far-flung
places offers an ideal opportunity for communities on both
sides to study the similarities and for people in Monaghan
to assess the impact that their forefathers had in building
up such strong communities in such far-flung places. The
Irish and Monaghan influence does not end there as, generations
later, some of these people left their new home and headed
for new destinations in New England, Colorado, California
and even as far away as South America and New Zealand so
that the Monaghan Diaspora has a much wider influence. To
date the connection has been kept alive only through regular
contact via local authority delegations, the first of which
travelled to Prince Edward Island in May 1990 with other
visits and twinning ceremonies taking place between Peterborough
and Miramichi in later years.
Representatives of those places have come on visits to Monaghan,
Joe Gizz, the Premier of PEI the first such visitor and
one delegation from Monaghan got headlines of a sort for
the connection due to an incident on a plane that was taking
the delegation back to Ireland. To realise the full potential
of this historic link the Monaghan /Nova Scotia connection
must be lifted to new heights and funding made available
for cross community studies and cross community exchange
visits as happens with groups from Monaghan who are twinned
with communities on mainland Europe. Such exchanges would
allow a more in-depth assessment to be carried out and by
people who have a direct interest in and knowledge of this
and related topics. Some of the literature and music of
that part of Canada has a distinct Irish flavour and proper
study would enable experts to separate myth-making from
a genuine Irish and even Monaghan influence. Our literature
tells us who we are and what we are. Monaghan has contributed
substantially to Irish literature and it would be a great
achievement to see the influence of that tradition assessed.
The Monaghan/Nova Scotia connection can provide the base
for something that could project Monaghan and her people
onto an even bigger stage worlwide. Can we afford not to
attempt that.
Taken from Monaghan's Match
December 2003
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