Paper presented at "The Scattering: Ireland and the Irish Diaspora" at University College Cork, September 24-28, 1997

Large-scale emigration from Ireland has been a fact of life for many generations, both before, and especially after, the Great Hunger of the 1840s. Those Irish men and women who arrived in the United States were part of this vast dispersal of people whose native land was no longer able to sustain them. Most, especially during the early years of migration, stayed in the coastal cities where they had landed and found work. Their particular story has been well told by historians. Others ventured inland along the canals and railroads they helped build, settling along the way as opportunity arose. Their story is beginning to be better understood. Still others ventured even further afield to areas where their willingness to work counted for more than anything else and established communities far from the coastal cities. Their story is less well known and only beginning to be told. Immigrants to one such area far from the coast, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, are the subject of this paper. It is hard to imagine a place more different from Ireland than the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

While Ireland is known for its many shades of green, the snow scientists of the UP have identified nearly as many, or more, different types of snow. Winter is long and hard and snow covers the ground for nearly half the year on a regular basis. The Copper Boom that followed Douglass Houghton's description of the copper resources of the Keweenaw in the early 1840s was followed rapidly by John Burt's discovery of iron ore near Teal Lake in 1844. These discoveries brought many people to the region seeking wealth, opportunity, or simply a new start in life. Irish immigrants were well represented among these early settlers, especially in the Copper Country of the far western Upper Peninsula. As early as 1849 John Q. McKernan had been elected sheriff of Houghton County and was later elected to five terms in the state legislature. By 1859 there were several Catholic churches serving the needs of Irish immigrants and a small number of other Catholics in the Upper Peninsula -- St. Ignatius in Houghton, St. Ann's (later St. Patrick's) in Hancock, Holy Redeemer in Eagle Harbor, Our Lady of the Assumption in Clifton, and St. Mary's in Rockland, serving the Copper Country alone. In 1860 a St. Patrick's Society was organized in Hancock with seventy members and had 180 when it was formally incorporated in 1874. Other communities in the Copper Country also established St. Patrick's Societies and later divisions of the Ancient Order of Hibernians. Other groups such as the Robert Emmett Young Men's Benevolent Society and the Emerald Library Society both in Hancock show a growing, prosperous Irish community.

One could, and at some point in this project I will, discuss a large number of Irish merchants, businessmen, and saloon keepers as well as physicians, attorneys, and successful politicians in the various communities of the Upper Peninsula. Yet, by 1920, the Irish had all but disappeared from the Copper Country and the entire Upper Peninsula. What happened to the Irish in Upper Michigan and why is too complex to get into today and work is not far enough along for definite answers to these large questions. But that is what drew me to this project and it is never far from the surface of any aspect of it. What I want to discuss today are two incidents from the very early years of the Irish communities of the Copper Country that reflect some of the difficulties and adjustments Irish immigrants faced in their new homes. While these incidents are specific in their details to the Upper Peninsula and the Copper Country, they are also broadly reflective of the process of adjustment all Irish immigrants faced as they adjusted to their new environment in the United States.

Rockland in Ontonagon County was the community nearest the Minesota [sic] Mine, one of the earliest successful mass copper mines in the region. Rockland today is a very tiny community whose physical appearance is not unlike a ghost town from the gold and silver fields of the mountain west -- except that it still has a small number of residents. Irish immigrant formed a significant proportion of its population and the workforce at the mine. The only tangible evidence of Rockland's once numerous Irish community is its cemetery - still called Irish Hollow Cemetery - located near the now long abandoned Minesota Mine. In late January 1865 the young priest serving St. Mary's in Rockland, Father Aloysius Maria Kopleter, who was also the pastor of St. Ignatius in Houghton, died and his funeral a few days afterwards was disrupted by a fierce storm. The history of the Diocese of Marquette describes the event,

[Kopleter's] funeral was an occasion long to be remembered by those who witnessed it - only a few - the pallbearers. A fierce snow-storm swept over the country for almost two weeks, so that it was impossible to cross the lake. So it was decided to deposit the coffin in the snow beside the fence of the old Houghton cemetery until the storm subsided. After the storm the body was conveyed to its resting place in Hancock.

The February 11 Portage Lake Mining Gazette carried a brief letter from "The Irishman," dated February 1 from Rockland, denouncing the treatment of Father Kopleter after his death.

The Catholic Church has always favored her priests with marks of special distinction. She exalts them in death as well as in life . . . .. The haste with which he was consigned to his grave was, to say the best of it, indecent. It argues very poorly for those gentlemen who were its authors. - The should remember that they will one day have to depend upon the charity of humanity. They may be repaid in kind. And no one may be left to ask for them what they have denied the unfortunate, yet learned and distinguished stranger.

Father Edward Jacker, one of the pioneer priests of the Copper Country published a fairly long letter in the Gazette pointing out that all possible respect was shown to Kopleter and no one could have predicted the violent storm that disrupted his burial. In fact, Jacker pointed out, Kopleter had been laid out in his priestly garments and lay in state from late Tuesday afternoon until his funeral Mass at 2:30 p.m. on Thursday. "The Irishman" responded to Jacker in the next issue of the paper. He was by no means satisfied with Jacker's argument.

I regret to be obliged to aver that some of his assertions are erroneous. The majority of clergymen are interred as Father Kopleter should have been. This is done wherever it is possible. It is not usually impossible in civilized communities. . . . . He has honored F. Kopleter with a grave in the only Catholic cemetery in Houghton County. This I presume he considers sufficient. I wish it were Catholic. It is not at present. This is disgraceful.- It is peculiar to that place. I hope the Catholics of Hancock will see that this "beautiful burial-ground" be fenced. They have given liberally during a number of years. It were well if a portion of their contributions have long since been expended for this purpose. They have given far too much and too often to obtain certain humble possessions for certain humble (?) missionaries. I hope this last may not become a custom of the country.

Jacker either chose not to reply to this letter, with its allusion to financial impropriety among the clergy, or the editor simply allowed the matter to rest. Within a month a more dramatic conflict engulfed the Irish community in Hancock and the Kopleter Affair faded from the press.

Soon after Irish people began to settle in the Copper Country they began to observe St. Patrick's Day as a special occasion. This is, of course, a common pattern among Irish communities in the United States. Exactly when this practice began in the Copper Country is hard, if not impossible, to determine, but there is a long article about the observance of St. Patrick's Day in the March 21, 1863 Portage Lake Mining Gazette. It was a day-long celebration beginning with a procession by the 312 members of the Hancock St. Patrick Society to a Mass celebrated by the local priest, Father Sweeney , with "an oration" on the life of St. Patrick delivered by Father Jacker. The celebration ended with a large ball at the St. Patrick Society Hall. All went well and the paper was very complimentary to the Society and its leaders and refers to many other successful events held by the St. Patrick Society and the Irish community. The general tone of the article suggests that the observance of St. Patrick's Day was already an accepted part of the community calendar in the area.

As St. Patrick's Day 1865 approached nothing seemed to be unusual until Father Sweeney forbade his congregation to hold a ball on St. Patrick's Day because the day, as it almost always does, fell in Lent. The ball had been postponed from February and was to benefit the United States Sanitary Commission, an agency that provided many services to Union soldiers, especially the wounded and ill. The organizers of the ball, however, ignored Sweeney's decree and proceeded to do as they had "always" done. (In this case, since Houghton as a community was not yet twenty-five years old, "always" is a relative term.)

They held their ball, although attendance was less than expected. Sweeney arrived during the evening with a horse whip and tried to clear the hall. Several ladies were struck by his whip, either deliberately or inadvertently, depending on whose account one accepts. The pages of the Mining Gazette erupted with editorial comment and letters attacking Sweeney and a few defending him. Once more Jacker was pressed into service to defend his colleague. A window opened, if only briefly, into the lives of the Copper Country Irish and their efforts to adjust to life in their new homes as Americans.

The ball had originally been scheduled for February 25 - the date "The Irishman's" last letter was published -- and was to benefit the U.S. Sanitary Commission, the major provider of support services for troops in the Union army. A brief notice in the paper during the exchange of letters between "An Irishman" and Jacker had announced that the ball was rescheduled for March 17. The card did not mention it, but the change was doubtless due to a conflict with a fair to benefit the Sanitary Commission scheduled for the same date by the Knights Templar. The ball remained a benefit for the Commission - an interesting combination of American patriotism and Irish ethnic celebration.

The Mining Gazette of March 25 -- there had not been time to get news into the issue that appeared on March 18 -- gave the episode a great deal of attention. "The Trouble at St. Patrick's Hall" provided a lengthy account of the nights events and condemned Sweeney in no uncertain terms. The tone of the article is set in opening of the third paragraph,

The Portage Lake St. Patrick Society, consisting of about five hundred intelligent, loyal Irishmen, determined to have a ball in their Hall, last Friday evening, for the benefit of the brave soldiers of Michigan who might need assistance. This rev. gentleman opposed it, contending that amusements were prohibited during the holy season of Lent. We make no pretension to any knowledge of the peculiar principles in accordance with which he regulates his actions or those of his subjects during those forty days. We will merely remark en passant, that the procession of the Society on St. Patrick's day was an amusement, that the speeches were in our opinion very amusing, and that the enlivening music of the brass band did not in any way remind us of the sufferings of Christ.

At least we know who the good guys were. The article goes on to argue that St. Patrick's Day is always in Lent and is celebrated in Ireland as the national holiday and goes on to compare prohibiting its celebration to banning the celebration of the Fourth of July in the United States.

Moreover, as far as we can learn, amusements are tolerated in Ireland on this day; and since this is so we can see no reason why Irishmen should be denied this privilege in America. Furthermore, it should rather be regarded as a right than a privilege. It is their national holiday, and it would be just as reasonable to tell an American that he should celebrate the Fourth of July by reading the seven penitential psalms, as it is to command an Irishman to commemorate the time when the Emerald Isle was a great nation, by listening to a poorly executed mass [sic] and a dull, prosy, sometimes illiterate and always a very monotonous sermon - such as Catholics of this county are usually tormented with according to the most reliable authority. The plea of Lenten time is an absurdity, the 17th of March is always included in this time; and to prohibit its proper celebration in lent is to prohibit it forever.

First, Sweeney's motives in prohibiting the dance, his loyalty to the United States, and his general character are attacked.

All this parade of sanctity is merely a screen which this gentleman, if may be allowed to so designate him, has endeavored to use in order to defeat the object of contemplated by these patriotic men. He had already shown his this in a manner which could neither be mistaken or misconstrued. It is not long since he took occasion to give his hearers to understand that the money they might contribute on this occasion would be used for proselyting [sic] purposes - in other words to that it would be spent in purchasing tracts for distribution among our soldiers! Could the most depraved mind invent a more base and sinister malicious slander than this, and yet it is an emanation from a rev. sir, a man who pretends to be a follower of Christ and to teach some thousands here the true road and the only road to Heaven! One might reasonably suppose that this would have satisfied the most capacious appetite for diabolical and inhuman malice - it would, in ordinary cases, but Mr. Sweeny [sic] is not an ordinary man. Not withstanding his unfounded assertions and insane threatenings the Society persevered in their determination, and made their announcement to the public accordingly. This was too much for this brutal impersonation of ignorance and clerical assumption, and he endeavored to put an end to this charitable and patriotic undertaking in a manner which will astonish all who believe that we are in the full blaze of civilization of the nineteenth century, and free citizens of a Republic which enforces no religion and is tolerant to all.

The details of the incident are reported in some detail, although the editor's support for the organizers of the ball and strong hostility toward Sweeney are never far below the surface.

About a quarter past ten p.m., the members of the Society and their friends were surprised by the entrance of this model clergyman, in St. Patrick's Hall. . . . . His whole appearance betokened something extraordinary, for , indeed if it were not for the well known lean, cadaverous visage which has so often terrified many a stripling on our streets, he might have easily passed for a Virginia bushwacker, or a genuine Italian desperado. It was neither. - They were blessed with the veritable Father Sweeny [sic], his cloak "turned inside out," looking very ghostly we will admit; but if any one thought he as a shadow the ponderous horsewhip which he held in his hand soon undeceived him. He stood for a few moments close to the door, spoke not a word to those around, braced himself as if for a great struggle, bound for the dressing room and used his loaded whip on every lady he met, till taken by the throat and ousted buy two or three of the members. This requires no comment from us. - Bloomingdale asylum cannot furnish a madman guilty of more infamous, insane, and uncalled for brutality.

But the bulk of the article attacks Sweeney's character and intelligence. He is charged with being unable to speak English properly, spell, being a slumlord, having purchased tenements in his own name with church money - an interesting echo of "The Irishman's" charge of financial impropriety in the Church - and accumulating a substantial fortune in the few years since his ordination. While seeming to attack Sweeney and defend the loyal and intelligent Irish who held the ball, the article drips with anti-Catholic and anti-Irish sentiments.

Now what is this man who has the audacity to cudgel Catholics into conformity with his opinions, to impugn the motives of men who are honored by the whole State of Michigan, and to harangue publicly against extending the gift of charity to the brave men who are battling to preserve the ingrate a country? Whence all this insolent assumption and ignorant braggadocio? If by any possibility he were to cease to be a priest tomorrow we venture to say that he would not be competent to fill the position of the humblest clerk in this village. He has never thoroughly mastered Town's speller, and we believe we can find many children in our district schools who can surpass him in everything connected with the rudiments of science. To be convinced of this it is necessary only to hear him speak. We doubt if he has ever delivered a single English sentence as it ought to be. We refer to the construction; for as far as pronunciation is concerned it is entirely out of the question. The man cannot enunciate the word itself. It might be supposed that he would make up in other languages what he lacks in his own, -- it is otherwise. He has never been able to translate a single Ode of Horace and -- he never will. He is in short, an ignoramus - ignorant of everything he ought to know, and too old and brainless to learn.

The reservations the Bishop had about ordaining Sweeney were perhaps not only due to his lack of theological training. The editor's attack on Sweeney was not limited to his tactics in enforcing his decree regarding dancing during Lent, or his lack of education and erudition. The priest's character and piety came under heavy fire.

Some may be under the impression that, although wanting in knowledge absolutely requisite for his position, he may be rich in piety, and so compensate by his prayers and zeal for what otherwise would be an unpardonable want. After what we have already shown, it might be considered superfluous to say that this is not so. Since he has cursed this community with his presence he has invariably evinced this community sordid, miserly, money-seeking spirit. He is emphatically a modern Shylock, -- a man who shows in his every actions that his God is gold. He was ordained, if we mistake not, in September 1862, and since he has accumulated property estimated at $10,000.00! -- He has taken the greater portion of this from poor miners who very often find it difficult to live, and yet when they propose to give their mite for the alleviation of our heroic wounded, this grasping, avaricious priest pounces on their delicate sisters and innocent children like a midnight assassin, and since they will not be convinced by his lying assertions from the pulpit belabors them with a whip as though they were the most degraded slaves. Let no one imagine that he has purchased this property for the church - the broad acres near the head of Portage Lake, and the shaky tenements around the Church in Hancock, filed in many instances with the very scum of society, are recorded in the name of James Sweeny [sic].

Then comes the peroration, where he really warms to the task of castigating Sweeney on all scores and casts him out of the community of civilized people, but I'll not quote it at length since the spirit is probably more than clear from what has already been quoted. One phrase, "[h]is superiors may find employment for him among savages …" Unintentionally refers to a problem facing the Church in Upper Michigan - adjusting from being a missionary Church among Native Americans to a church ministering to settled communities from many different cultural backgrounds.

A "card" as brief, informational notices were called, was inserted in the paper by the President of the St. Patrick Society also spoke to the event and the controversy it raised.

I, the undersigned, on behalf of [the] Saint Patrick's Society of Houghton County, take this means to show the people of this community that we emphatically condemn the actions of the Rev. Mr. Sweeney at the entertainment on the evening of the 17th instant, as being unworthy not only of a Christian Clergyman, but of a law-abiding citizen. J. H. Kerwin, Pres't. St. Patrick's Hall, Hancock, March 19th 1865.

The April 1 issue of the Portage Lake Mining Gazette continued to focus on the event and reported that the ball had not yielded much for the Sanitary Commission because it "was not over well attended through the denunciations of the priest Sweeny, [sic] to who we pay our respects in another article." It also reported Sweeney's defense, delivered from the pulpit at Sunday Mass. Unfortunately, Sweeney's words were not reported directly, but only by the Gazette editor, whose sentiments are unchanged and clear.

Rev. Horsewhip Sweeney treated his parishioners to a discourse Sunday last, of which ourselves and Messrs. Kerwin, Fitzgerald, Ryan and others formed the text. He then showed that we had an antipathy to priests, that it was not the priest but the church against which we have spoken, and finally stated that it was not us but "some man" who had "advertised Father Sweeney." Clear as mud.

The editor and his paper had not always been friendly of the Irish Catholic community and certainly used this episode to attack the Church. It is more than mildly interesting that the editor consistently misspells Sweeney's name in his own columns, even though it is spelled correctly in pieces by other contributors to the paper. There is no reason to believe that the Mining Gazette was any different from other small community newspapers where the editor set the type in addition to doing just about everything else. It is hard not to see the misspelling of Sweeney's name as deliberate. To what purpose, we can only speculate. The editor displayed little but prejudice towards the Irish, even when seeming to applaud the accomplishments of individuals. When reporting crimes and altercations the paper always identified Irish participants by name and ethnicity. An example is an article in August of 1862, which begins "The principle item this week, was the Irish row last Saturday night. Two men were engaged in a fight on the street, and were arrested by Officer Sheting, who was prevented from locking them up by the interference of a large and excited crowd of their countrymen. …" The Ryan mentioned in Sweenny's sermon and the article about it is doubtless Ed Ryan, elected sheriff of Houghton County in 1863. Soon after Ryan took office the Mining Gazette pointedly commended him for

continuing to arrest Irish trouble makers and not showing preference to his countrymen, as many had expected he would. Sheriff Ryan, we are happy to say has thus far disappointed the many predictions we have heard made that when he came into office, the Irish, would be allowed to do as they pleased, -- rule the town perhaps, -- but the prophets have all proved false for the Sheriff and all his prominent friends are laboring hard and earnestly to make their countrymen keep the peace, -- and they have done well, considering the provocation they have had to act otherwise.

The issue also contained a "defense" of Sweeney signed "Justice" that revealed the anti-Catholicism never far beneath the surface in nineteenth-century America.

. . . . When they became members of the Roman Catholic organization, they did it, we are to suppose, voluntarily, with their eyes open. They knew very well that they were required to yield obedience to some priest of that absolute and insolent hierarchy, at least so far as to obey his suggestions with regard to the holy seasons of their church. No man, we are happy to know, is compelled here to be a Romanist; and as I understand it, after deliberately and wilfully [sic] going contrary to these suggestions, and receiving the penalty (whether proper or not for Sweeny [sic]to administer is not the question), they come before the people of Portage Lake as candidates for their sympathy.

On April 8 a very long letter from Rev. Edward Jacker tried to set the matter to rest defending Sweeney and his effort to maintain the austerity of Lent and suggesting that while his actions might appear overzealous to non-Catholics, they were not inappropriate under the circumstances. Jacker refutes each point raised, and also identifies the anti-Catholicism underlying the attack on Sweeney. The editor would hear none of it and included a sarcastic response, as well as editorial comments in the body of the letter. The episode was certainly the subject of discussion for many months, but other issues and activities diverted attention. Lent ended and other balls and celebrations were held without controversy. In fact the announcement of a Ball at the St. Patrick's Hall in the April 15, 1865 paper included the phrase, "No fear of Sweeny [sic] this time." The same issue of the paper contained a long response by the Mining Gazette's editor to Father Jacker's defense of Sweeney and Catholic practices. But there was no published response from Jacker. More importantly the Fenian Brotherhood began raising money in the Copper Country with public meetings, lectures, and dress balls on a regular basis. The Fenians not only diverted public attention from Sweeney they provided a strong unifying focus for the Irish community of the Copper Country, which supported the Fenians generously.

What do these two small episodes in remote corner of America suggest about the adjustment people faced when moving from Ireland to Upper Michigan? I would suggest that they illustrate the tensions inherent in migration. Things were not "right" for "An Irishman." His frame of reference was a heavily settled country where a community of priests maintained proper observances. The sparsely populated Upper Peninsula, less than a generation removed from a time when the presence of the Church was as solely as missionaries to the native people, was not such a place. There were only fourteen priests, serving eighteen parishes when Bishop Baraga, the heroic missionary, died in 1868. Most of the priests were till the missionaries he had recruited in central Europe, only four had Irish last names. Kopleter's nationality, however, was less important to "An Irishman" than his priesthood, which required certain courtesies that the new world could not, at least not yet, support.

The Sweeney episode is much more complex. The connection between celebrating St. Patrick's Day and supporting the Union cause is remarkable. How quickly did an ethnic celebration become linked to loyalty to the new homeland and since attendance was low in 1865 among which elements of the Irish community? This ball suggests that happened fairly quickly, at least among those who wanted acceptance by American society. The leaders of the St. Patrick Society, men like Ed Ryan, were already assimilating into American society. In addition to being sheriff, for example, Ryan had a large dry goods store in Hancock and later one in Calumet. Their continued success, whether in elective office, a profession, or in business, depended to a considerable extent on their being accepted by "American" society. Linking St. Patrick's Day to Americanism and defying their priest -- one of a very few Irish priests in Upper Michigan at this time -- clearly gave them this acceptance as the Mining Gazette's coverage of the event shows. As the event also shows, anti-Irish and anti-Catholic sentiments were never far from the surface and were respectable enough to appear in the local paper without apology. Those who sought the acceptance of the larger American society had chosen a difficult path. They had begun a difficult journey from Irishmen in America to Irish Americans, a route many others would follow.

© William H. Mulligan, Jr., 1997.

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Mulligan Presentations

Updated 11/23/97

Comments: Bill.Mulligan@murraystate.edu