Sláinte, from our house to yours
To everyone who ever braved the waters, the heat, the fear
My husband has dual Irish/American citizenship, after a long process spent proving that his grandparents did in fact immigrate to Hartford from Ireland. We hang both flags out front (when the weather’s nice and one of us is going to be home to take them in before dark).
His mother was the Irish colleen/cailin, with sky-blue eyes and skin like porcelain. She married a blue-eyed Italian who was also a first-generation American, which in Hartford was as much a mixed marriage as you could find. The Irish fought fires and stayed on their side of the town. The Italians arrested bad guys, and stayed on theirs.
But the Italian cop spotted the Irish colleen at one of the community dances they once held at Goodwin Park, He walked up, introduced himself, and what happened next, if it wasn’t a traditional kind of hand-holding, gaze-across-the-table love, was something close to it. I never met my father-in-law — he was gone by the time I came into the family — but my mother-in-law was as Irish Catholic as you can get. She knew the feast days and sprinkled holy water on you as you left, and she was completely open to her son marrying a Protestant — a union that back in Ireland is also considered a mixed marriage. I loved her deeply.
The Campbells — or my branch of them, anyway — only touched gently on Ireland on their way to the New World. The Irish sojourn of one Campbell, a horse thief, was brief after the government asked him to seek their fortunes elsewhere.
They landed in Virginia in the early 1700s. A few — including a father and son of whom I am a direct descendant — fought in the Revolutionary War. You would think given how long we’ve been here, that we would have made something of ourselves.
I’ve been thinking about the passages of these two families since the Oscars, and Ke Huy Quan’s incredible acceptance speech for his Best Actor in a Supporting Role Oscar for “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” It’s inspiring, as is every immigrant story, everywhere.
Susan Dunne wrote a fine column on the Irish yesterday. I sent her an email complimenting her. In my email I mentioned my Irish roots and how my great grandfather (Mom’s side) and grandfather (Dad’s side) came to Hartford from Cork to escape the British starvation that was killing thousands. Upon arriving in Hartford they were “greeted” like lepers. The WASPS treated them with disdain yet they overcame it all to survive and raise families. Many did join fire departments and many like my great grandfather John Sheehan became police officers. God bless America, a place that offered refuge to my forbearers and millions more.🙏☘️🇺🇸
My paternal great, greats came from Ireland after a stay in Liverpool (I’m first generation on my mother’s side, her having been born in Estonia). My paternal grandfather was Catholic, my grandmother was Protestant. Their sons were baptized Catholic, their daughters Protestant. On Sundays they would walk to the end of the block. Grandma would cross the street to the Congregational church or the “Congo” as we would call it to get her going. Grandpa would continue walking the six blocks to St. Joseph’s for mass. On St. Patrick’s day it wasn’t unusual for her to give him something like an Orange card inscribed, “Erin go bragh you bastard”. Their relationship was a bit of a roller coaster. When asked about the Catholic/Protestant thing grandpa would engage in a little comparative analysis and say something like (paraphrasing now and cleaning up the language); “When you’re a Catholic you can be drunk all the time but you better not be screwing your neighbor’s wife. If you’re a Protestant you can screw whoever you want but you better be sober when you do it”. This once caused grandma to lock grandpa out of the house for a few days during which he slept on my uncles couch and stunk up the house with his cigars.
Ahh, memories. Sláinte!