History Back Drop: Faith and Political Power

From the late 1600s into the early 1800s, Protestantism was the religion of vast political power in Ireland. This power had wide social implications, including marriage between faiths. While marrying outside of one’s faith was not illegal during this period there were many disincentives for a Protestant to convert to Catholicism and many incentives for Catholics to become Protestant. For example, if a Catholic man owning land died, his property would be equally divided between his surviving sons. That is unless one of the sons was Protestant; in that case the Protestant son would receive all the land! Such draconian rules were called Penal Laws.

Penal laws were strictly enforced for over 140 years from 1689 to 1829. These laws were enacted to extract power from the Roman Catholic majority and came about under the Protestant crown reigns of William and Mary, William III, Anne, and George I and II, each subsequent rulers of the United Kingdom. Penal laws isolated Catholics and Protestants creating separate social classes, giving economic and political advantages to the Protestants. The Penal laws began to be repealed in 1829, but tensions between Catholics and Protestants in Ireland persist to this day.

The Dukelow [Ducklow] families of the 1800s and early 1900s frequently choose the first names of George, Mary, William, Anne and Elizabeth for their children. These names were often selected by the tradition of naming children after a father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, aunt or uncle. It seems unlikely that the first use of these names were just a coincidence in matching names of the ruling royalty. The original choice of these names in the Dukelow family no doubt demonstrated patronage, honor and respect to the crown.

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History Back Drop:
Native Hunting Lands and U.S. Westward Expansion

The land that Thomas homesteaded in Dodge County Wisconsin in 1848 was just fifteen years earlier a part of a large swath of territory inhabited by several Native American tribes. These tribes were primarily the Winnebago, Chippewa, Ottawa, and Potawatomi. The Dodge County area was part of a large hunting and fishing region that sustained the native's way of life and culture for hundreds if not thousands of years.

During the period between 1830 and 1833 the tribes living in the area (in these years the area was a part of Michigan Territory) were forced to sell or give their land to the federal government. This action was part of a broad policy of the United States at the time to expand the boundaries of the country westward. Sadly, this expansion policy came at the expense of the native people. Once the land was ceded, the Indian groups were moved west of the Mississippi River. Most Potawatomi, Ojibwa, and Ottawa tribes who lived in this area in the 1830s were relocated to Kansas.

Source: www.scils.rutgers.edu/~dalbello/FLVA/voices/839/voices/amind/landcessions.jpg

History Back Drop: Bias Against the Irish

Many Irish immigrants, especially those that arrived in the port cities of New York and Boston, were regarded with contempt and treated terribly by Americans. During the peak immigration years of 1840-1860, an estimated one million Irish arrived in the United States. This mass influx of people overloaded the economy, housing, and social support systems.

The Irish fled Ireland in large numbers due to famine and encouragement of the governing British crown. When they arrived in America many were taken advantage of. Most were illiterate, few could even sign their name. Many fell victim to unscrupulous landlords who sub-divided dwellings into cheap housing. Immigrant families were over-charged to live in a single nine-by-eleven foot room with no water, sanitation, ventilation or daylight. Irish men wanting of work were offered enticing jobs at fair wages digging canals in upstate New York (e.g., Erie Canal). But once they arrived, they were told the wages were half, or less. For lack of options, most had no choice to accept the work.

Historical Back Drop: Potatoes and Immigration

During the early 1800s the everyday diet of the people of Ireland depended largely on their potato crop. Potatoes could be readily cultivated in the marginal soils available to most farmers. When successfully grown, they provided an abundant food source for large families owning or renting small plots of land. Tragically, a water-borne fungus known as the “potato blight” made the crop’s annual yield unpredictable. Throughout the 1700s and 1800s, in particular the 1820s through the 1840s, various regions of Ireland suffered full or partial loss of their crop due to this fungus. The large crop losses caused great hardship and famine conditions, as potatoes were Ireland’s primary food staple.

In 1839 the potato crop failure occurred throughout Ireland causing many starvation deaths. The scope of crisis became a full-blown calamity, called the Great Irish Potato Famine, during the period of 1845 – 1852. These were years of successive and total crop failure across the whole of Ireland. The combination of blight and inadequate humanitarian policies of the governing British Empire caused hundreds of thousands of deaths. Some historians have written that over one million died from hunger or from the consequences of hunger during the famine years. Between 20 and 25 percent of Ireland’s population died.

The famine caused many families to make the difficult decision to leave Ireland and start new lives in new lands. Perhaps up to a million and a half Irish immigrated to Australia, Canada, and the United States during the 1800s.