This is a very interesting set of essays about certain Irish individuals in the US during the 19th century. John Mitchell, virulent siren for the Confederacy, inevitably looms large. The San Patricio battalion of the Mexican army was comprised of mostly Irish deserters from the US army who wound up being whipped, branded and imprisoned, or in the case of 50 of them, at the end of a rope during the war with Mexico. Clones-born Bishop Patrick Lynch of Charleston actually owned nearly 100 slaves and was buying them as late as 1863. He even opposed teaching the slaves to read on the basis they might read abolitionists’ writings. The author of the essay on Cork-born Confederate Gen Patrick Cleburne makes the absurd claim that Cleburne died in battle in a “fight for freedom”. The New York City Draft Riots of 1863, the worst blot on Irish-American history, are treated – what started as a revolt of the oppressed descended into a despicable race riot. The chapter on the Fenians is mixed, and does not do justice to John Devoy.
