Old Irish bones may yield murderous secrets in Pa.

Tampa Bay Online ^ | 8-16-10 | KATHY MATHESON

[afraidfortherepublic]

Online:

http://www.duffyscutproject.com

Malvern, PA -- Young and strapping, the 57 Irish immigrants began grueling work in the summer of 1832 on the Philadelphia and Columbia railroad. Within weeks, all were dead of cholera.

Or were they murdered?

Two skulls unearthed at a probable mass grave near Philadelphia this month showed signs of violence, including a possible bullet hole. Another pair of skulls found earlier at the woodsy site also displayed traumas, seeming to confirm the suspicions of two historians leading the archaeological dig.

"This was much more than a cholera epidemic," William Watson said.

Watson, chairman of the history department at nearby Immaculata University, and his twin brother Frank have been working for nearly a decade to unravel the 178-year-old mystery.

Anti-Irish sentiment made 19th-century America a hostile place for the workers, who lived amid wilderness in a shanty near the railroad tracks. The land is now preserved open space behind suburban homes in Malvern, about 20 miles west of Philadelphia.

The Watsons and their research team have recovered seven sets of remains since digging up the first shin bone in March 2009, following years of fruitlessly scouring the area for the men's final resting place. One victim has been tentatively identified, pending DNA tests.

The brothers have long hypothesized that many of the workers succumbed to cholera, a bacterial infection spread by contaminated water or food. The disease was rampant at the time, and had a typical mortality rate of 40 percent to 60 percent.

The other immigrants, they surmise, were killed by vigilantes because of anti-Irish prejudice, tension between affluent residents and poor transient workers, or intense fear of cholera - or a combination of all three.

Now, their theory is supported by the four recovered skulls, which indicate the men probably suffered blows to the head.

[afraidfortherepublic]

Ping

[Scotswife]

Both sides of my family are descended from PA/irish immigrants.

I’m working on an angle here to get my hands on some sweet “reparations” cash.

[Drawsing]

I remember reading in Mark Twain’s “Roughing It” of the common phrase, “No Irish need apply”.

[llevrok]

If the Irish Curse was in play, the bones will be very small.

[JoeProBono]

Frank Watson (second left kneeling) and William Watson (second right standing) survey the site that they think is a mass grave for immigrant Irish railroad workers in Malvern, Pa. Continuing field work seems to indicate some were killed not by cholera but by human hands. Despite their lack of archaeological experience, historians at Immaculata University are leading the excavation in suburban Philadelphia

[dfwgator]

I remember reading in Mark Twain’s “Roughing It” of the common phrase, “No Irish need apply”.

Or Blazing Saddles', "All right... we'll give some land to the n-----s and the ch---s. But we don't want the Irish!"

[Hodar]

If a family had cholera and was quarintined, but family members refused to stay at home and prevent exposure to the rest of society - what do you suppose would happen?

In a time where antibiotics were not common, cholera was essentially a plauge and death sentence. If someone who was living in an infected home decided to leave his home and go shopping, or go to work - it’s perfectly understandable that someone would want to ‘fix’ that problem and send a very clear message.

[Varda]

Philadelphia was a dangerous place for Catholics in that era.

"In 1843, Bishop Francis Patrick Kenrick of Philadelphia asked the local school committee to excuse Catholic students from reading the King James Version and from daily Protestant exercises. When the school committee allowed Catholic students in the common schools to be allowed to read their own translation of the Bible, nativists claimed that this was merely the first step to an outright ban on Bible reading in the schools. With a growing anti-Irish sentiment already strong in the city, the dispute erupted in a violent series of riots in 1844 that saw the bishop flee the city, 13 people killed and five Catholic churches burned to the ground." link

[bmwcyle]

My grandfather was a member of the KKK in Tower City PA long before I was born. My mother use to watch the cross burning on the mountain during 1925 for her upstairs bedroom window. She was 5 years old. It was the Irish that were their target in the mines at that time.

[RnMomof7]

I think it was more religious than ethnic .

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

My grandfather married an Irish Catholic woman, but his grandfather commanded a police precinct in New York City during the Civil War, including the draft riots after Gettysburg. My grandfather was raised vehemently anticatholic and his kids (including my father) were raised Dutch Reformed. He forbidden to enter a Catholic church.

[bmwcyle]

Grandfather was a Luthern.

[Vigilanteman]

I’m working on an angle here to get my hands on some sweet “reparations” cash.

Given the lack of melamine in your skin, I'll bet that is going to be an awfully long wait.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

My great-great-grandfather (the cop) was descended from my patronymic ancestor, a Huguenot immigrant to Neiu Amsterdam, who was recorded in the Dutch census of 1645 dwelling in Neiu Utrecht (Brooklyn) and owning a goat and was a Dutch Reform minister on Staten Island by 1690.

[nkycincinnatikid]

mark

[Defiant]

Reparations! I want reparations.

[RnMomof7]

But most of the later Irish immigrants were Catholic..so that would be the assumption I think ...

Was your grandfather Northern or southern Irish . the Northern Irish (protestants) were here early and fought in the revolutionary war

[EternalVigilance]

In a time where antibiotics were not common, cholera was essentially a plauge and death sentence.

Since the use of antibiotics didn't come about until the 1930s, they most certainly were not common.

[mrs. a]

PADDY WORKS ON THE RAILWAY

In eighteen hundred and forty-one
My corduroy breeches I put on
My corduroy breeches I put on

To work upon the railway, the railway
I`m weary of the railway
Poor Paddy works on the railway

In eighteen hundred and forty-two
I didn`t know what I should do (2x)

In eighteen hundred and forty-three
I sailed away across the sea (2x)

In eighteen hundred and forty-four
I landed on Columbia`s shore (2x)

In eighteen hundred and forty-five
When Daniel O`Connell he was alive (2x)

In eighteen hundred and forty-six
I made my trade to carrying bricks (2x)

In eighteen hundred and forty-seven
Poor Paddy was thinking of going to Heaven (2x)

In eighteen hundred and forty-eight
I learned to drink my whiskey straight (2x)

printed in Bill Meek Songs of the Irish in America