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The Irish have early connections with Texas and a long history filled with oppression, violence, individual ingenuity, faith, and exciting stories.
Long under English domination, the Irish have always left their homeland, in numbers large and small, to find fortune elsewhere. The ad interim governor of Texas in 1767 was Hugo Oconór, whose name leaves no doubt of origin. He was not the only Irish soldier or administrator or adventurer to enter the service of another country more congenial than England. Some were independent agents. Philip Nolan of Belfast was well known for efficient horse trading and illegal mapping in Spanish Texas. The latter occupation led to his death in 1801.
Father Juan Augustín Morfi, with a name as obvious as any Irish priest, came on a government inspection trip to the Texas area in 1777. His History of Texas is one of the earliest and best accounts of the land and people.
Nearly in the same tradition, Father Michael Muldoon, born in Ireland but in the service of Spain, left with Don Juan O'Donoju for the New World. O'Donoju became the last viceroy of Mexico. After Spain's expulsion Father Muldoon became priest to Austin's colony in 1831. In the colony under Mexican rule, everyone was Catholic—officially.
Some colonists saw Muldoon as a friend, others not. He was a friend of Santa Anna at times, visited Stephen F. Austin in his Mexico prison, and stayed in Texas after the revolution. In 1839 he called himself “Vicar General of the Catholic Communities of the Free and Independent Republic of Texas.”
Irish families settled in small groups in many areas of Texas but made up the greatest percentage of the San Patricio and Refugio colonial populations before the Texas Revolution. Here, McMullen and McGloin as well as Power and Hewetson in 1828 were allowed to set up colonial areas north and west of modern Corpus Christi and bring in Irish families. Rumor, and some fact, attest that the Catholic Irish were seen by the Mexican government as good, loyal buffer colonies between themselves and the troublesome Anglos. Even so, many Irish were members of Stephen F. Austin's colony to the east, and after the start of the revolution, the Mexican army became well aware on which side the Irish stood. Not their side. The Irish colonists near present Corpus Christi lived in one of the lines of march for the Mexican army. In today's terms, the Irish became excellent guerrilla soldiers.
Even their music was revolutionary. At San Jacinto two fifers and a drummer played “Will You Come to the Bower.” The music is a British army tune, and the words are an Irish love song by Sir Thomas Moore, whose Irish Melodies were popular in Europe, particularly among Irish nationalists. The lyrics, by today's standards and unlike many Irish love lyrics, are only mildly suggestive. Some verses later were printed in Texas schoolbooks.
Texas Irish, during the revolution, did not spend their time singing. Some 25 Irishmen signed the early Goliad Declaration of Independence, 11 died at the Alamo, 14 were with Fannin at Goliad, and about 100 fought at San Jacinto—a seventh of Sam Houston's army. Texas became a defended home.
In the next 50 years, Ireland was wracked by economic oppression and famine. The old country sent many settlers to Texas.
Some of the newcomers' work was stereotypical. The later 19th century Irish, arriving in substantial numbers after other established groups—as well as being Catholic, strange talkers, and considered “dumb” in the prejudice of the day—received the worst jobs: day labor. In Texas Irish crews worked east to west on the Southern Pacific railway. This route, the second transcontinental link in the U.S., was finished near Langtry. Even the railroad handcar, the velocipede car, became the “Irish Mail.”
Irish Artists
The Irish, in fact, entered most lines of work. John William Mallet, a Dubliner and professor of analytical chemistry, supported the South as a Confederate cavalryman after working as a chemist for the Geological Survey of Alabama in 1855. He became a professor of chemistry and physics and faculty chairman for the first session of the new University of Texas, never renouncing his European citizenship.
Today, more than a half million Texans identify themselves as Irish—direct descendants or recent arrivals. A number of Irish fraternal and social organizations exist in Texas, including the Irish Cultural Society of San Antonio; the Harp and Shamrock Society of Texas, a division of the Ancient Order of Hibernians; and a chapter of the Friendly Sons and Daughters of St. Patrick.
