The Irish in Quebec
Because the roots of the Irish in Quebec are so broad and deep, it is possible to give only a general sense of their pervasive influence on the development of most regions of the province.
The relationship between the French and the Irish in Quebec had its origins in the armies of France in which many exiled Irish chiefs and soldiers served, often forming distinct regiments. So great was the number of Irish in France in the 16th century that the Irish College in Paris was established in 1578 to educate children of Irish exiles who were denied a Catholic education by British authorities in Ireland. The College is still used today for Irish cultural and diplomatic events.
Serving with the French forces in New France, many Irish soldiers concealed their identity from British forces by changing their names to French-sounding ones. As a consequence, a significant number of supposed French names in Quebec are not found in France.
By the end of the 1600s, it is believed that 130 of all the 2,500 families in New France, or roughly 5%, were Irish. In 1871, after massive immigration, the figure rose to above 10%, making the Irish the second largest group in Canada after the French.
From 1816 to 1860, it is estimated that over a million immigrants — 60% of them Irish — passed through the ports of Quebec City and Montreal.
In the tragic year of 1847, the total number of deaths among emigrants heading for Quebec City is estimated at 17,477, of which the vast majority were Irish. It is recorded that of these 3879 are buried at Grosse Ile, while approximately another 5,000 are buried at the Pointe Saint-Charles sheds in Montreal.
The happy note of this disaster was that hundreds of orphans in both Quebec City and Montreal were adopted by French families but allowed to keep their Irish names.
Notable facts
After settling in Quebec City, Dr Timothy O'Sullivan, who was born in Cork, took the name Timothée Sylvain; he was the father of Marguerite d'Youville, who founded the Grey Nuns in 1737.
Governor Guy Carleton (Lord Dorchester), born in Strabane, Ireland, served as Governor of Quebec and recommended the adoption of the Quebec Act in 1774, thereby guaranteeing the religious rights and the right to education of French-speaking people.
Lewis Thomas Drummond, born in Derry, Ireland, became a highly renowned Quebec lawyer and was a reformist politician who defended the Patriotes of 1837. He served as Attorney General in various governments before becoming a judge.
Dr Edmund Bailey O'Callaghan, a lawyer born in Cork, was an advocate for the rights of French-speaking people in the events leading up to the 1837 rebellion, which forced him to flee to the United States alongside Louis-Joseph Papineau.
David Ross McCord, founder of the McCord Museum, came from a distinguished family originally from Dublin.
In the run-up to Confederation, Robert Baldwin, Francis Hincks and D'Arcy McGee, three politicians of Irish descent, worked alongside Quebec politicians Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine, Augustin-Norbert Morin and Georges-Étienne Cartier respectively to defend the rights of French Canadians in the new country.
Louis Riel, the man who secured provincial status for Manitoba and who was charged with treason and hanged for establishing a provisional government in Saskatchewan, was a descendant of Jack Reilly, a native of Limerick who had changed his name to Jean-Baptiste Riel upon his marriage in Boucherville in 1704.
The Honourable Charles Fitzpatrick was the lawyer who defended Louis Riel in 1885 and Honoré Mercier in 1892. He served as a member of both the National Assembly of Quebec and the Canadian Parliament, and was appointed Chief Justice of Canada and Lieutenant-Governor of Quebec.
The Honourable Charles J. Doherty served as a judge on the Superior Court of Quebec from 1891 to 1906. Elected to Parliament for the first time in 1908, he held the post of Minister of Justice for ten years and, in that capacity, signed the Treaty of Versailles on behalf of Canada in 1919. He represented Canada at the League of Nations and contributed to the establishment of the International Court of Justice. He acted as an adviser to the Chief Justice of Ireland in the drafting of the Constitution of the Republic of Ireland. His grandson, the Honourable Charles Doherty Gonthier, currently sits as a judge on the Supreme Court of Canada.
The Honourable Edmund James Flynn taught at Laval University for over 40 years. He served as a minister in a number of Quebec governments and was Premier of the province in 1896 and 1897.
During the 19th century, the city of Montreal had six Irish mayors: William Workman, Francis Cassidy, Sir William Hingston, James McShane, Richard Wilson-Smith and the Honourable James Guérin.
From 1849 to 1980, 32 Irish judges sat on the Superior Court of Quebec. Between 1867 and 1973, 44 Irish Members of Parliament were elected in various ridings across Quebec, whilst from 1867 to 1978 no fewer than 57 Irish people served as members of the Quebec National Assembly, representing different regions of the province.
Many politicians began their careers at local council level, and some went on to become mayors. Among them were Francis Byrne (Charlesbourg), Xavier Kennedy (Douglastown), Charles Kirkland (Saint-Pierre), Charles McLary (Clifton), Dennis James O’Connor (Huntingdon), George O’Reilly (Verdun) and Charles Alleyn and Owen Murphy (both in Quebec City).
The parents of Catherine Broderick, the mother of the Right Honourable Louis Saint-Laurent, were originally from Ireland. After serving as federal Minister of Justice and federal Minister of Foreign Affairs, he was elected Prime Minister of Canada in 1948 and subsequently re-elected in 1949 and 1953.
Georges Vanier, son of the Irishwoman Margaret Maloney, enjoyed a distinguished military and diplomatic career before becoming the first Canadian of Irish descent to hold the office of Governor General in 1959.
Inheriting his interest in politics from his Irish grandparents, the Honourable Daniel Johnson served as Premier of the province of Quebec from 1966 to 1968. Two of his sons, Pierre-Marc and Daniel, also served as Premier of Quebec in two different governments.
Claude Ryan, Louis O'Neill, Brian Mulroney and Jean Charest are among the prominent Quebec politicians whose ancestors were Irish.
Irish engineers and labourers played a leading role in the construction of the Lachine Canal (1821–1825), the Beauharnois Canal (1843), the Grand Trunk Railway (1852) and the Victoria Bridge (1854–1859).
The establishment of the Savings Bank of the City and District of Montreal (now the Laurentian Bank) was the result of joint efforts by the French and the Irish. Among those recruited by Bishop Ignace Forget to serve as patrons of the bank were, on the one hand, Morin, Lafontaine, Papineau and Cartier, and on the other, Hincks, Drummond, Curran, O’Brien and Workman. Among the bank’s presidents were Henry Mulholland, the Honourable Edward Murphy, Sir William Hingston and Dr Donald A. Hingston.
St Patrick’s Basilica, St Mary’s Hospital, the Father Dowd Centre and Loyola College are among the institutions that the Irish helped to establish in Montreal. Shaughnessy House, donated to serve as the first site for St Mary’s Hospital, is now the centrepiece of the Canadian Centre for Architecture.
The Montreal Shamrocks won the Stanley Cup in 1899 and 1900, whilst the Montreal Canadiens were founded in 1910 by Ambrose O'Brien. During the team’s first decade, George Kennedy served as both coach and manager; the team won the Stanley Cup in 1910.
Joe Malone, born in Quebec City, played for seven years for the Quebec Bulldogs and led the team to victory in two Stanley Cups in 1912 and 1913.
James O’Donnell, born in Wexford, Ireland, was the architect who designed the Notre-Dame Basilica in Montreal, beneath whose floor he is buried. He devoted five years of his life to supervising the construction of this building.
La Bolduc (Mary Travers), Quebec’s greatest singer-songwriter, and Émile Nelligan, a renowned French-Canadian poet, were half Irish and half French, and their art was enriched by both cultures. The legendary fiddler, Ti-Jean Carignan, skilfully incorporated Irish musical traditions and techniques into his music, giving Quebec music its unique sound.
