The eagle and the harp: the enterprising Byrne Brothers of County Monaghan

Abstract

Minnesota-based Christopher Byrne, a soldier in the Civil War, discovered an article in a New York newspaper reporting on a concert given in Ireland by his long-lost brother, the last of the great Irish harpers. The article compares the lives of Irish soldiers in the American Civil War with changes occurring in Irish popular culture in Ireland. It addresses the fact that Irish musicians who once were supported by aristocratic patrons were turning increasingly to the concert hall, where they performed for wider audiences, even as their siblings were seeking avenues for success in the USA and utilising post-war benefits to good effect.

Keywords:

• abolitionists
• Belfast Harp Society
• Idaho
• immigrant letters
• Minnesota

Notes

 1. Christopher Byrne, letter to his brother, Patrick Byrne, 21 March 1863 and 1 May 1863, Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI), D3531G/6. Unless otherwise noted, all references to Christopher Byrne's correspondence to his brother Patrick can be found in italicised and displayed quotes in this paper. Readers desirous of obtaining a copy of the entire letter are welcome to contact Ruth-Ann Harris at [email protected].

 2. There are two dates on which the Standard reported a Byrne concert: 15 February 1860 and 4 February 1861. Christopher may have seen a New York newspaper because every US military post had a library that was required to keep newspapers from all over the country. (Information gathered while visiting Fort Snelling, Minneapolis, Minnesota.)

 3. PRONI, D3531G/6. Christopher Byrne to his brother, Patrick Byrne, 21 March 1863 and 1 May 1863. Shirley Papers, PRONI. The papers are in the care of the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, and we are indebted to the Deputy Keeper of the Records and to the depositor Major J.E. Shirley for permission to quote from them.

 4. There is some question concerning this date, mostly stemming from an inaccurate estimate of his age when he was photographed in 1845. F.J. Bigger, for example, writing in 1911, gives his birth date as 1794. Robert Bruce Armstrong, writing in 1904, gives his birth date as 1784.

 5. Alexander Mitchell, a member of the Belfast Harp Society and sometime estate manager of the Shirley Estate is likely to have been Patrick Byrne's sponsor at the School (Keith Sanger, personal communication with Ruth-Ann Harris).

 6. In his old age, Christopher's story was included in a series of biographic sketches by settlers of South Dakota. See Memorial and Biographical Record , 447–50.

 7. Keith Sanger, private correspondence with Ruth-Ann Harris, 12 August 2002. Courtesy, Ruth-Ann Harris.

 8. Keith Sanger, private correspondence with Ruth-Ann Harris, 12 August 2002. Courtesy, Ruth-Ann Harris

 9. O'Neill, Irish Minstrels and Musicians, With Numerous Dissertations on Related Subjects, 79.

10. Moloney, The Irish Music Manuscripts of Edward Bunting (1773–1843), 7.

11. The fullest account of the life of the itinerant Irish harper is found in the memoirs of Arthur O'Neill. These can be accessed online at http://pybertra.free.fr/ceol/oneill.htm.

12. O'Neill, Irish Minstrels and Musicians, 474–5.

13. Breathnach, The Folk Music and Dances of Ireland, 104–5.

14. Letter of James MacKnight to Patrick Byrne, about 1850.

15. Use of the harp in Ireland certainly dates to antiquity, and the nation is closely identified with the harp and its music. However, the harp music of the old Irish harpers bears little resemblance to the music we would characterise today as ‘traditional Irish music’. Correspondence found in Patrick Byrne's effects indicates that by the time he began his public performances, the harp had become thoroughly modern in its size, shape, composition of strings, and musical range.

16. Two other musicians are listed on the tenant register; at least one other is described as physically disabled.

17. Grattan Flood, A History of Irish Music, 323. Several tunes in the Bunting manuscripts are attributed to ‘Patrick Byrne’ or ‘Pat Byrne’. These include ‘Rose McWard’, and ‘Nurse Putting the Child to Sleep’, a descriptive piece in 6/8 time. Interestingly, the former piece is written in the key of E-flat major, a key that would have been notoriously difficult for Byrne to play on a contemporary harp. See Moloney, The Irish Music Manuscripts of Edward Bunting (1773–1843), 363.

18. This is a possibility suggested by Charlotte Milligan Fox in her Annals of the Irish Harpers, pl. 103, and also alluded to by Robert Bruce Armstrong and Gráinne Yeats in her The Harp of Ireland, ii, 36. Although Charles Byrne hailed from County Leitrim, there is little other evidence to suggest this relationship. Although the O'Carolan form of this musician's name seems to be popularly preferred, the foremost work on the musician's life cites it as ‘Carolan’.

19. O'Neill, Irish Minstrels and Musicians, With Numerous Dissertations on Related Subjects, 79.

20. This noble goal was largely unmet, however, and Breathnach is gloomy in his assessment of the success of the Societies. For more, see Breathnach, The Folk Music and Dances of Ireland, 68–9.

21. This entry calls into question the claim that Arthur O'Neill was Byrne's teacher because O'Neill died in 1816. However, Byrne may have been a student of the first Belfast Harp School also.

22. Ó Buachalla, I mBéal Feirste Cois Cuain, 67.

23. Illustrated London News, XXIX, no. 824, 11 October 1856, 371.

24. Letter of James MacKnight to Patrick Byrne, about 1850.

25. Cited in http://www.irelandseye.com/aarticles/culture/music/traditional/ulil.shtm (accessed 10 September 2009).

26. There is an interesting parallel here between the reception of the harp as an instrument preferred by the Anglo-Irish nobility and the popular conception of the uilleann (English: elbow) pipes – with their soft, ‘chamber’ sound – as an Irish instrument often taken up by gentlemen for their own musical edification. There are tales of ‘gentlemen pipers’ who became quite expert on the uilleann pipes, but there are relatively few such stories about the harp. It is notable, then, that among Patrick's Byrne's correspondents was at least one gentleman who desired Byrne to find him a suitable cruit so that he might learn and perform Irish harp music. Was this gentleman a student of Byrne's as well as his (presumed) patron? Both pipes and harp, of course, were widely viewed as symbols of the ‘nation’ of Ireland, although it did not exist in a political sense at the time.

27. In his memoir, Christopher writes that by the 1890s sisters Alice and Anne joined sister Catherine and brother James in Norwalk, Ohio. Alice and Anne were daughters of the first family and each inherited from five to fifteen pounds from Patrick's will. Another sister, Elizabeth, married to a James Finigan from County Monaghan, remained in Taberg, New York, and sisters, Ellen, Mary and Margaret, who had each inherited from five to fifteen pounds in bequests from Patrick's will, immigrated to New York City later in the century. For more, see Memorial and Biographical Record.

28. In his memoir, Christopher writes that by the 1890s sisters Alice and Anne joined sister Catherine and brother James in Norwalk, Ohio. Alice and Anne were daughters of the first family and each inherited from five to fifteen pounds from Patrick's will. Another sister, Elizabeth, married to a James Finigan from County Monaghan, remained in Taberg, New York, and sisters, Ellen, Mary and Margaret, who had each inherited from five to fifteen pounds in bequests from Patrick's will, immigrated to New York City later in the century. For more, see Memorials

29. The Pre-emption Act of 1841, based on English colonial law, was later replaced by the Homestead Act of 1862. See ‘Dividing the Land’, in Landscapes of Minnesota, John Fraser Hart and Susy Svatek Ziegler, 83.

30. United States Census, 466. E.P. Mills, born in Vermont, was thirty-three years of age. His wife, Statia, was twenty-eight, born in New York State. Their children were John, six, and Harvey, three, both born in Minnesota.

31. In order to retain the claim it was necessary to improve the land. This explains why Christopher would have needed income, which he obtained by working for the Mills family.

32. The James-Younger Gang was legendary among nineteenth-century American outlaws; it included Jess James. Centred in the state of Missouri, the gang had their origins in a group of Confederate bushwhackers who fought in the bitter conflict that wracked the state of Missouri during the American Civil War. Their post-war crimes began in 1866 and dissolved in 1876, when they were captured in Minnesota after an ill-fated attempt to rob the Northfield First National Bank.

33. For this service, he later received a bounty of $27.

34. One Octavius Leland, who was a member of the Tenth Minnesota Regiment, kept a journal of his experiences. He wrote on 18 November 1864: ‘… all Irish drunk even the Officers. No one could sleep till after Midnight …’ Leland did not survive the war. For more, see the Octavius A. Leland Journals, Schoff Civil War Collections, William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan.

35. http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Estates/5418/10reg.html. Subsequently called ‘Regimental History’. I wish to acknowledge the assistance of Keith Sanger in locating some of the ancillary records on the regiment.

36. Leland wrote in his journal that the Irish were heavy drinkers. Older than the average recruit, and more proper, Leland wrote:

As usual, the officers monopoly all priveledges in the Boat, the Privates are the same as cattle or a lot of hogs and are thot no better of by people generally … I supose if I would swear & drink Whiskey Smoke and chew tobacco play cards & gamble I would be as good a favorite as the rest. [sic]

For more, see Octavius A. Leland Journals, Schoff Civil War Collections, William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan.

37. see Octavius A. Leland Journals, Schoff Civil War Collections, William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan

38. Memorial and Biographical Record.

39. Memorial and Biographical Record

40. PRONI, D3531/G.6. Placed in quotes because it is not clear which side Price led.

41. Memorial and Biographical Record.

42. ‘Regimental History’, http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Estates/5418/10reg.html.

43. Thomas Francis Meagher (1823–67) was an Irish nationalist who immigrated to the USA. A leader of the Young Irelander movement in Ireland, he became a Union army general during the American Civil War and an American politician. For additional reference to Meagher in this present issue, see the paper by Mary C. Kelly.

44. Both orphaned young and raised by grandparents in Enniskeen, County Cavan, they had followed Christopher to Minnesota from Norwalk, Ohio.

45. Memorial and Biographical Record, 447–50.

46. Memorial and Biographical Record, 447–50