The Irish in Latin America

The Irish in Latin America ww w.dfa.ie @dfatIRL Irish adventurers, missionaries, soldiers and settlers appear in the history of Latin America since the time of Columbus. Irish soldiers and their families, fleeing British colonisation, went into exile in Spain. The men joined Spanish armies and fought in European wars. Irish exiles availed of patronage in the royal court of Spain and served as high-ranking military officers and administrators in Irish the Spanish Empire. They became some of the first Europeans, who Migration were not Spanish subjects, in the American colonies. Loyalty to the Spanish Crown saw this washerwomen. As settlers in frontier generation of exiles go from being regions, they became part of the oppressed in Ireland to becoming increasing European population, colonial administrators in the Spanish particularly in Cuba and in Argentina. The s to Latin imperial world. The next generation of sons and daughters of Irish immigrants y e Creole-Irish (American-born) supported a made substantial and lasting n break with Spanish rule. In the Spanish contributions to the economic, political, r u American wars of independence (1810– social and cultural life of society in Latin o 25) the Irish fought on both sides, with America. The greatest legacy has been in J America l the Spanish forces but in greater Argentina. This exhibition describes the a numbers with Bolívar’s patriot armies. complex, varied and shared history of c i Some left their mark as revolutionary Ireland and different countries in Latin r o heroes; others became diplomats or America, connected through migration t s merchants taking advantage of economic over the centuries. In telling the life i opportunities in the new republics. There stories of Irish people, each panel reflects H were also Irish individuals who stood out the diversity of experiences in different as advocates for subjugated peoples in historical periods and in different Latin America, particularly African and countries. Most of the important indigenous Americans and women. The characters who appear in the dramatic largest flow of migrants to leave Ireland political and economic events on display for Latin America took place in the here are men. On the centenary of Irish nineteenth century, with smaller independence, we have arrived at a more numbers arriving through the United balanced understanding of events by States. Attracted to Catholic South including the equally important role of America, the promise of land and new Irish women. Their place in the history of opportunities, ordinary Irish emigrants Irish migration to Latin America needs to joined a growing immigrant work force be told, as do the stories of thousands of as artisans, farm-hands, labourers, emigrant lives yet to be uncovered. railroad workers, seamstresses, and Ireland in Latin America | 2/ 3 Shared I have come to South America to practise the art of war in order that I might use my Histories new-found skills in the liberation of Independence Ireland from British rule. & Nationhood Francis Burdett O’Connor to Simón Bolívar s 2016 marked the centenary of the rebellion of Easter 1916 in y e Dublin, an event that led to an independent Irish Republic in n r 1922. Men and women involved in the 1916 Rising believed that u national democracy through self-determination and government o J by consent could only be achieved through full independence l a from Britain. c i r The leaders of the Rising declared a free different countries throughout the region o t Irish Republic in the words of the 1916 up to 2025. Coincidentally, in July 2016 s i Proclamation, which “guarantees Argentina celebrated the bicentenary of H religious and civil liberty, equal rights and national independence with the signing equal opportunities to all its citizens”. of the Declaration of Tucumán in 1816. The events of 1916 set in train an Ireland and the countries of Latin unstoppable process culminating in the America share a history of European War of Independence and ultimately an colonialism and subsequent independent Irish Republic in 1922, with revolutionary and independence six counties in Northern Ireland struggles. There is much to learn by remaining part of the United Kingdom. comparing common experiences of decolonisation: their positions in relation In Latin America, a fifteen-year cycle of to processes of globalisation; and the bicentennial commemorations began in entanglements of diverse ethnicities, 2010, marking the processes of cultures, and languages as a result of independence in the ex-colonies of the colonial histories. Spanish Empire. It will continue in Ireland in Latin America | 4/ 5 o c i x e William M Lamp(16o11 – r1657t ) Guillén de Lampart William LamTporth fouend hiIs wrayi insto h coZnsoortingr writho witch doctors. He the Spanish military service, but had escaped seven years later, but he to leave Spain after a scandalous continued to criticise the Spanish affair with noblewoman Ana Cano Inquisition and was returned to Levia, with whom he had a daughter, prison for a further nine years. Teresa. The Crown sent him to Despite the degradations of prison Mexico with a brief to spy on Creole brutality, Lamport railed against the insurgents, but soon after he arrived Inquisitors, resisting them at every Lamport took up the cause of turn. He took up the cause of fellow indigenous, black and Creole prisoners, Crypto-Jews (Portuguese populations. He began to preach merchants of Jewish origin, living as radical ideas about racial equality, Christians) who were also the abolition of slavery, and the persecuted by the Inquisition. He restitution of land to the Indians and spent his time writing revolutionary wrote what is described as the first pamphlets and also left behind a Declaration of Independence in the remarkable collection of 918 Indies. Lamport was thrown into religious psalms entitled Regio William Lamport from Wexford arrived in New Spain (Mexico) as a prison, accused of plotting rebellion Salterío . member of the Spanish Court in the 1630s. Accused of plotting as well as dabbling in astrology and against the state, he was imprisoned by the Spanish Inquisition. He escaped but was ultimately found guilty of heresy and burnt at the stake in 1657. Lamport is celebrated as a precursor of Mexican LAND REFORM independence, and his statue is among a pantheon of patriots in the Monument to Independence ( Ángel de Independencia ) in Mexico RACIAL EQUALITY City. Some biographers claim that this seventeenth-century SOVEREIGNTY Irishman has been immortalised by Hollywood in the fictional character of Zorro . WEXFORD Ireland in Latin America | 6/ 7 o c Born in Seville to Irish parents in 1762, Juan O’Donojú, known as i x the “Last Viceroy” of New Spain, was in fact the Jefe Político e Superior of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. Celebrated in Mexico, he M was regarded as a traitor in Spain for his role in the final arbitration of Mexican independence. Napoleon’s occupation of Spain and the status with pure Spaniards, and Mexicans constitutional crisis in Madrid led to the of pure or mixed Indian blood were outbreak of independence wars in ascribed lesser rights. O’Donojú saw this Spanish America in 1810. The leaders of as a pragmatic solution to achieving a independence in South America came bloodless separation from Spain. On 28 largely from the aristocracy, inspired by September 1821, Mexico became a Enlightenment ideals. In Mexico the sovereign state ruled by conservatives initial revolt came from indigenous and under the self-proclaimed Emperor, Juan peasant masses, led by Catholic priest Agustín de Iturbide. The empire was Father Miguel Hidalgo. He issued the short-lived and in 1823 General Santa Grito de Dolores , a revolutionary tract Ana set up the first Mexican republic. that called for an end to Spanish rule, endorsing racial equality and the O’Donojú played an extraordinary role in redistribution of lands. Hidalgo was the achievement of Mexican O’Donojú executed and his popular movement independence. He became persona non (1762 – 1821) crushed by a coalition of royalists and grata in Madrid and died two months Creoles refusing to share power with the after his arrival in Mexico at the age of lower classes. 59. His Spanish wife, Doña María Josefa Sánchez-Barriga Blanco, and her three O’Donojú arrived in August 1821 with a sons paid the price for her husband’s mandate to introduce a liberal treason. Forbidden to return to Spain, she programme to the Viceroyalty. Just weeks was left destitute once her pension of later he signed the Treaty of Córdoba 12,000 pesos a year from the Mexican with the conservative Mexican army government dried up, and she died in officer Agustín de Iturbide. The treaty 1842. Juan O’Donojú’s body was approved the Plan of Iguala, making embalmed and laid to rest in a vault Mexico an independent constitutional under the magnificent Altar of the Kings monarchy. It also gave Creoles equal in Mexico City’s cathedral. TREATY OF CÓRDOBA PLAN OF IGUALA “LAST VICEROY” OF NEW SPAIN CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY Ireland in Latin America | 8/ 9 o A plaque in Plaza San Jacinto, San Angel, Mexico honours the c i Batallón de San Patricio as martyrs who gave their lives for the x e Mexican cause. The San Patricio Battalion was made up of Irish, M Scottish and German soldiers who changed sides in the Mexican– American War 1846–47. They deserted the American army and John Riley, an experienced soldier from fought in defence of Mexico. In the US Clifden in Galway, was one of the first to they were branded as vile traitors, and desert. He organised the Batallón de San those who were captured after the war Patricio, a company of more than 200 were executed.

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