How Jewish the Dawson / Eitelman's Are!!!

Believed to Be Jacob Woelfle

Believed to Be Mrs. Jacob Woelfle

Believed to Be Elizabeth Christine Wolfle

Years ago, after I commenced the genealogy, my generation of the Dawson/Eitelman clan would call and asked, "Pete, is it true that Jacob Woelfle was Jewish?"

Jacob Woelfle, recollect, is our ancestor by Bobo...

GF Edward Decatur Eitelman was the son of

G1 GF Michael George Eitelman, who was the son of

G2 GM Elizabeth Christine Wolfle, who was the daughter of

G3 GF Jacob Woelfle, our known Jewish ancestor.


Well, it turns out that we have more Jewish ancestors through Bobo, the Baehr's...

GF Edward Decatur Eitelman was the son of

G1 GF Michael George Eitelman, who was the son of

G2 GF Michael Andrew Eitelman, Jr., the blacksmith in Fort Worth married to Elizabeth Christine Wolfle, who was the son of

G3 GF Michael Andrew Eitelmann, Sr., who came from Germany, who was the son of

G4 GM Elisabetha Bahr.

G4 GM Elisabetha Bahr was clearly the descendant of a Jewish line...

G4 GM Elisabetha Bahr was the daughter of

G5 GF Abraham Baehr, who was the son of

G6 GF Mosche ("Moses") Baehr, who was the son of

G7 GF David "Dov" Baehr, who was the son of

G8 GF Mosche ("Moses") Baehr.


That's a very, very Jewish line of names, and almost certainly Jewish. So, when Michael Andrew Eitelman, Jr. married Elizabeth Christine Wolfle, he was functionally following in the steps of his grandfather Johann Georg Eitelmann, who also "married Jewish."

To me, this was very significant. When I married my wonderful wife Rise Deborah Sobel, I was "marrying Jewish" like G2 GF Michael Andrew Eitelman, Jr., and I have always been so proud of my boys' Jewish/ Catholic heritage.

Now I see that Johann Georg Eitelmann, in Germany, was doing the same.

The Wolfle's, the Baehr's. Who else?

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part IX

THE DAWSON'S COME TO AMERICA

In early February, 1851, 20 year old G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, crushed by the death of his first wife, and sick to death of waiting for employment in London, bade farewell to friends and family in London (perhaps Thomas and Ann Dawson and their son William, also of Christ Church in Spitalfields -- relatives?), and made his way from London to Liverpool. In Liverpool he walked to the docks, and seeing the recently-arrived American-made packet ship "Washington" tied up to the wharf belonging to Taylor, Crooke & Co., the Liverpool agent for the famous Black Star Line, went into the ticket office in front of the wharf and inquired about the price of passage.

"Berths" aboard the Washington ranged from 3 pounds, 15 shillings to 4 pounds for a crate-like "cot" bolted to the deck side of the gunwales, to 5 pounds for a space in a cabin. Any of these fares were enormously more economical than the cost of the trans-oceanic voyage for an individual during the previous century, due to the effects of economies of scale as emigration out of the British Isles increased after the commencement of the Potato Famine. The amount of 4 pounds amount to about 2 weeks' wages for a common laborer during this period. Perhaps WILLIAM chose the mid-range fare of 4 pounds, and then registered. He stated that his name was "William Dawson." He gave his age as "20." He described himself as "a citizen of England" who worked as a "laborer." The clerk for Taylor, Crooke & Co. then gave G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON his ticket for his voyage.

The ticket promised, per day, 3 quarts of water, and, per week, 2-1/2 pounds of bread, 1 pound of flour, 5 pounds of oatmeal, 2 pounds of rice, 2 ounces of tea, 8 ounces of sugar and molasses, vinegar, and 1 pound of boned pork. The reality would turn out to be far less pleasant than the promise.

The "Washington" was built specifically to bus Potato Famine emigrants from the British Isles to America. It was about 200 feet in length, weighed about 1,600 tons in drydock, had a wide beam, and was very sturdily built and easily able to withstand the worst storms the Atlantic could throw at her year round. The ship was commanded by Ship's Master A. Page, while the crew consisted of 4 Ship's Mates, 5 officers including Ship's Doctor Charles Reynolds, and 31 sailors. About 900 passengers were booked to make the passage across the Atlantic with G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON.

On or about February 13, 1851, WILLIAM went to the Taylor, Crooke & Co. wharf and waited in line to board. An English doctor asked him his name, asked him if he felt healthy, told him to stick out his tongue, and then, on seeing his tongue, pronounced WILLIAM "fit."

As the line proceeded across the wharf to the gangplank, WILLIAM was undoubtedly surprised and disturbed to see the Ship's Mates pushing, screaming and cursing to herd the emigrants on board as quickly as possible. He may or may not have realized that this was the beginning of their 6 week effort to jam as many fares as possible onto the boat and get them to America as fast as possible, while giving them as little food and water as possible, to maximize profits.

Once all had boarded, the Washington was untied from its wharf, and perhaps after dropping a sail or two allowed to drift out into the River Mersey, where it dropped anchor.

On the first day of the voyage, while the "Washington" lay at anchor only a few hundred yards from the wharf at Liverpool, passengers were instructed to line-up for water. Only the first 30 to line up received their tin of water. The rest were sent
back to their berths. The same thing happened later in the day -- only the first 30 received their water ration.

Probably sometime during the second day, a steamer approached the
"Washington". The "Washington's" crew threw the steamer a bowline which was tied to a post on the stern of the steamer. Once anchor was weighed, the steamer began towing the "Washington" slowly down the River Mersey. As this was being done, roll was taken on board the "Washington." and stowaways returned to the dock on a small boat.

Once she had been towed to the Irish Sea, where the wind was fresh and reliable, the
"Washington" cut loose from the steamer and unfurled its sails.

A week passed. Still, nothing but water had been doled-out to hungry passengers. Finally, Ship's Doctor Reynolds was seen moving from berth to berth, taking note of passengers less than 16 years of age. Though the Black Star Line contract, and naval regulations, permitted half rations only for those who were less than 14 years of age, Captain Page arbitrarily raised that limit to 16. Perhaps he felt that he had a right to to "handicap" to protect against lying by passengers -- assuming, of course, that no food at all during the first week was legitimate.

More days passed with no food being distrubuted. When whipping, cursing, punching and screanming failed to quell the riot for food, food was finally distributed. Some passengers who noticed that the Ship's Cook was very generous to passengers who bribed him with money or whiskey complained, but to no avail. Ultimately, passengers received less than one-half of the provisions promised by their contract.

Fierce and frigid Winter storms slammed against the vessel during the ensuing weeks. When the weather became too rough, sails were reefed-in to protect against capsizing, while gigantic waves of freezing water came crashing over the gunwales into the "berths." Many passengers prayed during such storms. Those who died of the diseases brought with them from Liverpool -- cholera, typhoid, and dyssentery -- were tied-up in cloth bags weighed-down with rocks and tossed overboard.

On March 28, 1851, after Ship's Master Page never once showed his face to the passengers, Doctor Reynolds began walking down the deck between berths, screaming, "Now, then, clean-out and wash-out yours rooms, every one of you, God damn and blast your souls to Hell!" The passengers were greatly cheered by this, realizing as they did that clean-up time meant that they were nearing the American coast, and would soon be able to disembark from their Hell-hole. A short time later, G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON and the other passengers saw with their eyes what Captain Page had seen through his telescope -- the American coast.

Finally, on March 31, 1851, the "Washington" sailed into New York harbor. Passengers crowding against the gunwales stared wide-eyed at the Statue of Liberty, correct? Not at all. It did not even exist in 1851. Then, later the same day, sick passengers were ferried ashore to quarantine on Staten Island. The balance of the passengers stayed on the Washington until it tied-up to the wharf at Ellis Island, a tiny tract of land in New York harbor, then about one-eighth its current size, closer to the Jersey shore than to Manhattan, featuring only a few small wooden buildings. There G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON disembarked with the remaining passengers, was given a brief physical, and waited, until a ferry from New York City arrived to take them ashore. On that day WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON swore allegiance to the United States of America, and he became an American citizen.

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part VIII

Dore's Portrait of East End Squalor

Wash Day in the East End

Christ Church, in Spitalfields, London, the Anglican Church

Where William Samuel Charles Dawson Was Baptized

Street Urchins in 19th Century London

LONDON ROOTS OF THE DAWSON'S

During most of the first half of the 19th century, while English overlords in London's West End collected rents from their stolen Irish estates, and demolished Irish industry by flooding Ireland with cheap English manufactures after the Act of Union indirectly eliminated all trade barriers, London's neighborhoods for the working classes in the East End boomed as employment opportunities in London's newly-mechanized factories grew in number. The new neighborhoods lacked sewage facilities -- toilet and wash water drained into the Thames from open gullies in the streets. Public transportation was just then coming into its own, so that steam locomotives at street level or on elevated tracks belched steam, oil, sparks and smoke into adjacent streets. In short order new neighborhoods became overcrowded working-class ghettoes. Cholera, typhus and dyssentery spread via the open sewers. Mini-epidemics of these diseases, wiping out this section and that neighborhood of London's East End, became commonplace. Especially during the Summer, the smell in London began to become so unbearable that Parliament actually considered leaving for a pleasanter location.

Around 1810, somewhere in these interesting neighborhoods in London's East End, a little boy name WILLIAM DAWSON was born to one working-class family, and a little girl named SARAH TRAVELLER was born to another working class family. These would become our G2 GPs, the parents of G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON.

Both G2 GF WILLIAM DAWSON and G2 GM SARAH TRAVELLER would have been baptized into the Church of England by their parents.

The London of the first half of the 19th century is well-portrayed in Dickens' novels. On the East End, it really was a despicable place. Both G2 GF WILLIAM DAWSON and G2 GM SARAH TRAVELLER would have "lived lives of quiet desperation" in their families, going out to work, without much education, if any, as early in their teen years as possible to supplement family income. There is some evidence that they met and engaged in an intimate relationship before marriage, and that G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON was conceived and born before their marriage, a not-uncommon thing in the disorganized lives of the denizens of the East End in those days, according to books on the subject.

G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON's early years would not have been much different from that of his parents. As a member of the working class in London's dirty East End, he would have been poorly educated, and forced out to work as early as possible in his teen years. WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON's classsification, on his immigration record, as a mere "laborer" bears this out. Who knows when his parents died, and why. Perhaps one of the many cholera, typhoid or dyssentery epidemics, borne through London by the sewers, did them in.

It was customary for young men in London's East End to commit themselves to marriage at around the age of 17 or 18. G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON apparently did so, probably around 1848. We really know nothing at all about his wife, except that, according to family tradition, she died shortly after their marriage, perhaps of one of the mini-epidemics of cholera, typhoid or dyssentery which came out of London's open sewers on a regular basis, or perhaps she was one of the 250,000 victims of the great tuberculosis epidemic which assailed the population of London and its suburbs between 1850 and 1855.

While 1848 was a deadly year in Ireland, 1848 and subsequent years were difficult years in London's East End. When the Potato Famine hit Ireland, the Irish suddenly had nothing, so that English exports to Ireland plummeted. Elsewhere throughout Europe, the failure of the potato crops due to the same fungus caused food prices, generally, to rise, resulting in a massive shift of cash from industry into farming, further drying-up markets for England's manufactures. Suddenly, the working class in London's East End, and throughout Europe, were thrown out of work. Unemployment as a consequence of the failure of the potato famine is the major caused of the violent revolutions wracking government across Western Europe in 1848.

The employment picture would not have been too pretty for G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON during this period. Though London avoided a revolution in 1848, emigration to America of the chronically unemployed began to skyrocket. Hundreds of thousands of English young people began to join the Irish crammed into the windjammers out of Liverpool, hoping for a better life in America. WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON was one of these.

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part VII

Eviction day: After Parliament "taxed the problem to eliminate it,"

by adopting thge Four Pound Clause -- a $3,000 annual penalty on every

quarter acre set up for potato cultivation -- English landlords evicted every

Irish family, previously forced by them into n potato farmjing,

from every potato plot to avoid the penalty; 4,000,000 Irish Catholics

were suddenly homeless; 1,500,000 died in Ireland;

250,000 died on the ships to America

In drawings from the era, the men are frequently absent;
they died giving up their food to the women and children,
or charging the docks, crammed with food being exported by Engliush landlords,
in the famous "skeleton armies"

Relief measures were only sufficient to help about one-fifth of the evicted, starving Catholic families. The rest walked until they died of starvation. The Roman Catholic Church was illegal. Therefore, only the Protestant churches could publicly maintain active soup kitchens. Some of these required conversion to Protestantism before food was provided -- the famous "soupers." Many starving parents had to decide whether to bury the first of their children to die, or butcher and cook the dead to feed their living children. While the bellies of the young swelled enormously in response to the complete absence of food, dogs left behind by their dead masters formed packs and began unearthing famine victims from shallow graves, so that their bellies became swollen with human flesh. The image of the leprachaun with swollen belly, skinny limbs, and thin, curly facial hair which we see in today's cartoons dates from this period -- that is what an Irish boy looked like shortly before death from starvation, down to whispy, prematurely-sprouting facial hair.

As pregnant ANNA and her husband slowly starved, since they apparently lived in Londonderry County they functionally starved in front of their Protestant neighbors. The experience must have very, very drastically impacted their outlook. Though he is completely unrelated to us, ANNA's first husband Mr. Mallon should probably be remembered as someone who gave his life for our G1 GM. He died; pregnant ANNA didn't.

At a particular point ANNA gave birth. How she must have agonized when she realized that her baby, great aunt BARBARA MALLON, was blind! Perhaps ANNA ultimately received some assistance from one of the poorhouses erected after the beginning of the famine. At a particular point, ANNA decided to join the millions of Catholic Irish who were emigrating to America to survive. A tiny amount of indirect evidence suggests that ANNA made application for funds from one of the several English philanthropists who were paying for passage to America.

Probably around the year 1848, G1 GM ANNA FULLER, only about 19 years of age, holding the tiny hand of her blind little daughter, great aunt BARBARA MALLON, boarded one of the steamers out of Londonderry carrying emigrants to Liverpool. "At last," she may have thought, "I will escape hardship and find an easier life in America." And she did -- kind of.

The great packet ships built to carry people from the British Isles to America had not yet come into their own. Early-on in the Potato Famine years most passengers were carried in windjammers originally built to carry cargo across the Atlantic, but converted to move people.

The voyage across the Atlantic took about six weeks. I will tell the story of such a voyage in the narrative on G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, since it is so well documented in his case.

It is more likely than not that g1 gm ANNA FULLER and her little daughter BARBARA MALLON came to the United States through Canada, and that therefore their point of disembarkation was Grosse Isle in the St. Lawrence Seaway, about 30 miles east of the city of Quebec (not the Grosse Isle out in the Atlantic). Grosse Isle, one of Canada's most important quaratine sites, was a horrible place. Many thousands of Irish who emigrated during the famine years died there of typhoid, cholera and dyssentery, if they survived the voyage across the Atlantic. Though the British government hoped that many of the Irish disembarking at Grosse Isle would stay in Canada, in fact the overwhelming number of those who survived quarantine either had themselves ferried up the St. Lawrence Seaway if they had money, or ferried to shore if they didn't so that they could walk south to the United States.

Somehow, ANNA moved south into the United States with her little daughter, all of the way to Philadelphia, so that in 1851 ANNA was living at #3 Goldsmith Court in Philadelphia, as described in the 1852 Philadelphia Directory (which explains in its introductory passages that it is published in the beginning of 1852, using the very latest 1851 information). Why Philadelphia? The answer may have been the famous Pennsylvania Institution for the Instruction of the Blind, at 20th and Race Streets in Philadelphia. An oral tradition of the family hints that ANNA may have had her daughter BARBARA MALLON boarded there.

Not too long after her arrival in Philadelphia G1 GM ANNA FULLER met and married her second husband, our ancestor G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, whose story we shall now commence.


TO BE CONTINUED

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part V

After the bloody 17th century, the antagonism of the Catholic Irish toward English Protestantism was way too deeply imbued to be erased. The Irish social order was collapsed by the English, but there was a new psychology in its place -- far more defensive, far stronger than anything ever confronted by the English. Cromwell, in committing genocide, and the subsequent invasion by the English in the Williamite War, left the Irish culture with a very permanent bad taste in its mouth.

As the 18th century progressed, English overlords, ruling their stolen lands, forced the Irish to grow crops for export only.

At the same time, the price of those crops was driven down slightly by imposing large tariffs on Irish exports to England, while exempting English goods exported to Ireland from tariffs, milking Ireland's economy, but badly injuring Irish welfare in the process.

As this process continued, Irish anger began to build. Extremely cold winters generating a food shortage in 1740 and 1741 was made ten times worse by the English economic policy. 400,000 Irish -- about one-eighth of the population, died.

The oppression of Irish grew so fierce that Protestant Irish and Norman Irish united with some Catholics to form the Society of United Irishmen to pressure the English into permitting Irish self-rule. When it became clear that the English were determined to only exploit the Irish, anger exploded into Wolfe Tone's Irish Rebellion of 1798.

Wolfe Tone induced the French to try to land a very large army in Ireland in 1796, but severe storms made the landing impossible and the soldiers were returned to France. Accompanying acts of sabotage by Irish rebels shocked the English into terrorizing the Irish with mass burnings, torture and murder of both Catholic and Protestant Irish. Comprehending the impact of indiscriminate torture and murder -- a much more united Ireland -- the British military recommended manipulating Irish Protestants with reports that the British government was only suppressing a "popish" conspiracy. The documents verifying this are very clear.

As the British noose tightened, alarmed Ireland exploded.

Armed guerilla units attacked British army units and forts from all sides. England poured thousands of troops into Ireland. By-and-large, the trained British, assisted by native loyalists, carried the day. Catholic and Protestant rebels were relentlessly pursued. There was little taking of prisoners by the British. Captives, healthy and injured, were tortured and murdered. Their families were raped, tortured and murdered.

The rebels struck back with localized terror, but there was no comparison with British terror.

The French landed a small force of 1,000 regulars accompanied by Wolfe Tone. 5,000 rebels joined them. At Castlebar the British retreated in panic, suffering an embarrassing defeat. Ultimately, the British prevailed, capturing the French and rebels. French prisoners were traded for British prisoners. Irish rebels were murdered.

By the end of 1798 the rebellion had lost its steam. The last of the rebels' guerilla groups did not surrender until 1804, however.

Afterwards, the British used the divide-and-conquer method in Ireland, favoring Irish Protestants while terribly oppressing Irish Catholics. Catholicism was essentially outlawed. Agriculture was "reformed," as four-fifths of the Irish Catholics were forced into potato cultivation, recently discovered by British landlords in London's West End as a means of maximizing profits, setting the stage for the greatest catastrophe of all.

Next chapter: Annie's story.

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part IV

England herself carried the next conflict with Ireland to Ireland, by fighting the main battles of the Glorious Revolution there. When King James II bore a Catholic son, Protestant nobles invited William of Orange to come to England and rule in James' place.

James escaped to France, and then sailed for Ireland with French troops. There he formed a coalition of French Catholic soldiers, Protestant Royalists and Irish Catholics. He restored Irish freedom and lands taken by Cromwell.

As Protestant Derry was besieged, an English force loyal to William of Orange arrived and relieved Derry, and increased its numbers from the Protestant population in and around Derry.

In July, 1689, the army of James at Newtownbutler was easily routed by William's army. But then, in the north, a large Williamite force dissolved from a scorched earth policy by the Catholics, and from cold and disease and guerilla attacks.

In 1690 William himself formed a giant Protestant army in the north, and marched on the Catholic army's camp on the Boyne River. Casualties were light, but the Catholic forces were forced to retreat.

Discouraged, James returned to France, abandoning the Irish, who forever after referred to him as "Seamus an Chaca," "James the Shit."

The Irish successfully repulsed a fierce Protestant attack in Limerick, in August, 1690, but lost a bloody battle to the Williamite army at Galway in 1691, quickly followed by the Catholic surrender of Limerick the same year.

The Treaty of Limerick offered generous terms to Irish Catholics swearing allegiance to King William, but the Protestant Parliament in Ireland refused to ratify the treaty, and recommenced oppression of the Catholics.

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part III

Cromwell "solved" the Irish problem by

butcthering his way across Ireland;

women and children were a special target

The fierceness of Cromwell's attack

gained be judged from the impact

on land ownership

As the English oppressed rather than assimilate the Irish, favoring the English and Presbyterian settlers in all contexts of Irish society, the "Old English" in Ireland -- the descendants of Norman lords -- became "Hebemiores Hibemis ipsis" or "more Irish than the Irish themselves," converting to Catholicism and learning Gaelic and adopting Irish culture, sharpening class lines from English prejudice sharpened religious divisions resulting from the Reformation. Renewed conflict became inevitable, if the English and Presbyterians continued extending their rule, which they did.

Catholic lords in Ireland sought an audience with English King James I and then King Charles I. Each time the English King relented, increasing Irish rights in exchange for higher taxes. The higher taxes were duly paid. The English reneged on their end.

As the seizure of more Catholic lands by ruling English Protestants was announced in this context, Ireland exploded in anger. The English reaped what they sowed.

The conflict began when Charles I attempted to impose Church of England prayers on Scottish Presbyterian churches.

Scotland revolted. Parliament in London also refused to support Charles' effort. Charles tried to trade freedom and lands to Catholics in Ireland for support against the Scots.

The process made Charles I look weak.

Catholic Irish lords thereafter seized Protestant forts in the northern counties in the name of Charles I, perceiving him, as they did, to be "pro-Catholic."

English forces responded with indiscriminate and excessive brutality against the Irish generally. Ireland exploded.

At first, the Irish very carefully restricted themselves to seizing personal property and control of real estate. Not too many English and Protestant overlords and settlers died. But then, at Lisnagarvey in 1641, the settlers murdered hundreds of captured Catholics.

Catholic Ireland exploded with rage. Ireland suddenly became the scene of numerous massacres of Protestant civilians by Irish Catholics.

The Protestant settlers struck back with murderous vengeance. Massacres of helpless Catholic followed massacres of helpless Protestants.

Catholic Owen Roe O'Neill brought the murdering under control, and thereafter restricted the killing to disciplined warfare. A Catholic government was set up in Ireland.

Cromwell landed in Ireland with a well-trained English army in 1649. He thereafter butchered his way across Ireland, by some accounts murdering a third of the population. Most Catholic land was seized and handed over to Protestants. He outlawed the practice of the Catholic faith.

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part II

Map Showing the Sites of Major Battles

In Hugh O'Neill's Rebellion

Clontibret, 1595

Yellow Ford, 1598

Kinsale, 1601-1602

As all of the Irish thought, "Why are they here?," in the early 1590s the English continued to extend their control over the whole of Ireland from Ulster in the northeast.

As they did so, Hugh O'Neill of the Tyrone Clan of Ulster, tolerated by the English as loyal to the crown, began organizing a powerful Irish army.

In 1591, the English murdered an Irish lord for opposing the appointment by the English of a sheriff over the lord's region.

Filled with fear and rage, the Irish resisted appointments of even more sheriffs. As battles broke out, O'Neill gave up any effort to achieve sovereignty and freedom by guile, and joined the rebellion. In 1595, the Irish inflicted an embarrassing defeat on an English army at Clontibret, Ireland, and the English suddenly found themselves in the largest war of the Elizabethan period.

In 1598 the Irish repeated their success, at Yellow Ford in Ulster. A large English army, comprising a substantial portion of the English army in Ireland, was marching to relieve a fort in Ulster, when the Irish attacked the English army after it had become bogged down in the rear by a cannon slowed by mud, and bogged down in the front by a large trench. About half of the English army was annihilated.

In 1599 the English responded to Yellow Ford with a huge army for the time -- 17,000 men. A large contingent was sent to relieve an embattled Gaelic chieftain loyal to the crown. At Curlew Pass, the English attempted to advance up a "road" comprised of huge stones and bog between them, littered with trees felled by the Irish. The Irish savagely harassed the advancing English from nearby woods. The English soldiers, hungry and exhausted, began to panic, and retreated. Colliding with their comrades, the English army was thrown into chaos. The main body of the well-trained Irish charged, and soundly defeated the English. The Earl of Essex was executed by the English for his military failure, his subsequent parley with the Irish, and his unauthorized return to London and attempted coup d'etat there.

The Earl's successors thereafter employed a mix of conciliation, guile and force to retake English forts in Ireland, amidst an occasional Irish victory. At Kinsale in 1601-1602, after surrounding a Spanish army landed at Kinsale in the south of Ireland and bombarding them around the clock, the English force became desperate when surrounded by a large force of Irish irregulars and Scots under Hugh O'Neill. After a long seige, when the English were on the point of surrendering, the Irish foolishly attacked, and were defeated. The Irish retreated, and ther Spanish allowed to return home. In 1603, O'Neill and his allies fled to Spain in search of renewed Spanish support. The Spanish declined. The British, discovered the absence of O'Neill and his allies, seized all of their lands and people, securing the north for the English, who then colonized the land with a large contingent of Presbyterians from Scotland.

Over the next 40 years, the English completely failed to do anything but hate and oppress the Irish clans.

A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part I

Dermot MacMurrough,

The Man Whose Actions

Caused Centuries of Sadness

And Suffering for the Irish

"Dawson" is one of the "John Smith" names of Britain. The role of our family in history has not been great.

Even less significant to the world, and even to members of our family today, is our father's father's mother, Annie Fuller Mallon of Ireland.

To fully understand Annie's story, it is best to have at least a sketchy knowledge of the history of Ireland.

In the middle of the 12th century, before England "knew about" Ireland -- before she began to actively covet control of and exploitation of Ireland as a national policy, King Tiernan O'Rourke ousted King Dermot MacMorrough from his throne and lands. MacMorrough struck back, not only taking back his throne and lands, but also taking O'Rourke's probably-willing wife. In 1166, O'Rourke returned in force, easily retaking his throne and lands -- but the wife stayed with MacMorrough. MacMorrough then made an error for which the Irish would pay a terrible price for three quarters of a millenium -- he went to King Henry II of England for assistance, in exchange for accepting English sovereignty over Ireland. Henry jumped at the opportunity, and in 1169 enabled MacMorrough to conquer Ireland with English soldiers, and then reconquered Ireland again in 1171.

Over the next century, Norman rule based in England weakened, until the native Irish badly defeated the Normans at the Battle of Callann in 1261. English control and influence shrank until, in the 1300s, especially after the Plague made its landfall in Ireland in 1348, the English crown controlled only Dublin.

In 1487, the Irish foolishly allowed themselves to be the launching point of a Flemish and Burgundian army supporting a pretender to the English throne. Greatly disturbed, Henry VII began to reassert control over Ireland. The Irish did not much like resubjugation to the English, especially after Henry VIII began to lead the English out of the Catholic Church. And so, in 1534, Silken Thomas Fitzgerald commenced his famous rebellion, and, after his defeat and capture, despite English guarantees of safe conduct he was murdered on Henry VIII's order, in 1537.

In the two Desmond Rebellions, from 1569 to 1573 and 1579 to 1583, the English responded to Irish efforts to throw off English rule with terrible brutality. In the first Desmond Rebellion, Humphrey Gilbert, appointed Governor of Muenster, terrorized the Irish by murdering civilians at random and lining the roads to his camps with severed Irish heads -- somewhat reminiscent of that pathway of Jewish tombstones in "Schindler's List." One of Gilbert's successors William Drury broke the peace entered into after the first rebellion by simply arresting and murdering 700 of the participants.

In the second Desmond Rebellion, the Irish killed English soldiers and property. The English destroyed everything in sight by fire -- including the Irish families. They burned and murdered the Irish into submission. The enormous destruction by the English generated severe famine. Many thousands died of hunger.

GGGGGGGG GF Garrett Van Swearingen

Great great great great great great great great ("G8") grandfather Garrett Van Swearingen, a Dutchman, really is one of our more intriguing ancestors.

He is our mother Eleanore Anne Eitelman's (and therefore Uncle Eddie's and Uncle Mike's)...

father Edward Decatur Eitelman's
mother May Katherine Pitman's
father Decatur Pitman's
mother Eleanore Amanda William's
father Congressman Jared William's
mother Anne Swearingen's
father John Swearingen's
father Thomas Swearingen's

father.

Garrett was born to David Janse Swieringh and Hester Jacobs in Beemsterdam, Holland on February 4, 1636. (A few sources say "Reemstwerdam," but this is almost certainly a typo copied from one fastidious chronicle writer by another. Beemster is a section of Noord Holland County. "Beemsterdam" or "Beemsterwaal" refers to the section of Beemster closer to the inland sea, next to the dike. It is possible that "Reemstwerdam" is a reference to "Amsterdam" a short distance to the south, but I find no geographical precedent for the "ee" instead of "a" between the "r" and the "m" of "Ramsterdam.")

In the 1500s, the Netherlands, especially the Holland counties on the west, were a hotbed of economic and religious and political rebellion. The Holland counties became the most densely-urbanized section of all of Europe in the 1500s, and generally well-to-do. However, as the nation-state concept gained preeminence in the thinking of the people, increasing awareness of the idea of Separation of Church and State, as it did in Germany, and as the Princes of the Church in Europe wenched and taxed their way to disgust and infamy, the people of Holland started getting "itchy." After Holy Roman Emperor Charles V began to back-off Inquisition-style repression and executions in the Netherlands -- and there were a lot of executions in the Netherlands -- and began to grow lax in tax collections, his son Phillip II, inheriting the Netherlands as his share of the Holy Roman Empire, tightened the Catholic noose while reaching into purses with renewed vigor.

This made the Netherlanders, both those known to be sympathetic to Herr Luther and those who remained loyal to the Church, crazy people. The Protestant AND Catholic nobles asked for relief, and Margaret of Perma, Regent in Phillip's absence, was very intimidated by the unanimity of the support for relief, and, being small-minded, responded in exactly the wrong way, at a pivotal moment in history: She called the nobles "gueux," "beggars," and kicked them out of the room!

And thus began the Eighty Years War, one of the Reformation Wars which devastated Europe, in 1568.

Street gatherings led to armed mobs led to an attack on the walled town of Veurne. Called to respond, the militias -- the "Dutch National Guard" -- declined to repress the attack. Regent Margaret made late concessions to try to quell resistance. But she was closing the barn door after the animals escaped. Resistance continued. A noble loyal to Phillip led an army against the disorganized Calvanist rebels, crushed the revolt, and executed all of the leaders.

Phillip, alarmed at all of this, sent the Duke of Alba and a large army of Italian mercenaries to Holland. Alba proceeded like a political moron. He arrested 9,000 Hollanders, Catholic and Protestant, and executed 1,000 of them, and drove the rest into exile, seizing their property.

"Sea Beggars" -- Calvanist pirates authorized by Letters of Marque from William of Orange as Count of Holland, with a name snidely referring to Regent Margaret's unkind words dismissing the nobles of Holland -- preyed on Holy Roman Empire trade.

William of Orange invaded the Netherlands at the head of an army of 30,000 Germans, mostly Protestant. but he began to run out of money, and therefore began to lose his ability to feed his soldiers, who began to melt away.

But Islam, of all things, came to the rescue. Phillip was too distracted by the ferocious war with Turkish Islam at the Battle of Lepanto to oppose even William's weakened army.

And then the Duke of Alba was doubly stupid. He frightened even his most ultra-loyal ultra-Catholic supporters in the Netherlands with his brutal tax collections, and destroyed all local support.

The Dutch, Catholic and Protestant, suddenly wanted independence.

William of Orange proved himself even more harebrained than Alba, when he joined an invasion of the Netherlands, to promote respect for unity and public order in France!

At the same time, as all pirates do, William's Sea Beggars got out of hand, and began to prey upon 100% Catholic-but-neutral Hanseatic League ships, profitable to all.

Two negatives multiplied-out to a positive, here, though. Alba withdrew his Catholic army from a port named Brill to oppose Orange. The Calvanist pirates of William, having disgusted Queen Elizabeth by their profit-threatening anti-Hanseatic activity, were met with fierce opposition at sea. They took refuge at Brill. The pro-rebel militia in Flushing seized their port and invited the Sea Beggars there, too. William sought the support of these two ports and the surrounding provinces, and got it. Suddenly, he had his own united Catholic/Protestant rebel kingdom!

For the next 60 years, the battle went back-and-forth, back-and-forth. In all of the chaos, by 1635 the relatively-religiously-neutral Dutch had generated a stable, habitable republic which saw its way to entering into a Treaty of Alliance with Catholic France to divide-up the Spanish Netherlands, generating more warfare.

During this time, the Dutch East India Company and Dutch West India Company began to become extremely prosperous, generating a navy larger than that of any other in the world.

William of Orange's rebellious little state had become a world power.

This was the context of Garrett Van Swearingen's birth. At least one of his parents -- we can't tell which -- had him baptized Roman Catholic, and he remained Catholic to the end of his days. His Catholic faith, which he tended to "wear on his sleeve," makes his biography all the more notable, in several ways. We will see that, despite his Catholicism, he was at all points implicitly trusted by the Dutch West India Company. Despite his Catholicism, he will win a fierce political battle over the fate of a murderous debt collector visiting a colony for which Van Swearingen was sheriff and a judge. Despite his Catholicism, Van Swearingen will literally get away with murder, himself. Finally, despite his Catholicism, the English, in an attack upon Swearingen's little American colony, let him live, and probably because of his Catholicism Lord Baltimore gave Van Swearingen a wonderful tract of land in Maryland.

One biographer credits Garrett Van Swearingen with being well-educated, based on his knowledge of French, German and English. One gets the sense, in viewing his life panoramically, that he was indeed deeply intelligent. But in fact his knowledge of the three languages may simply be the result of his roots and exposure to cosmopolitan Holland.

Probably after several years' exposure to the shipping industry in Holland as a teenager, in December, 1656, at age 20, Garrett Van Swearingen secured employment as "super cargo" -- superintendent of cargo -- on board the Dutch West India Company's "Prince Maurice." His subsequent actions, bold, tending to take control in a responsible fashion, ratify the wisdom of his appointment, and verify a supposition that even at age 20 Garrett Van Swearingen had considerable experience even at age 20.

West India Company archives related the following...

"Sailed from Amsterdam December 21, 1656, left Texel December 25, 1656, arrived at Long Island March 8, 1657; wrecked.

"Jacob Alrichs, director
Alexander D'Hinoyossa, Lieutenant
Evert Pietersen, comforter of the sick
Gerrit van Schweringen, Supercargo
Jan Barents, chief boatswain
Jan Gerritsen, sailor
Joost Theunissen, sailor
129 persons including Colonists, free mechanics, soldiers and attendants.

"J. Alrich reports: 'We proceeded with them on the proposed voyage, and after some storm and other obstacles, reached the vicinity of the Manhattans. ...[T]hrough ignorance of the skipper and pilot who were never on this coast, having neared the shore in the evening, [the Prince Maurice, on March 8, 1657] immediately grounded, and so shoved, which continued afterwards harder and harder, that we were not for a moment, sure of our lives, and seeing no escape in the morning, we unanimously resolved to save ourslves on a broken coast, which we, some days later, understood to be Long Island. An agreement was made with the skipper of the Beaver to charter the passengers to the Colony on the South River. The Beaver set sail from New Amsterdam on April 16 to the South River, arriving at New Amstel, April 25th, with about 125 persons for the Colonie from the ship Prince Maurice, including 50 persons who arrived on other ships. Thirty-eight soldiers, with the Captain and Lieutenant, marched over land because there was no room in the Beaver to allow of their coming by water. The ship experiencing contrary wind, the soldiers, on that account, started somewhat later from the Manhattans, and therefore arrived at the fort six days later."

Other details which have come down to us are that Dutch Governor Peter Stuyvesant, hearing from some Indians that a vessel had run aground on some rocks just outside Fire Island Inlet, sent a small boat to investigate; that Garrett Van Swearingen was carried by that boat to Peter Stuyvesant and introduced to him, and that Peter Stuyvesant, after receiving a full report from Van Swearingen, released him to allow Van Swearingen to hire a somewhat smaller boat, the "Beaver," to ferry "Prince Maurice" passengers and crew ashore and off-load the valuable cargo.

New Amstel, their ultimate destination, was Fort Casimir, now Newcastle, Delaware on the South River, now Delaware River.

Fort Casimir was no impregnable fortress. A sketch and a model illustrating that it was little more than a small walled compound containing the fort's residential headquarters make it clear that it was a place Dutch colonists would only retreat to in the event of an emergency...

On April 25, 1657, Garrett Van Swearingen, his superiors, the colonists and the soldiers demanded surrender of Fort Casimir by the occupying Swedes. The Swedes duly surrendered the fort, without violence, perhaps because the Dutch comprised a vastly superior force. The Dutch renamed the fort New Amstel.

Garrett Van Swearingen rose up steadily through the ranks, from Clerk in the Fort Store, to Chief Commissary, to Second Councilor, to First Councilor (Executive Officer), to Captain -- the military commander-in-chief -- and "Schout" or Sheriff, and judge

In January, 1659 (the most-commonly-cited date), GGGGGGGG GF Garrett Van Swearingen, at 23 years of age, married GGGGGGGG GM Barbara DeBarette, also 23 years of age, daughter of GGGGGGGGG GF Isaack DeBarette, probably a wool merchant from Valenciennes, Nord Pas de Calais, France, who brought Barbara and her brother Peter to Fort Casimir, perhaps at Garrett Van Swearingen's invitation.

In December, 1659, Garrett Van Swearingen reported by letter to a sponsor in the Dutch West India Company...

'New Amstel, December 8, 1659

'NOBLE, WORSHIPFUL, WISE, RIGH, PRUDENT SIR: --

'With due respect and reverence, have I hereby taken the liberty to greet you, though bound in duty of gratitude, to devote to you all the days of my life. ...I cannot neglect, hereby to communicate my promotion. About a year and a half, after my departure from Patria (my native country), with your Honor's faborable recommendation, I have been appointed Sheriff here subject to the approbation of the Honorables the Principals. Previously, I have taken care of the store as clerk; and after J. Rynevelt's death, as Commissary, from which I have not requested to be discharged, as I have, though unworthy, been recently made Second Councilor, with Sir Alexander Hinojossa, First Councilor, and Captain of the military here, who intends to go over in the Spring, to represent this miserable place.

'If things become worse, I, individually, am ruined, for I have received here, some goods from my brothers, all of which I have laid out in a house, horses and mules, which cost me full, four to six thousand guilders, Holland currency.

'Besides that, I am also married. ...

'Herewith I commend your Honor to the mercy and protection of the Most High God, and remain.

'Your obedient, humble servant,

'G. Van Sweringen'

More to come.