ExtractNew Perspectives on the Irish in Scotland
Edited by Martin J. Mitchell
Preface
Irish emigration to Scotland is one of the most important events in the modern history of the nation. Other immigrant groups have arrived over the past two hundred years, and have made major contributions to Scottish society. But arguably none has had the same impact as the Irish on the social, economic, political, religious and cultural life of the country. Irish immigrants were vital to the success of the Scottish economy during the industrial revolution of the nineteenth century, and they played an important role in the creation of the
trade union and labour movement.
The impact of Irish immigration is still apparent in twenty-first-century Scotland. Today there are over a million Scots who are descendants of those who crossed the North Channel from the 1790s onwards. Between two-thirds and three-quarters of the new arrivals were Roman Catholic, and their presence led to the re-emergence on a large scale of sectarianism and religious bigotry. These problems continued into the twentieth century, and indeed to the present day, although there is some considerable debate as to the current extent of anti-Catholicism in Scottish society.
Some of Scotland’s major institutions would either not exist or would be insignificant if there had been little or no Irish immigration. The Roman Catholic Church in Scotland is a prime example. In the 1780s, prior to the arrival of the Irish, there were only around 30,000 Catholics in Scotland out of a total population of around 1.5 million, or 2 per cent of the total. Today there are over 800,000 Catholics in the country – the bulk of whom are of Irish descent – who make up around 16 per cent of Scots. In the 1780s most Catholics in Scotland lived either in the western highlands and islands or in the north-east. In the western lowland counties Catholicism was all but extinct. Irish immigration changed this geographical pattern. By the 1830s the west of Scotland had become the centre of Catholicism and the Catholic Church, and remains so to this day: around 70 per cent of Scotland’s Roman Catholic
population live in the region.
Other contemporary institutions are the creations of Irish immigration. Between one-quarter and one-third of the Irish in nineteenth-century Scotland were Protestant, and these immigrants brought over their own culture and heritage, part of which for some was Orangeism. Orange lodges were established in areas of Protestant Irish settlement, and throughout the nineteenth century their membership was drawn overwhelmingly from that community. Today the order and Orangeism are important features of the lives of tens of thousands of Scots. Finally, one of Europe’s most famous sporting institutions, Glasgow Celtic Football Club, was founded in 1887 by and for members of the city’s Catholic Irish community.
Despite the Irish having made a vital contribution to the creation of modern Scotland, the immigrants were for a long time neglected by academic historians. In the 1940s James Handley published two histories of the Irish in Scotland; but it was 40 years before another monograph appeared on the subject, namely Tom Gallagher’s study of the Irish in Glasgow. In the intervening period the subject was kept alive through articles and essays by historians such as John McCaffrey, Bernard Aspinwall, William Walker and Ian Wood.
The past two decades have seen a resurgence of scholarly interest in the Irish in Scotland. Monographs, theses, articles, essays, conferences and symposia on the subject have all contributed to a better understanding of the immigrant experience. This volume brings together most of the leading scholars of the Irish in Scotland. New perspectives are offered on some of the major themes of Irish immigration, such as communal relations and sectarianism, the relationship between the Catholic Irish and their clergy, Catholic devotional life, the Famine Irish, immigrant political activities, the impact which the Protestant Irish had on the Scottish Episcopal Church, Orangeism, Catholic Irish involvement in the First World War, and the experience of the Catholic community in Scotland since the end of the Second World War.
More research is needed on the Irish in Scotland. The approaches and methodologies adopted by the contributors demonstrate the ways in which the subject can be advanced. Some areas need more research than others. For example, little is known of the experience of Irish women, or of the Irish middle class in Scotland. The study of Irish involvement in local politics is in its infancy. Detailed local studies of Irish communities are essential for a fuller understanding of immigrant life, as comparisons can then be made to determine if the Irish experience was uniform throughout Scotland, or differed according to the social and economic context of individual towns and villages. Finally, comparisons need to be made with Irish immigrant communities throughout the world, in order to place the Irish in Scotland firmly in the context of the study of the Irish Diaspora.
Most of the essays in this volume were first given at a symposium held in the AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies, University of Aberdeen, as part of its major research programme on the Scottish and Irish diasporas. I am grateful to the late Janet Hendry, the then administrator of the centre, and to the founding director, Professor Tom Devine, for their support. I also wish to thank Jean Fraser who helped to prepare the text for publication with her usual efficiency and enthusiasm.
Martin Mitchell,
University of Strathclyde
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