The Molly Mcguires of Pennsylvania - Essay Example

Though their life in Ireland was fraught with famine, poverty and arduous labor conditions, life in America was no less hard. At least in Ireland, they were not the subject of bigotry based simply on their heritage, accent or religion. Irish Catholics were thought of as almost sub-human. Two Catholic churches were burned to the ground while occupied in Philadelphia on May 6, 1844 causing 16 people to lose their lives. One of the only places in the country that the Irish were welcomed was in the coal mines of Pennsylvania where the owners of the mines were more than happy to employ those disenfranchised persons of Irish nationality who were desperate enough to take the dirty, dangerous jobs.

It was in these Pennsylvania mining camps that the Molly Maguires experienced a rebirth in America. In 1860, following a typical tough day of mining, several Irishmen were heavily drinking and bemoaning the harsh working conditions at their usual location, the Girardville, PA lodge of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, a group established by Irish Catholics (Liljegren, 1964). The Irish working class had a long history of acting violently when they believed that they were being taken advantage of and the addition of being drunk and extremely unhappy served to light the fuse for actions against their oppressors.

This is when they reformed the Molly Maguires, a group that had its roots in Ireland during the 1700’s. This very secretive brotherhood was originally formed to exact retribution upon their cruel English landlords who were infamous in their treatment of Irish tenants. The English would actually kill their tenants so that they could raise the rent on new renters. The ‘Mollies,’ as they were commonly called, took this name from such an instance of cruelty. Molly Maguire was an aged widow who was one of the people being evicted from her home by one of these evil