Saint Patrick’s Day in the United States, featuring parades and parties, singing and dancing, and green everything, is often a puzzle to visitors from Ireland. Why don’t Irish-Americans just celebrate Saint Patrick by going to church, the way every other saint on the church calendar is honored ? I remember this question being raised by an Irish visitor to my maternal grandparents’ house when I was quite small.
Our guest found it odd that people who had never been to Ireland would be celebrating St. Patrick’s day at all. My grandparents (who both had Irish descent through their mothers) set him straight, with the following explanation, which I would like to share with you.
Please understand that celebration of Saint Patrick’s day is an American tradition, one that belonged first to Irish exiles. One of the songs sung in my grandparents’ house was The Wearing of the Green. This is the first verse:
“Oh Paddy dear and did you hear the news that's going 'round?
The shamrock is forbid by law to grow on Irish ground.
No more St. Patrick's Day to keep, his colours can't be seen.
There is a cruel law against the wearing of the green.”
This old ballad commemorates the 1798 rising of the United Irishmen, when wearing a shamrock tucked into your buttonhole was a secret symbol of rebellion. After the 1798 rising was crushed by the English government, the independent Irish Parliament in Dublin was dissolved and merged into the Parliament in Westminster. Ireland as a separate political entity ceased to exist.
At this point, wearing a shamrock — especially on St. Patrick’s day — was a punishable offense in the United Kingdom.
My grandfather was a great-grandson of one of the United Irishmen who had managed to escape to America (New York City, to be precise) in 1798. According to family lore, this gentleman always wore a “bit of green” on St. Patrick’s day as his quiet way of remembering his homeland — and in his day “wearing the green” or displaying a shamrock on March 17th could only happen in America, because it was forbidden in Ireland.
There was also my grandmother’s mother, born in Ireland in 1850, who came to America with her family as a very small child. These newcomers, and all the other Irish famine refugees who crossed the Atlantic at that time, knew nothing about the American tradition of shamrocks, parades and “wearing of the green” on St. Patrick’s Day, although they readily adopted these traditions when they became Irish-Americans.
Saint Patrick’s Day celebrations were an American thing, because for over a century they could not happen in Ireland. (Irish independence was officially achieved on December 6, 1922.) So in in our small corner of California, even in the middle of the 20th century, there was always a patch of shamrocks (bigger than clover) growing next to the kitchen door of my grandparents’ house. A vase displaying a freshly picked green shamrock bouquet always appeared on the table on St. Patrick’s Day, and my grandmother always pinned a slip of green ribbon on anyone who wasn’t “wearing the green” at her table on “the Day.” If “the Day” came on a weekend, there was a festive dinner, one of the cousins played the piano, there was singing and dancing… But even on a weekday, the family gathered for a meal to celebrate a day, and honor a heritage, that had been suppressed by a larger and more powerful country next door.
At this time when Ukraine is fighting for independence, I pray that her refugees may find places among friends and carry forward their heritage, as my ancestors did.
Lá fhéile Pádraig sona dhaoibh! Happy Saint Patrick’s Day to you all!
More information:
https://exhibits.lib.ku.edu/exhibits/show/easter-1916/ireland-and-opposition
https://www.theirishstory.com/2017/10/28/the-1798-rebellion-a-brief-overview/#.YjKnVrhOnzU