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Join
Us as History is Made At the
Dedication of the
Weekend Activities:
(Note:
Discount rooms are available at the Clarion Town House,
1615 Gervais St., Columbia, SC.
Call - 803-771-8711, ask for Jennifer Shy and the block of rooms for the AOH)
Friday Afternoon, Tour of the Canal
Friday,
September 5th
Saturday, September 6th
Gravesides
Memorial Ceremony (Following
Mass, St. Peter’s Cemetery
11:00 AM Dedication
of the
Keynote Speaker:
Neill
Burgess, Consul General, The
Among
the honored guests: The
Family of Consul General Neill Burgess,
1:30PM Lunch, Music, &
Dancing,
Half-Way to
St. Patrick’s Feis, Delaney’s Irish Pub,
Saturday
evening to be announced:
Hosted by:
The
St. Columba Division
The Ancient Order of Hibernians
Jim Pat Lawracy, President and Chairman
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People
of the Irish race bear the crown and the cross of thousands of years of known
history. A part of the cross was
carried right here, at the confluence of three rivers, when they shipped men
from Ireland as the indentured workers whose bondage was to be served digging
the Columbia Canal. Also, part of the crown is this canal.
The
practice of using bondage to move the Irish out of Ireland began soon after the
claiming of Ireland by the English monarchy and reached its numerical peak
during the Cromwell years in the mid-1600s, when, historians tell us, up to
100,000 men, women, boys & girls were “transplanted” to America and the
West Indies as slaves and, the contractual equivalent, indentured servants.
The stones stand to the memory of the Irish “leetmen” (a feudal term
for those bound to work the land) brought here in the 1810’s and Twenties to
build the
These
Irish leetmen were the reason why St. Peter’s, mother church of the UpCountry,
was founded and many of them are buried in its cemetery.
Their memorial is built of granite blocks, salvaged from the
Click here
to read the June 29th article in the Columbia newspaper. "The
State" Newspaper Article
