The Irish Republic, January 11, 1868
No Irish Need Apply!
The heading of this article, some years ago used to be a favorite mode of emitting the venom of senseless bigotry against our race, even here in America. It reached its culmination in the days of “Know Nothingism,” and was buried on the battle-fields of the Union. It is an English importation, transplanted from English soil, and carefully cultivated here by English gardeners. A nation like Ireland, that has the audacity to protest against being trampled beneath the car of English progress-laden as it is with bastard princes, bloated aristocrats, bald-headed shopmen who ape their betters and lay their souls at the foot of the throne, bibles, gibbets, famines, poorhouses and impudence—must be calumniated. In England, where their own working girls are treated like slaves, our Irish countrywomen are treated like dogs—they will not become slaves. Hunted from the land that should be their own, and from the demolished homesteads that should give them shelter, they come to America, and this hatred and spite of England rises up here in respectable newspapers, in such paragraphs as “No Irish need apply.” Apply for what? To work honestly and virtuously for a miserable pittance, subject to the contumely of men and women, who, for the most part, were lackeys to me lud Puddington, in Yorkshire, and who by chance find themselves elevated to the position of whip holders, even while their own persons show the marks of the master’s hand or boot.
The worst feature of the whole matter is, that America, the child of liberty and liberality, gets the credit or disgrace of this “no Irish need apply” nuisance. John Baldy Pudge wants a victim. He immediately advertises in some respectable American paper that, “A girl is wanted at No. 8, Victoria Place. American, English, Norwegian, German, French, Negro, Hottentot, Chinese, Japanese preferred. No Irish need apply.” Now, Baldy Pudge is careful to conceal his name, and, of course, it looks as though some Yankee, with the blood of three generations of freedom throbbing through his heart, is the advertiser. Pudge has had his revenge, he has cried “mad dog” to the Irish, and thrown the onus on the Yankee. Our race is insulted, and America is disgraced, for it would be a disgrace for an American man or woman to insult a whole people and injure a virtuous and industrious class of girls such as our Irish girls are.
When we say that we are not afraid to champion our Irish girls for virtue, honesty, industry and filial affection against the girls of any other nation on earth, we do not wish to hurt the feelings of others. Heaven knows we look upon the working girls of all nations with the greatest respect, and would not insult the humblest cheek that blooms with honest labor in the kitchens and workshops of the land. How heartless and brutal scoundrels can outrage the common feelings of humanity by insulting our whole race—for we are all insulted when the humblest girl who toils to live a virtuous life is insulted with such inexcusable and intentionally vicious bigotry as tacking on to their advertisements “no Irish need apply,” baffles our comprehension.
Last week a correspondent drew attention to a few of these advertisements from the Chicago Tribune of the 18th December:
- WANTED—A good girl to do general housework in a family of three. Apply with references at 298 Calumet av. No Irish need apply.
WANTED—A good girl to do general housework. German, Norwegian, English or American. No Irish need apply. 182 West Monroe st.
WANTED—A good cook, washer and ironer, one who can give good references may apply at 219 West Adams st. No Irish need apply.
WANTED—A girl from 12 to 15 years of age to take care of children and assist in the upstairs work. One with good references may apply at 219 West Adams street. No Irish need apply.
We have gone to some bother to find out who these advertisers were. We have the pleasure of assuring our Irish readers that, as we before surmised, those “no Irish need apply” style of people are not Americans. The “Calumet” establishment we have not visited as yet, but the other two are peopled as follows: 182 West Monroe street is kept by C. E. Lowell, a book-keeper; 219 West Adams street, by one Liverius DeGraff, who keeps a clothing store at the corner of Randolph and State streets. Liverius DeGraff, Esq., we believe, is an Englishman, and so is the book-keeper. As DeGraff does not keep the sign of “no Irish need apply” over his clothing house we trust our Irish friends will look on it as though it was there. We are going to open a column in our paper where we will publish the name, business and nationality of every “thing” who insults our country with such advertisements. We are sorry that newspapers of respectability, such as the Tribune, will sully their pages with such advertisements. They become a party to the insult, unintentionally, of course. We know the gentlemen who are connected with the Tribune too well to impute any anti-Irish feeling to them. Their advocacy of Ireland’s cause during the last year or two is proof enough of their liberality. We trust they will prohibit any further use of their columns to insult and traduce our Irish girls.
We shall pursue this question by all means in our power until we silence those venemous vipers who would poison the American mind against our poor country girls by such advertisements as we allude to.
Is it not enough for those requiring help to say who can apply, without winding up with this British fling, “no Irish need apply?” Everybody has a perfect right to hire whom they please; but they cannot insult our race with impunity any longer, and we now give them timely notice to that effect.
Chicago Tribune, September 13, 1868
The Democracy are circulating in bill form an article extremely offensive our Irish citizens, from the Chicago Evening Post. Lest they ran short this kind of ammunition before the election, we republish gratuitously an from the Chicago Times, purporting be a description of the Irish settlements Chicago.
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