4.5. Irish Immigration http://www.ck12.org
FIGURE 4.9
Jensen, Richard. “No Irish Need Apply:
A Myth of Victimization.” Journal of Social
History 36.2 (2002) 405-429One chestnut horse, 3 years old, is also for sale. Excellent saddle horse; can be ridden by a lady.
Also, young man wanted, from 16 to 13 years of age, able to work. No Irish need apply.
Questions:
- What does the advertisement mean when it says: “No Irish need apply?”
- Based on this advertisement, how do you think the Irish were treated when they looked for jobs? Why might
this be the case?
Wages of Whiteness –David Roediger
Source: Excerpt from the book Wages of Whiteness, written by historian David R. Roediger and published in 1991.
Irish-Americans were sometimes used as substitutes for slaves in the South. Gangs of Irish immigrants worked
ditching and draining plantations, building levees and sometimes clearing land because of the danger of death to
valuable slave property (and, as one account put it, to mules) in such work. One Southerner explained the use of
Irish labor as follows: ’n—–s are worth too much to be risked here; if the Paddies (Irish) are knocked overboard...
nobody loses anything.’
Irish youths were likely to be indentured servants from the early 1800s through the Civil War. In that position they
were sometimes called ’Irish slaves’ and more frequently ’bound boys.’ In New York City, Irish women made up the
largest group of prostitutes, or as they were sometimes called in the 1850s, ’white slaves.’
Questions:
- Why were Irish used to do difficult labor in the South?
- Based on this document, do you think the Irish were treated like slaves?