A question for English/UK members

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I believe that Ireland was a net exporter of food during the “famine.”

It was the people that were hungry, not the country.

Despite my pride in my English background this remains a point of shame for me: this time in history could be classed as a genocidal event.

This is the time when some of my Irish ancestors came to England.
 
triumphguy said:
I believe that Ireland was a net exporter of food during the “famine.”

It was the people that were hungry, not the country.

Despite my pride in my English background this remains a point of shame for me: this time in history could be classed as a genocidal event.

This is the time when some of my Irish ancestors came to England.
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As did mine.
From the information I gathered, my Irish ancestors fled into Scotland and eventually ended up in Lancashire in the 1860s. The census form for my great grandfather in 1900 lists his birthplace as “England”, but his nationality as “Irish” or “Irish free state”. His oldest brother was born in Ireland. There was another brother, a shadowy figure I have been unable to locate. As a child I heard he spent some time in the “wild west”, and indeed there were more than a few with my last name who worked for the railroad out in Colorado.
 
triumphguy said:
My Irish ancestors worked in an aristocratic house when they came to England and even though husband and wife were not allowed to live together or to see each other except once a week and then only with a grate between them.
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Since I have a uncommon Irish last name I was able to trace one ancestor who worked as a servant for a rich industrailist in the 1870s. She was only 18.
We have been spared, to some extent, that kind of class system here in the US.
 
JustaServant said:
Since I have a uncommon Irish last name I was able to trace one ancestor who worked as a servant for a rich industrailist in the 1870s. She was only 18.
We have been spared, to some extent, that kind of class system here in the US.
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???

What that a serious comment?
 
lerapt78 said:
. . . . .More specifically, for any members who are of English, Welsh, Scottish ancestry (ethnicity) and currently living in the UK:

I know that there has been a large number of Irish immigrants in England for decades now, who probably consider themselves to be both English and Catholic, due to their nationality. But I was wondering if there are any non-Irish/non-other immigrant English/Welsh/Scottish people on here who are Catholic and have always been Catholic (ie: not converts)?

If so, I would like to hear a bit about your family backgrounds.

How did your families manage to maintain their Catholic faith uninterrupted throughout the centuries?

Are there any Catholic enclaves in England, where a sizeable portion of the population has held the faith as a minority amidst a Protestant majority? And if so, was there ever any persecution against them, or have they just quietly observed their faith over the generations?

If they were always practicing Catholics, did they tend to keep it to themselves?

I thought I remembered hearing once that Wales had a larger number of Catholics - is that correct? And if so, is that in any way tied to the stories I’ve heard about shipwrecked survivors of the Spanish Armada (if there is indeed validity to those stories)?

No offense to any Brits of Irish descent - you’re welcome to reply as well! - I was just curious about getting the perspective on the history of non-convert ethnic English/Welsh/Scottish Catholics.

Thanks!

(Mods, please remove my post if I put this in the wrong forum :))
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I’ve never met anyone with a solid Catholic background who isn’t Irish.
 
I can understand your objection, then, as “famine” infers a natural disaster.
 
Symphorian said:
When the First Book of Common Prayer was introduced in 1549 it was not well received in Devon and Cornwall which were areas of Catholic loyalty. As a result, The Prayer Book Rebellion/Prayer Book Rising ensued. Cornwall was also a Celtic land, many people still speaking the Cornish language. Another possible cause for the uprising was the desire of the Cornish to have independence from England. The Cornish were concerned by the introduction of English for church services in the 1549 Book of Common Prayer. This was another threat to the Cornish identity. Glasney College (suppressed under Henry VIII) had been an important cultural centre which had produced a important cycle of Mystery Plays in the Cornish language. Fortunately these survive but we can only guess at what might have been lost as a result of the suppression. The Catholic Church had been sympathetic to Cornish culture and language - the new English regime was not.
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This is very interesting. The only thing I know about Cornwall is that they produced some delicious chickens!🙂

Showing my ignorance regarding the subject. . . . . I always had the impression that while Elizabeth I implemented the great schism, it was primarily Oliver Cromwell who was responsible for the forcible overturning of Catholicism. However, according to your post, is it more correct to say that Catholic suppression began a century prior, and much of it had to do with nationalistic identity and less to do with actual religion?
triumphguy said:
Lancashire and Cheshire were Catholic centres. Look up some of the English Martyrs and it will give good info on where the Catholics were. Many were hanged drawn and quartered in Lancaster Castle.

Eg., St. Ambrose Barlow from Barlow Moor in Cheshire (now inside Greater Manchester). I went to St. Ambrose School and Church when I was a kid.
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Do you know the particluar reason for this? Was it because of their geographical distance from London?
 
Zundrah said:
I’ve never met anyone with a solid Catholic background who isn’t Irish.
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My family is Irish RC if you go back long enough on both sides. Indeed, their Roman Catholicism was tied up strongly with their Irish nationalism.
 
The scale of mass immigration in England is so bad now that I have heard the Brompton Oratory is celebrating the Mass in POLISH on a weekly basis.
 
lerapt78 said:
Do you know the particluar reason for this? Was it because of their geographical distance from London?
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I’d have to look on a map. If those cities were closer to Scotland, it would make sense. Many Irish refugees fled into Scotland.
 
triumphguy said:
I am sure they are HAPPY to be celebrating the mass in Polish.
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It was common in Pittsburgh during the immigration to have Masses said in Polish, Slovak, German, ect. Most of the immigrants worked in the steel mills. There is still standing a Ukrainian Orthodox church with very large domes that served the Ukrainian immigrants. Holy Cross Catholic (long gone) was built to accomadate the influx of Irish immigrants.
So many of these immigrants lived and worked in the same community, even though they had thier own areas. Even as a child I remember hearing several different languages spoke. It was a true melting pot.
Those days are long gone now. Life was very tough for those immigrants. They were worked to death in the mills, lived in poverty and were looked down on because they ‘spoke funny’.
My wife and I the other day were talking about Bruno Samartino, a local Italian immigrant wrestler who became the champion of what would later become the World Wrestling Federation. Nobody made fun of his “funny accent”. :eek: He grew up in the Italian area of Pittsburgh. A true soft-spoken gentleman.
 
lerapt78 said:
This is very interesting. The only thing I know about Cornwall is that they produced some delicious chickens!🙂

Showing my ignorance regarding the subject. . . . . I always had the impression that while Elizabeth I implemented the great schism, it was primarily Oliver Cromwell who was responsible for the forcible overturning of Catholicism. However, according to your post, is it more correct to say that Catholic suppression began a century prior, and much of it had to do with nationalistic identity and less to do with actual religion?

Do you know the particluar reason for this? Was it because of their geographical distance from London?
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In many ways Lancashire was somewhat isolated from the rest of England. First, it lay near the geographical northern limit of the realm. Also, it had very scant parliamentary representation, with only 10 seats: 2 for the county and two each for the townships of Preston, Liverpool, Wigan and Lancaster… and, by the early 16th century had not actually sent representatives to Parliament in over 200 years. Lancashire was also the most fervently Catholic county in the land during times of religious dissent, enforced Protestantism and eventual Civil Wars.
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When the Tudors forced the break with Rome and began the English Reformation, Lancashire’s gentry closed ranks and offered stiff resistance. Many Catholic families simply continued practicing the old faith and went on celebrating the Mass in secret, while nominally embracing Protestantism, as new laws demanded. Lancashire Catholics tended to send their children to be educated on the Continent, so that only in the Parish of Manchester itself did the Protestant faith really flourish, surrounded as it was by a veritable sea of overt Catholicism. Official response to Catholicism was somewhat laissez-faire, and initially at least, little was done, other than a few fines here and there. At the very worst of times only 16 Lancastrians were executed for their beliefs during the reign of Elizabeth I, sometime around 1537. The county was a virtual hotbed of priests, and apart from Manchester itself, Anglican Protestant ministers of religion were few and far between.
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manchester2002-uk.com/lancashire1.html
 
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