The Circle of Giving
Taoiseach Micheál Martin emphasized that the Famine’s lessons of compassion, solidarity, and humanity would resonate with future generations. He spoke at the annual National Famine Commemoration, held on May 17 at the Irish Workhouse Centre in Portumna, County Galway, honoring those who suffered, died, or emigrated during the An Gorta Mór (1845–1852).
To mark the occasion, the Irish Heritage Trust released a special documentary video titled President Mary Robinson’s Visit to Choctaw Nation and the National Famine Museum, Stokestown Park.
This act of modern remembrance illuminates the enduring legacy of Robinson’s presidency (1990-1997), which transformed how Ireland engages with its past. By linking the then 150th anniversary of An Gorta Mór to contemporary global hunger and the Irish diaspora, the former president argued that Ireland’s historical trauma had given the nation an “informed consciousness” and a profound moral obligation to support developing countries facing modern crises.
Central to that global vision was her 1995 visit to the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma, which had donated $170 (worth thousands today) to help starving Irish families in March 1847.
“I first learned about the gift of the Choctaw people to the Irish famine victims when I was president,” she recalls in the documentary video. “I was very pleased to have the opportunity to travel to Oklahoma and thank the Choctaw people for that incredible humanitarian generosity. They didn’t know who the people were on this island.”
In the video, Mary Robinson reflects not only on her experiences with the Choctaw Nation but on two further defining moments of her presidency. “I was very pleased when I was invited to open the National Famine Museum at Strokestown Park House,” she said. “I felt that was a very fitting way to begin the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of An Gorta Mór.” In 1994 she also visited Grosse Île and the Irish Memorial National Historic Site of Canada – twinned with Strokestown – to honor the generosity of the Canadian people, particularly the people of Quebec, who adopted Irish orphans whose parents had perished on the coffin ships. She notes that some of those orphans, among them Thomas and Patrick Quinn, not only survived the voyage but returned to Strokestown as adults, completing “that circle.”
Robinson returns most powerfully to the theme of the circle of giving. Paying tribute to the Choctaw Nation, she recalls thinking at the time “that I was closing a circle – that it had involved the suffering of the Irish people in An Gorta Mór, and 16 years before that, the suffering of the Choctaw people in being moved from their tribal land on the Trail of Tears.”
Today, she resists the notion that the circle is complete. Inspired by Irish donations to the Hopi and Navajo during the Covid-19 pandemic, she said: “The way in which the Choctaw people have become part of our story, the way in which it has led to generosity during COVID towards other Native American tribes – to me – it’s a gift that goes on giving.”
Memorials Unveiled on Staten Island
Thousands of Irish who fled the Great Hunger, died before they could rebuild their lives in the New World. Some died aboard ship, some in a quarantine station in what is now the St. George section of Staten Island. Many were buried in a mass grave in a field near today’s Borough Hall. They lay there for decades, forgotten until recently, when construction of a new courthouse uncovered some of their remains. A portion of the site was left undisturbed after workers found the initial remains.
On Sunday, Sept. 20, a solemn ceremony of remembrance, a blessing, and two monuments were dedicated to their memory.
The monuments will face a walkway leading to the courthouse whose construction led to the discovery of the old cemetery.
One monument, based on a traditional 19th-century cemetery obelisk, memorializes the lives of all those buried at the site. Robert Flood of Staten Island Monuments offered his expertise in designing it. A second monument features two bronze shoes on a pedestal, reminding visitors of the journey of Irish Famine immigrants and serving as an official representation of an initiative known as the Global Irish Famine Way. This is the first site the Global Famine program has recognized in the United States.
Years of research and advocacy, spearheaded by the Friends of Abandoned Cemeteries under the leadership of its CEO, Lynn Rogers, culminated with the ceremony and dedication, which began at 2 p.m. Speaking of the men, women, and children buried at the site, Rogers said: “Their fate was tragic, but now, 180 years later, they will receive the recognition and benediction they never received in life.” – Terry Golway
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