Irish Nationalists In BostonCatholicism and Conflict, 1900-1928

Damien Murray

The evolving identity of the Boston Irish during the first quarter of the 20th century provides a fascinating backdrop for Damien Murray’s book on Irish nationalism. Murray, an Associate Professor of History at Elms College in Chicopee, examines how Boston Irish identity was shaped by seismic events in Ireland like the 1916 Easter Rising and the campaign to form an Irish Republic after WWI. But Murray also uncovers the tensions on the ground within Boston’s Irish community, pressured by Boston’s Catholic Church, the local Anglo-American Ascendency known as Brahmins and the specter of socialism. Additionally, there were debates between physical force versus constitutional methods, and tensions between immigrant and working-class Irish, who tended to be more nationalistic, versus the establishment middle-class Boston Irish who had vested interests in assimilating into Boston’s business community.
Catholic University of America Press | 296 pp | $46 | 2018