How the Irish Won the West

by Myles Dungan

Here is the full story of the Irish immigrants and their decedents whose hard work helped make the West what it is today. Learn about the Irish members of the Donner party, forced to consume human flesh to survive the winter; mountain men like Thomas Fitzpatrick, who discovered the South Pass through the Rockies; Ellen “Nellie” Cashman, who ran boarding houses and bought and sold claims in Alaska, Arizona, and Nevada; and Maggie Hall, who became known as the “whore with a heart of gold.” A fascinating and entertaining look at the history of the American West, this book will surprise many and make every Irish American proud.

Genres: History, Ireland

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Dr. Myles Dungan (PhD Trinity College, Dublin, 2012) is a writer, lecturer and broadcaster and is also Programme Director of the annual Hinterland Festival in Kells, Co. Meath. He currently presents the weekly RTE Radio 1 programme The History Show, writes a weekly column (‘Fake Histories’) for the RTE Radio 1 Drivetime programme, and has worked as presenter of various RTE radio and TV programmes for the last thirty years (Five Seven Live, Rattlebag, Prime Time). He is an Adjunct Lecturer in the UCD School of History and is the recipient of two Fulbright Awards. He has taught Irish history in UCD, Trinity College and the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of more than a dozen books on Irish and American history (including Irish Voices from the Great War, How the Irish Won the West and Mr. Parnell’s Rottweiler). In 1985 he co-founded the Dublin Film Festival with film critic Michael Dwyer. He is now masquerading as a novelist

Reviews

[Damian Shiels · Rating 4 out of 5]

A

[Bill reilly · Rating 3 out of 5]

John Reed and Ross Cox begin this story of the Irish in the West. John Jacob Astor founded the American Fur Company and sent the two Paddies on an expedition to find and trap the valuable beaver pelts which were the basis of his fortune which includes the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in NY City. Thomas Fitzpatrick competed with Astor but was run out of the business by Astor’s cut-throat tactics. The fate of the Donner party is well known. Amongst the group were three Irish families; the Breen’s, the Murphy’s and the Dolan’s. Patrick Dolan came up with the idea of drawing lots to pick a food source for the starving party. Ironically, Pat died shortly thereafter and was cut up, cooked and eaten by his fellow travelers. Jacob Donner suffered a similar fate. His children survived with their daddy as food; roasted heart and liver were a part of the main course. One of the cannibals, Patrick Breen, died twenty years later in California. The fur trapper, Thomas Fitzpatrick, reappeared in the 1850’s as a chief diplomat to the Indian tribes of the West. The Buffalo herds had been decimated by the U.S. government and the tribes signed numerous treaties which were later broken. Fitzpatrick kept the peace until his death in 1854. The Cheyenne chiefs called the Irishman a good and honest man. Sir George Gore, an Anglo-Irish baronet from Dublin, spent three years killing thousands of buffalo, elk and bear, just for the fun of it. Eric and Donald Trump, Jr. carry on the tradition of the great white hunter. In 1882, Oscar Wilde toured the U.S. The miners of Colorado challenged Oscar to a whiskey drinking contest. They lost. The writer had a high regard for the American West. Most of the women who came to America from Ireland remained in the east; N.Y., Boston and Philadelphia were the favored cities. Many worked as household servants. An exception was Nellie Chapman. The Irish born woman opened a boarding house in a mining town in Nevada in 1872. After three years and numerous deaths from gunfights, Nellie moved to British Columbia and then to Arizona. She established a hotel and restaurant there and led a campaign to build a Catholic church in town for the growing population of her brethren. She spent the final twenty years of her life prospecting for gold in Alaska. Most of her estate was left to Catholic Charities. Dungan adds some comic relief in the form of Lola Montez, a Sligo born prostitute of some notoriety; two of her better known conquests were Tsar Nicholas I and Alexandre Dumas. After a colorful life, Lola died at the age of forty in NY’s Hell’s Kitchen. A few pages are given to Thomas Meagher, a short time governor of Montana. Read Timothy Egan’s “The Immortal Irishman” for a comprehensive account of his life. In the 1860’s, 1,775 miles of railroad tracks were spiked into the ground by thousands of Chinese and Irish immigrants. Lawrence Murphy and Jimmy Dolan (not the MSG guy), were two of the biggest cattle dealers in Lincoln County, New Mexico. They battled for control of the industry with others of questionable character. In the midst of this overlong and tedious chapter appears Billy the Kid, born Henry McCarty in N.Y. City. He played a minor role in the Lincoln County Wars. Hollywood made him famous. The folklore of the west is uncovered and set straight by How the Irish Saved the West.

[Jackson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I feel the need to preface this review by saying that if it were permitted by Goodreads, I would rate this book 2 1/2 stars. Since it is not permitted, I have rounded my rating down to 2 stars. As an eternal optimist, I tend to round my ratings up, but I just can't bring myself to do so in this case - the first time I have felt such a way about a book review. I didn't dislike this book; I didn't particularly like it, either.

Several years ago, I read a book titled "How the Irish Saved Civilization" which was a well researched and even better written tale of how the sons and daughters of Erin preserved scientific, academic, and other bits of knowledge, the loss of which would likely have set the human race father behind than it found itself following the fall of Rome, Greece, and Egypt (obviously not in that order). I had hoped that I would find "How the Irish Won the West" as equally enjoyable a book; I was sadly disappointed. I have limited this review to only three of the reasons for my disappointment:

1. While well researched and filled with many interesting bits of trivia (though at times to a fault and detracting from the larger narrative), this is not a dispassionate look at the historical record. At various times throughout the book, the author chides historians more contemporary to the vignettes being shared for what he calls individual biases while himself inserting multiple moral and ethical judgments without the slightest hint of irony.

2. When not inserting his own moral and ethical judgments, the author tried to insert humor into the narrative, the vast majority of which failed to resonate with the reader. I freely admit that I did find a few of the attempts at humor truly funny and I did audibly chuckle a time or two - however, even as one who enjoys when levity is woven into an historical account, I most often found myself annoyed rather than bemused with the attempts in this book.

3. Finally, as one who acknowledges the prevailing attitudes of the time and place in which the mini-biographies that make up this book take place, the author still attacks the actions by some in this story by today's standards (hence my earlier charge of inserting his own moral and ethical judgments). After doing that, the author seemed to look for ways with at least three of his stories to insert negative/disparaging comments about the Mormons, comments that did not add to or further the accounts into which these anecdotes were forced. I can't take you serious when you judge how people treated/thought about the Chinese, American Indians, or African Americans and then attack an entire religion.

With all of that said, I did find the chapters (or the reels as they are called in this book - the Irish author's way of reminiscing about the popular American Western films of his youth) on the mountain men, the Donner Party, and the Lincoln County War interesting reads, though they were not entirely free of the fallacies listed above that turned my off from the book as a whole.

[Paul Lunger · Rating 3 out of 5]

Myles Dungan's "How the Irish Won the West" is an "attempt" to retell the history of the settling of the Western US. The book portrays itself as being a 9-reel Western with each chapter telling a different phase of the history some of it more interesting than others. Dungan does do though a decent job at times of separating fact from fiction & in the chapter on the Donner party gets a bit too graphic in descriptions. The book honestly isn't horrifically bad & will open up some different things with regards to Irish American history in the US, but this book realistically won't do too much for a lot of people.

[Henry McLaughlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting overview of Irish participation in the settling of the West. Focuses on individual stories and isn't afraid to point out the good, the bad and the ugly.
I'm Irish and the West figures into many of my stories.
This book helped fill in gaps of my knowledge of both the West and my Irish heritage.

[Dan Cunningham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well resdearched and wide ranging look at the role the ethnic Irish had in the pioneer West.

[Robbie Dunne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful!

[Harold Harkin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Book

📖 📚 Well written book about History, will buy from again love this history book looking forward Reading other history Books. 📖 📚

[Bee · Rating 2 out of 5]

An interesting perspective on settling the west and how Irish immigrants were involved.

[Patrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved the subject - but not the author. Not a great writer.

[Judi · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you are a history buff, you'll probably love it. I finally gave up after about 250 pages.
There's a lot of interesting info, just not my cup of tea.

[Paul Roper · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting look at US History form the "Old Country", Ireland. The actions of the Irish-born soldiers that fought the Native tribes of America has always seemed rather ironic, considering that so many Irish came to the States because they had been forced or starved out. Nice work Mr. Dungan, very informative and easy to read (as long as I can find the time to read!) Worth a read by those interested in Irish-American history and Western American/Cowboy history, enjoy!