The Irish and the Powder Mill

Walking through the Dutch Reformed Church cemetery, one might be struck by the headstones, seemingly out of place, of four Irishmen. They were victims of the explosion of the Bellona Powder Mill in 1814. Most likely Presbyterians, they came from County Donegal. Because British aliens--and the Irish were British nationals at the time, Ireland having been incorporated into Great Britain by the 1801 Act of Union--had to register with the Federal Government at the beginning of the War of 1812, we know that John Stevenson arrived in the US on June 8, 1811, and that William Birney arrived May 3, 1812. According to his will of 24 April 1814, James Wilson was the son of Moses Wilson of Ireland. They may have come directly to Belleville, but it is also possible that they came from Ireland as part of a group recruited by the DuPont family of Delaware to work in their powder mill.

There is a connection between the powder mill in Belleville and the du Pont mill in Wilmington, Delaware. One John Mitchell wrote to du Pont from Belleville on 6 April 1811 in response to a letter du Pont had sent him. Mitchell was investigating the use of water looms for the weaving of woolen cloth and natural cotton. Mitchell says he had gone to Spotswood with Mr. Decatur. This Decatur was one of the owners of the Bellona Powder Works. He also mentions learning from a Mr. Stone(?) at Paterson of a Scotchman named James Murray of Cranetown who made the looms which, Mitchel reports, will do, “with some little improvement.”

Many of the Irish who later worked for du Pont were Irish Catholics from Ulster whose passage had been arranged by du Pont. It might be possible that many if not all of the early Irish in Belleville came through a connection with DuPont. Those whose origin is known came from the Province of Ulster.

While it has not been determined whether the Irish workers in the powder mill were brought over specifically for that work, or if they found it once they were here, we do know that Irish Murphys, also a Donegal name, but most likely a Catholic name, were specifically brought over to work in the calico printing plant.

In the January 11, 1812 issue of the New York Herald, the firm of Bullus, Decatur and Rucker of 33 Beaver Street, New York, advertised the products of the Belleville Powder Mill: “Single, Double and Treble F, and Cannon Powder . . . warranted to be equal to English, or any powder made in this country. In September 1812 an attempt was made to blow up “the extensive powder works of Capt. Decatur, at Belleville.

On April 20, 1814, the powder mill blew up. There was no indication that this was anything more than an accident. The account of the explosion in the April 26 edition of the Newark Centinel begins: “It is our painful duty this day to record one of the most afflicting occurrences which has happened in this part of the country for many years past.” The article goes on the say: “By this awful catastrophe, four of the workmen were instantly hurried into eternity; ten were badly wounded, seven of which have since died--and the remaining three, in all probability, will not long survive their comrades.  The foreman and two of the workmen escaped the explosion, because they had gone to the aid of a gentleman whoe wagon had lost a wheel. Decatur and Ruckus were on their way to the mill, and would probably have been there at the time of the explosion if they had started their journey just ten minutes before they did.

The following men died in the explosion or soon thereafter: Thomas Lakey (leaving a mother and six children), Mr. Gillespy (a wife and two children), Wm. Burney (a wife and one child), Robert Doak (a wife and one child), John Davis ( a wife and two children), John Stevenson (a wife), and Alexander Dunsimore, John O'Neal, Andrew Norris, William Coventry, and William Wilson (all single). Three were still living at the time of publication-- Henry Connor, James Wilson, and Mr. Wilkinson--although the paper had heard that one died in the meantime.

According to the inscriptions on their headstones, we know that William Coventry, Andrew Norris, and William Wilson were natives of County Donegal, and Norris and Wilson more specifically of a town given as Auhnithen, County Donegal, a name that cannot be found in any list of Irish place-names, but is pretty definitely to be identified with Aghanunshin, in County Donegal, near Letterkenny, as a former archivist of Bantry House confirmed for me. I visited Aghanunshin and found in the cemetery there many of the same names as are to be found among the early Belleville Irish. Most of the names of those Irish known to be in Belleville at the time are all names found in the Letterkenny area.

The “Mr. Gillespy” who was one of the victims was Michael Gillespie, an Irish Catholic. He was not buried in the Dutch Reformed Cemetery, but was probably buried in the Catholic cemetery on New York City, where the Gillespie family owned plot. In 1820, a Catholic Mass was being celebrated in the house of the Michael Gillespie family, who had moved from to Belleville from Paterson shortly before. One of the members of the family was Edward Gillespie, who founded and edited the New York newspaper, The Shamrock, which began publication in 1810.

The Bellona Powder Mill, Hendricks Brothers Copper Rolling Mill, and the Calico Print Works were three Belleville industries that employed the Irish who settled in Belleville during the first third of the nineteenth century.  

“Paddy Attacks Ah Sin”: The Irish Reaction to the Arrival of the Chinese in Belleville

The New York Tribune of October 24, 1871, under the title “Paddy Attacks Ah Sin”,  reported on the Irish laborers on the Midland Railroad who would not accept the presence of the Chinese laborers who had been brought to Belleville to work for the Passaic Steam Laundry.  As the laborers were returning to their dormitory from a class in Belleville, they were attacked by a group of Irish laborers. The Chinese were carrying revolvers, due to previous experiences of Irish antipathy, and they fired on the group of Irish workers, one of whom was injured. One of the Irish rioters was arrested and held in Hackensack jail. His fellows threatened to destroy the laundry and Hervey’s house should the incarcerated Irishman be injured. The account of the incident in another newspaper ends by saying: “The residents of Belleville resent the actions of the laborers unqualifiedly, and are determined the lend Captain Hervey assistance.”       

The Chinese had been brought to Belleville by James Hervey, a retired sea captain who was at that time operating the Passaic Steam Laundry, which prepared newly-manufactured shirts for sale in the retail establishments.  The laundry, established in 1856 in what is now North Arlington, was originally staffed by Irish women. They were generally good workers, but Hervey was annoyed that they would sometimes strike for better wages, or leave his employ when a better job came along.  

On September 20, 1870, sixty-five Chinese workers arrived to work in the laundry. Hervey had learned of the Chinese laborers who were working in San Francisco, and thought that he would have better luck with Chinese workers than he had had with the irish women. On September 21, an anonymous letter was sent to Hervey, with a threat to murder him if the Chinese were not gone by October 1.  A reporter who asked about the general feeling in the village was told, “Oh, the Irish don’t like it, and threaten vengeance, but the other people don’t seem to be much worried. The demands of the trade will regulate the trouble.” One of the laborers working on the main road was also interviewed, and answered, “be jabers, if the pig-tails are kipt we’ll slather the viry life out o’ them.” The other laborers, the reports continues, “gave a grunt and sloked their black clay pipes the faster.”    

The Springfield [Mass.] Republican, reporting on Hervey’s employment of young Chinese men, reported that “he has heretofore employed only Irish girls, but has not only found them oftentimes dishonest and irresponsible. but has had entirely been unable to procure as many as he needed, who were competent to do the work as nicely as it must be done to please his patrons.”

The New York Tribune of September 29, 1870 reported on a mass meeting held to protest the employment of Chinese in Belleville. One of the speakers denounced the importation of “Coolie laborers” and called upon laborers to raise their voices against held the importation of “idolatrous heathens.”

On August 21, 1872,the Daily Constitution of Middletown Connecticut reported that Hervey was bringing in another group of workers, and erecting a dormitory to house them. The animosity between the Irish girls and the “haythen” had subsided, and they were getting along very amicably together.

The January 18, 1873 issue of the Jersey Journal carried the story of a love-smitten Chinese Man. A girl “apparently of Irish parentage” approached one Detective Nugent, telling him about a Chinese Man who was following her and, if not arrested, would go to New York with her on the ferryboat. She had been an employee at Hervey’s laundry, where Nimba-Shing was smitten with her. He followed her around and became affectionate with her. While they were speaking, Nugent espied the Chinaman, who looked “anxious, care-worn, and love-sick” and who had cut off his pig-tail and dressed in American clothes. Nugent arrested him and took him to the station house.  A different newspaper’s account of the incident refers to him as “Ak Sin,” an allusion to the name of the fictional Chinese immigrant in Bret Harte and Mark Twain's Ah Sin (1877)   

By April 1873 Hervey eventually soured on his Chinese workers, and cancelled his order for more.  According to one account, he had found that, rather than being “celestial,” they do not hold to their contract, run away, develop an opium habit and are lazy. In addition, they are not as “spry ironers” as the Irish.

Of course, all of these stories from newspapers have to be taken with a grain of salt. Newspapers at the time were quite biased, and even made up stories at times. (Unlike today, of course!) But certainly the animosity between the Irish immigrant laborers and the Chinese working for Hervey was real.  

The Early Irish in Belleville

The first evidence of the Irish presence in Belleville is a little surprising. These are the Irish connected to the Dutch Reformed Church. Long before the Irish Famine that saw thousands flee hunger and oppression, Irish were settling in the area that would become Belleville. The earliest identified are Dennis Price and his wife Dorothy Moor. Dorothy was the daughter of Anthony Moor of Emoc, Queen's County (now County Laois). They were married at the Dutch Reformed Church on August 25, 1733. "Dennys Prys" is identified as a native of Ireland, "Dalle Moore" as a native of Dublin. Both were living in Second River at the time of their marriage. Dorothy died on October 15, 1739, at the age of age 28, and was buried in the churchyard, where her tombstone can be seen. 

Among the marriages that were solemnized at the Dutch Reformed Church are those of a couple of other Irish natives. Robert Clark, an Irish native, and widower of Rachel Cloud, and Abigal Pingham, widow of William Pease, and both living at Second River, were married on October 21, 1764. The banns for the marriage of Joseph McKarll, born in Ireland, and Mary Sproils, living in "Beskenriets" (Basking Ridge) were published three times in 1758, but they never married. There are other names in the records that could be names of Irish natives, but their birthplaces are not indicated.  

More Irish came over in the early 1800s, presumably to take advantage of the growing industrialization of Belleville. Not surprisingly, given Belleville's position on the Passaic River, and its connection to shipping, many Irish came from the northern counties of Ireland and worked in the shipping industry, or found other employment. Peter Donnelly, from the north of Ireland, first appears in the records on December 15, 1826, when he marries Eliza Cole at the Dutch Reformed Church. He was Catholic, and remained so. She, a native of New Jersey, was either Dutch Reformed or Methodist. Their son Hugh would convert to Methodism, and was the foreman of the Hendricks Brothers Copper Mill. 

Employees of Hendricks Brothers Copper Rolling Mill

On October 15, 1832.this same  Peter Donnelly “of Bloomfield” bought for $50 a plot of land “at Belleville” but “being in the township of Bloomfield” from Solomon I. Isaacs and his wife Elizabeth of the city and state of New York. This is identified in the deed as “Lot #169 on Isaacs Street.” This Solomon Isaacs was a co-owner, with Harmon Hendricks, of the copper mill at Soho. It was at this time that Solomon sold his part in the copper mill. This lot was contiguous to one owned by one Murtaugh, who was, judging by his name, another Irishman.

Peter was naturalized on July 1, 1834, and William Dow testified that Peter had been in the United States at least five years, the required time for residence before one could apply for citizenship. 

On 11 June 1835, he bought another piece of land in Bloomfield. Although the land was in present-day Belleville, Belleville would not be set off from Bloomfield until 1839. This 4 65/100 acre piece of land, bought from John H. Farrand and his wife Isabella W. of Bloomfield for $100, was at the intersection of the branch brook and the Morris Canal. In 1848, he added to this piece of land a piece contiguous to it. By deed dated 17 July 1848, “Peter Donally” of Belleville bought of Robert Baldwin and his wife Mary D. of Newark, for $650, 90/100 acres of land to the east of the land bought in 1835. On the same day, according to this same deed, Robert and Mary Baldwin sold a piece of land contiguous to this one to Peter Kahoe [Kehoe]. On 9 October 1849, Peter Donnelly and Peter “Kohoe” jointly bought another piece of land contiguous to both of their lots, containing four acres and situated to the east of the Morris Canal.    

Another early Irishman, possibly related to Peter by marriage, was Henry McLaughlin. I am still trying to straighten out all of the information about this man, but it seems that he was born in County Tyrone on December 13, 1813, and came to Second River (Belleville) where he bought three pieces of land in 1830, one of them from Solomon Isaacs. He is listed in the 1830 census, which census tells us that he had living in his household ten white males aged 20 to 30, and eleven white males aged 30 to 40. Of these, fifteen were aliens.  He must have had financial troubles soon thereafter, since in 1838 his property was sold at auction to pay debts. He was probably affected by the depression that had hit the country in 1837. He returned to Ireland, where he died in Magheragart, County Tyrone, and was buried in the old family cemetery there. He was probably related to the McLaughlins of Brooklyn, whose descendants would include George Vincent McLaughlin, one-time Police Commissioner of New York City, since Peter Donnelly's brother Hugh had married a Brooklyn McLaughlin who was related to George Vincent's family.

Living near McLaughlin in 1830 were several men with Irish names: William Walsh, Barney Cunningham, William Hanly, and James Murtaugh. 

So the Irish presence in Belleville was particularly strong several years before the famine.