The Wearing of the Green

 

The first thing you notice is their hats.
Tall, silky black top hats,
and lots of them.
And next are the mustaches.
Long, bristly, mustaches
like cartoon Yosemite Sam's brush.
And then it's their sticks.
Not umbrellas or canes,
but very slender knobbly sticks,
almost switches really,
with small American flags attached.

It's a curious bunch of gentlemen,
assembled outdoors on the steps of a building
for a formal group photo.
Oh, and there's a brass band too,
which is why I took an interest
in the photograph.

Unfortunately there is nothing stenciled
on the bass drum head to identify them.

{Click on any image to enlarge it.}

 

 

Altogether there are 69 men and one boy in the group, and everyone is wearing a hat. On either side are two men astride horses with felt homburg hats. (The men, not the horses!) The band has 16 musicians, one hidden behind the horseman at left, dressed in wool uniform coats with short brimmed field caps. The band's leader, holding a cornet and wearing a longer wool coat, stands in front right. Further right next to a tall trombonist, is a young boy of seven or eight wearing a larger winter-weight hat. The remaining 51 gentlemen, sporting nearly identical top hats, zylinders in German, wear heavy double-breasted overcoats. It appears to be a sunny day but there is snow on the ground.

 

On the back of this 8" x 10" albumen photo, mounted on brittle buff card stock is a helpful stamp from the photographer.

 I. U. Doust
Photographer,
Supplies, Printing and
Developing for Amateurs
130 E. Genesee St.
Syracuse, N.Y.

 

   

The photographer's full name was Isaac Uriah Doust. Born in Syracuse in 1856, he first opened a studio and gallery in Syracuse in 1875. Mr. Doust also sold photography supplies, materials, and equipment and continued in business until just a year before his death in 1937 at the age of 80.

The photo's albumen print style is typical of the late 19th century going into the first decade of the 20th. But dating men's clothing is difficult since top hat fashions didn't change much between the 1850s and the 1920s. Initially I mistook them for a minstrel show company. In this era there were dozens of professional minstrel shows touring the theater circuits of America. Minstrel bands and singers, which often numbered over 50 members, typically marched in a parade before commencing their first concert, all dressed in identical long overcoats, top hats, and carrying canes. My story from 2018, Hi Henry's Minstrels and the Big Dog, featured a similar photo of 32 men wearing top hats standing outside a civic building in San Francisco. That photo was dated from 1899.

But here there are many more sticks and fewer instruments. Most of these fellows don't look like they ever wore blackface or sang novelty minstrel songs. Who were they? Could there be more clues?

 

 

Behind the group on the two columns framing the portico entrance are two pairs of numerals, 18—82, which I interpret as the year the building was constructed. In front of the doorway, one of the men holds a pole on which hangs a fringe-edged banner. It has the words DIVISION No. 8 separated by an design of a harp, a symbol recognized around the world as the emblem of Éire—Ireland. This was a terrific clue as no one likes to march in parade better than an Irishman.

Syracuse, New York has a long history of Irish immigration and even today Irish ancestry makes up the largest segment of nationalities represented within the city's population. So not surprisingly Syracuse has a tradition of celebrating St. Patrick's day on March 17, the Catholic feast day of Saint Patrick - the patron Saint of Ireland. In the newspaper archives I found several reports of the event beginning in the 1880s and continuing on to the 1920s. The principal organization responsible for overseeing the Syracuse parade was an Irish-American fraternal society, the Ancient Order of Hibernians. Founded in New York City in 1836, the A.O.H. sought to provide assistance and protection to Irish Catholic immigrants, and defended Catholic churches from anti-Catholic abuse that the Irish encountered in 19th century America. The Irish harp is prominently displayed in its emblem, along with shamrocks and the flags of Ireland and the United States.

 

Emblem of the Ancient Order of Hibernians
Source: Wikipedia

In a report from the 1894 St. Patrick's parade in Syracuse, there was a description of the A.O.H. units marching with blackthorn canes and bands playing tunes like "Yankee Doodle", "Garry Owen", and "The Wearing of the Green". Yet even though it was a long parade, the order listed only five Hibernian divisions, not eight. But in 1896 the celebration promised to be even larger, a "Monster Parade" with close to 1,500 men.

 

Syracuse NY Sunday Herald
16 March 1896

 

In the days of old, newspapers were printed on extra-large paper sizes with tiny fonts and multiple dense columns. The editor of the Syracuse Herald managed seven column pages and parades like this were always a great way to fill space with hundreds of official's names and details on the street route that would never get mentioned in reports today. On this St. Patrick's day there would be 10 divisions of the A.O.H. and Division No. 8 would be led by Patrick J. Guilfoyle followed by the band from Marcellus, a community about 12 miles west of the Syracuse.

 

  

Syracuse NY Evening Herald
17 March 1896

 

The parade started in the afternoon after mass was observed at Syracuse's Catholic churches that morning. The day was crisp and clear, though "the only disagreeable feature was the slush  through which the paraders tramped. The decorations of the stores and other places of business were in keeping with the occasion. The green flags, with the cherished 'Erin Go Braugh' were fluttering from many places. Side by side they were hung with the red, white and blue. Little bits of green were on pinned on coats out of honor to the patron saint." Thousands of people turned out to watch the parade which lasted several hours before it finished. Entertainments continued throughout the evening and into the early morning.

 

 

Syracuse NY Sunday Herald
16 March 1896

 

The Syracuse weather report for the previous day confirmed that it snowed overnight, a common springtime occurrence for a city so close to Lake Ontario. This snowfall matched the frozen precipitation seen on the ground in my photo. The slippery slush and mud must have given trouble even to the horses. Still it made good business for laundries and shoeshine boys.

 

 

 

A week later the Syracuse Sunday Herald rand a full page of news on the "Secret Societies" around Onondaga County. There was reports on the activities and lodge meetings of the Elks; the Odd Fellows; the Masons; the Royal Arcanum;  the Good Templars; the Select Knights; the Knights of Honor; the Knights of Pythias; the Knights of Sobriety, Fidelity, and Integrity; the Red Men; the United American Mechanics; the Ancient Order of United Workmen; the Foresters of America; the Daughters of Liberty; the Patriotic League; and a short followup on the Ancient Order of Hibernians at their St. Patrick's day parade.

 

 

 

Syracuse NY Sunday Herald
22 March 1896

Ancient Order Hibernians.

True to general expectation, Division No. 8 was far and away the finest appearing body in the parade on St. Patrick's day. The members were all attired in new dark clothes, the very latest style silk hat and carried themselves in fine marching style. Each member wore a bouquet and had an American flag fastened to the end of the cane, which was carried at the shoulder. Eighty men were in line, and the Central City band, the finest in the line, discoursed sweet music during the parade. All the pretty girls along the line were loud in their praises of Division No. 8.

 _ _ _

 

The description of the wardrobe worn by the Hibernian members of Division No. 8 could not be a better match for the smart coats, boutonnieres, canes, little flags, and silk hats that we see in my photo. So I am pretty confident that it exactly dates the photograph to 17 March 1896. 

 

 

 

 

However there is one mystery that will never be solved. The original photo is quite faded and bleached, but digital photo software is amazingly adept at restoring the image's contrast. But when I did that I noticed there was one man in the center, third row back, whose face has suffered an ink stain. It might be the result of an accident at Mr. Doust's studio or a blemish caused by storage next to a leaky ink pen. But I wonder if it was deliberate smudge, an inept attempt to eradicate the man's face. Could it be a mark of an Irish "black hand"? Sadly, not everything can be knowable. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

This photograph is a great example of two popular American pastimes, parades and fraternal societies. Once upon a time Americans loved the spectacle of parades, big or small, either watching one from the sidewalks or actually taking part as a marcher. Pick a newspaper from the 1890s at random and inevitably there is news about a parade. And every parade required a band to provide music. For this Hibernian celebration there were ten bands listed in the parade order. It was a source of pride for a community to have good bands, and in big cities like Syracuse there was a lot of work for professional musicians in accompanying an important parade.

 

This photo also illustrates how America's heritage was built by fraternal societies. These groups were originally formed as a means of self-protection and insurance against the many hardships America inflicted on immigrants and workers. The Irish-American gentlemen who marched on St. Patrick's day were celebrating more than just a Catholic tradition. The Ancient Order of Hibernians were demonstrating a patriotic connection to both old Ireland and their new home in America. It was a fun celebration, to be sure, but it was also a political statement as well, particularly since Ireland in this era was not free, but still an unwilling subject to Great Britain's monarch and parliamentary laws. In America the Irish could find freedom from the long history of English domination and repression. That deserved raising a toast to the American flag too.

 

After researching this photograph, I have reassessed a story I wrote in January 2018, Top Hats on Parade, about an unmarked postcard photo of a parade of men in top hats led by a British military band. At the time I speculated, based on the houses in the background, that the picture was taken in Canada. Now I think the men in black top hats could be a Canadian lodge of the Ancient Order of Hibernians.  

 

I can't resist adding some music to this story. One of the favorite tunes played by the bands on that St. Patrick's day was "The Wearing of the Green", a old Irish street ballad that laments the English suppression of the Irish Rebellion of 1798. The lyrics also describe an Irish rebel's exile to a free foreign land which might be France or America.

 

The melody can easily be played at a spirited tempo suitable for marching, but I bet later that evening after the parade the gentlemen of Division No. 8 sang the this song in a way not unlike this version recorded in 1912 by the celebrated Irish Tenor, John McCormack (1884–1945).

 

 

 

 

 Oh! Paddy, dear, an' did you hear the news that's going round,
The shamrock is by law forbid to grow on Irish ground.
No more Saint Patrick's Day we'll keep, his color can't be seen,
For there's a true law agin' the wearing of the green.

I met with Napper Tandy and he took me by the hand,
And he said "How's poor old Ireland? and how does she stand?"
She's the most distressful country that ever you have seen,
They're hanging men and women there for wearing of the green.
 

Then if the color we must wear is England's cruel red,
Let it remind us of the blood that all Ireland has shed.
Then take the shamrock from your hat and throw it on the sod,
But never fear, 'twill take root there, though under foot 'tis trod.

When the law can stop the blades of grass from growing as they grow,
And when the leaves in summer time, their colors dare not show,
Then I will change the color to I wear in my caubeen,
But 'till that day, praise God, I'll stick to wearin' o' the green.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday
where if you're not careful
somebody's liable to get poked in the eye.