The Forgotten Colony: San Patricio de Hibernia: The History, the People and the Legends of the Irish Colony of McMullen-McGloin Page: 423
xi, 459 p. : ill., maps, ports ; 23 cm.View a full description of this book.
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OLD CEMETERY ON THE HILL
EPITAPH
Susanna O'Docharty
Here I lie beside my own-
A hundred springs have come and gone
Since first I lay upon this lonely hill.
William and I came from Ireland to America,
To New York, to Kentucky, then to Texas.
We heard of land given for the coming;
So we pledged allegiance to Mexico and became her subjects.
The Province of Texas was a wilderness
Untouched except by native tribes.
Near us were the Lipans and the Karankawas,
But when the full moon shimmered the river,
The Comanches would come down from the northwest
To raid and ravage the colonies.
On moonlight nights we dared not stray far from our cabins.
We spent five years in our rude picket homes
Made of willow poles driven into the ground.
The earthen floor was swept and sprinkled every day.
Its palmetto roof rustled in the wind.
While William surveyed, I planted and tended a garden
And taught my children and others too.
Our days were made long by waiting,
Waiting for the land commissioner;
For only he could parcel out the land.
Wild game could be had for the shooting;
Deer fell before the rifle's whirr and boom.
Turkey, dove, and quail roasted over glowing coals.
We built a picket church and thanked God
For this lovely, lonely, cruel land that we must tame
With axe and plow, then sow to make it bear.
The Mexicans and the Irish were friends.
Did we not meet the alcalde and the merchants of Matamoros
In 1832 and sing and dance and feast beside a creek
Still named Banquete because we had a banquet there?
We had no thought of independence for Texas,
(Though all the Irish did not think as we did.)423
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Hébert, Rachel Bluntzer. The Forgotten Colony: San Patricio de Hibernia: The History, the People and the Legends of the Irish Colony of McMullen-McGloin, book, 1981; Burnet, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth61113/m1/444/: accessed March 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .