Re: Information is wanted of Thomas McNamara, of Glandree,
Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2019 11:54 pm
The Right Rev. Dr. Vaughan, who replaced the Rev. Thomas Kenny as Parish Priest of Nenagh in 1850, was made Lord Bishop of Killaloe in 1851. His consecration "took place in the chapel of Nenagh on Sunday" and was reported in the Boston Pilot of 4 July 1851. https://newspapers.bc.edu/?a=d&d=bpilott18510704-01.2.7 A very long listing of priests included the Rev. Mr. Sheehy, P.P. Tulla; and Rev. Mr. Bowles, C.C., Nenagh. Not one single McNamara, despite being one of the most common surnames in County Clare, is included on this list of priests from 1851. The McNamara's of County Clare appear to be more highly represented in the military than the priesthood.
The Right Rev. Dr. Vaughan, Bishop of Killaloe, has appointed the Rev. James Bowles, from the curacy of Birr, to the parish priest of Tulla, vacant by the death of the lamented Rev. Patrick Sheehy, P.P. The Rev. Mr. Bugler, C.C. Tulla, has been appointed administrator of Borrisokane. Boston Pilot, 8 March 1856.
https://newspapers.bc.edu/?a=d&d=bpilot ... 08-01.2.31
The missing Thomas McNamara of Glandree who earned a furlough during the American Civil War was most certainly already in New York at the time of the 1862 appeal. His sister Elizabeth McNamara was also in New York in the early 1850's and married to John D Hornbeck of Wawarsing. The appeal by the Rev. James Bowles provides the conditions in Tulla in 1862 and perhaps an explanation why his sister Mary McNamara Madigan left County Clare and moved to Yorkshire. The timing of when the Madigan family moved to Barnsley is between January 1863 (baptism of their son Patrick in Tulla) and June 1866 (baptism of daughter Johana at Holy Rood in Barnsley).THE DISTRESS IN CLARE
Our readers are already sufficiently conversant with the details of the distress prevailing throughout the South and West of Ireland, and of which this historic county of Clare has had to bear so large a share. The eloquent appeal of the Rev. Father Vaughn, on this subject, has elicited a response from this side of the Atlantic, the generosity of which reflects eternal credit on our people. Since its publication we have received a letter from another well-known clergyman, the Rev. James Bowles, P.P., of Tulla, setting forth the urgent necessities of the poor of his parish, and asking the assistance of their friends in this Republic. In his letter he says:-
"You have heard, no doubt, of the great distress prevailing at present among the poor of this country. We have our share of it in this parish. We, however, have been able to struggle on up to this by means of a local fund which is now exhausted. If you could do something to make up some small sum among the friends of the poor in the old country, you might enable me to help them out for the next few months - say May and June. Do what you can, and you will have the blessing of many a poor creature."
What a fearful change must have come upon the unhappy people of Ireland, to reduce a district once so thriving and prosperous to a condition of misery so low as that the inhabitants are thus compelled to appeal to their exiled brethren to save them from the horrors of famine to which an alien government has not merely abandoned but condemned them. To an appeal so forcible, we are sure we need not add a single word to ensure its being answered as promptly and liberally as those which have preceded it. The name of the Rev. James Bowles is familiar to hundreds of our readers, to whom he must have become known during his long and arduous labors on the mission throughout Clare and Tipperary. As a clergyman he has ever merited and received in a high degree the esteem and affection of his flock; and his care for their temporal, as well as their eternal, welfare is manifested in his anxiety to obtain assistance to relieve the distress which he sees amongst them without having himself the power to alleviate.
There are, we know, in this vicinity many natives of the parish of Tulla, who will be glad of this opportunity to assist directly their suffering brethren at home. The months of May and June have always been known in Ireland as "the dear months," coming as they do between the old harvest and the new, when labor is hard to be obtained and provisions are enormously high. If the working classes have had to suffer during this season, even in prosperous times, what must be their condition now, when all their resources are swept away, and want of every necessary of life is the general and all prevailing rule. It is no wonder that they cry aloud to us for aid. Let us not close our ears or our hearts against their appeals.
Irish American Weekly, New York, 5 May 1862
The timing of the May 1862 appeal by the Rev. James Bowles was right after the appeal by the Rev. Jeremiah Vaughan, P.P., of Doora and Kilraghtis, County Clare from February through April 1862. Not the best timing. "Father Vaughan's Appeal" received lots of publicity in the Irish American Weekly including lists of subscribers from Brooklyn, Boston, and as far as Ohio (for example, Patrick Considine & friends of Cincinnati donated $168). "Father Vaughan's Appeal" appears to have collected well over a thousand dollars, most of them individual $1 donations. The Rev. James Bowles appeal didn't receive nearly as much publicity or donations, but his goal of providing for the Tulla poor just over the "dear months" was not so great. Both of these appeals were during the American Civil War.To the Correspondent of the IRISH-AMERICAN.
With the forgoing letter was enclosed a stamped receipt for the sum from the Sisters of Mercy, which receipt I enclose with this correspondence. The Rev. Mr. Bowles writes thus:-
Tulla, Co. Clare, July 3, 1862
Dear Sir- I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 1st inst., enclosing a draft for £9 12s 7d for the poor of this parish, which was received at the office of the IRISH-AMERICAN newspaper. I beg you will convey to our friends in America how grateful we feel for all this timely and much needed aid. I shall have it acknowledged without delay in the Limerick Reporter and Clare Journal newspapers.
I remain, dear sir, very faithfully, your obedient servant. J. BOWLES
Irish American Weekly, New York, 26 July 1862