Im sure this topic has come up before but im interested in the New York Draft riots of 1864, In which the irish were heavily involved.

Do people have any feelings why they got so involved, was it solely down to the draft or was it a build up of tension?

Mark Power

Eager to prove their patriotism and quiet nativist critics, New York's Irish immigrants volunteered in large numbers to fight in the Union army, often serving with great distinction in such regiments as the Fighting 69th. Yet New York's Archbishop Hughes spoke for a number of Irish and non-Irish in the city when he predicted that Catholics would fight only for the preservation of the Union, not for the end of slavery. Like others, he regarded abolitionists as dangerous radicals and supported the Church's official position that slavery was allowable under canon law as long as owners did not mistreat their slaves. He also argued that slaves in the South were often better off than the Irish poor in Northern cities, particularly the slums of New York.

Therefore, the country met President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation of January 1863 with mixed reactions. Republicans saw it as a necessary war measure that would give a much-need moral tone to the North's struggle and help attract African American volunteers to a diminishing army. Conversely, Northern Democrats felt the Proclamation detracted from the main goal of the war, which was the preservation of the union. New York Tammany politicians in particular viewed both the Proclamation and the Conscription Act passed soon after as evidence of the Lincoln administration's growing centralization of power away from the city into the hands of the Republican elite.

Irish workers objected to emancipation and conscription on more practical terms; angered by wartime job shortages and low wages, and fearful of African-American job competition, they saw both acts as an attempt to uplift African Americans at their expense. Such fears came to a head when officials in New York tried to enforce the first federal draft on July 12. Despite their distinguished military service, Irish immigrants were still the most underrepresented group in the army compared to the overall population, so the first draw fell most heavily on them. Angered by a controversial $300 exemption waiver in the Conscription Act, which would allow wealthier individuals to buy their way out of service, workers protested the draft by attacking various symbols of Republican, federal, and abolitionist power, including an uptown draft office, the office of newspaper editor Horace Greeley, and the homes of prominent Republicans. The protesters the first day included German, Irish, and native industrial workers and artisans, but they had limited aims and soon dissipated. They were followed by mobs of laborers and longshoremen, many of them Irish, who turned increasingly violent as they tore up railroad lines, burned down the Colored Orphan Asylum, and brutally beat and killed soldiers, African Americans, and authority figures. By the time five Union regiments were able to march up from the Battle of Gettysburg to restore peace on July 15-16, at least 105 people had been killed, including at least eleven black men beaten and lynched by the mobs.

Irish opposition to emancipation and conscription gave them a reputation for treason and disloyalty, discounting the loyal service of thousands of Irish volunteers in the Union army. For many nativist critics, Irish participation in the Draft Riots was another indication of Irish immigrants' savagery, unfitness for self-government, and their inferiority to other white races. Newspapers like Greeley's Herald Tribune and George William Curtis' Harper's Weekly highlighted Irish involvement in the riots, featuring illustrations of simian-faced mobs and denounced their "barbarism."

Conversely, Irish papers were quick to defend the reputation of the Irish community, contesting the characterization of the mob as solely "Irish" and playing up the role of Irish men and women who worked to end the violence. While a new draft was conducted the following month without incident by "Boss" William M. Tweed (1823-1878) and his Tammany Hall Democrats, the memory of the riots remained fresh in the minds of the African American community and the Protestant elite, who forever associated the affair with the "savage Irish." In the months after the riots, Republican leaders paraded African-American victims around the city, honoring them with military marches and public ovations. Despite this treatment, blacks fled from the city in droves, fearful that similar outbreaks of violence would occur again.

The reactions of nativists, radical Republicans, and elite reformers toward Irish involvement in the draft riots cemented immigrants' devotion to Tammany Hall and the Democrats. Tammany claimed to represent the interests of the poor and working class, as opposed to the Republican Party and reformers, who they identified with uptown aristocrats and nativism. Boss Tweed and his Tammany ring recognized the potential political strength of the city's Irish population and other immigrant groups, who continued to arrive in droves during the 1860s and 1870s.

The Draft Riots continued to linger in the city's memory as the worst episode of ethnic and racial violence in New York's history. Irish opposition to abolition and fears of African-American competition left bitter feelings between the two groups, while nativist reformers and Republicans viewed Irish advancement through Tammany with resentment. Continued immigration of poor Catholic Irish throughout the 1870s and 1880s maintained the image of the violent "shanty Irish." Long after the second and third generations of famine immigrants had begun to establish an economic foothold in the city, Anglo Americans continued to deny them social acceptance based on their religion and perceived inability to assimilate. It was only with the arrival of Southern and Eastern European immigrants that they could view the less-foreign Irish as acceptable and loyal Americans.

The draft riots of 1863 are the most "famous" of the New York riots of the Civil War but I have in the past heard of futher riots in New York City in 1864 involving the Irish. I was listening to a lecture quite a while ago in regards to the Battle of Cold Harbor (April 1864). In that battle General Grant ordered an assault against a heavily fortified Confederate position in which in only twenty minutes the Union suffered 7,000 casualties. Most of these casualties were of New York regiments. Indeed many of these men most have been Irish. It was one of the most viscious slaughters of the war and to make a bad situation worse, Grant immediately ordered another assault upon the position. To a man, they refused. The commanding officer said something to the nature of; "If Jesus himself had ordered me to attack I would have refused." A Confederate officer said this was not war, but MURDER! A leading newspaper in New York later printed a list of the dead. No commentary, just names. It took seven pages of fine print to include all the names. The lecturer said upon the release of this edition of the paper the Irish in New York City went "beserk". Incensed, indignant and angered that so many Irishmen would be sent to their deaths to free blacks that they went on another rampage of lynching and killing of blacks in the city.

At the time I had heard this lecture, many years ago, I just took it as an interesting "side show" to the history of the Civil War. Recently, during Black History Month the topic of the Draft Riots of 1863 came up and I wondered about that, and other lectures I had heard in regards to the post Cold Harbor riots of 1864. I went searching for information on the internet and I can find NOTHING! Has this incident been removed from the official "History" due to it's racial and societal implications? Can anyone tell me where I can find some information on this matter? Is someone concerned this would be fodder for Irish discontent and decided this was "dangerous" history and needed to be expunged from the record? If anyone has any current information on this matter please post it on this site. Thank you.

Ooops, My mistake. Cold Harbor was a little later in the year. June I believe, not April. Oh well, I never said I was an historian. Just an amateur Civil War Buff. The facts on Cold Harbor are a matter of record so if any one is interested in those events I suggest they go to a library instead of listening to me. Still, I do recall those lectures in regards to post Cold Harbor riots in New York city and I'd appreciate it if anyone can find me any information on them whether true or false. Thank you.