Earlier this year, we shared haunting images of the Irish Famine memorial on the shores of the River Liffey in Dublin.
On a visit to Philadelphia in April 2024, I had the chance to visit an American counterpart to the monument in the Irish capital.
The Irish Memorial in Philly was dedicated in 2003 and memorializes the Irish immigrants who fled famine and disease in their native land in the 1840s and 1850s. Thousands sought refuge in the Keystone State.
Many traveled to the mining villages and towns of Eastern Pennsylvania and established new homes in America.
Despite decades of discrimination from nativist neighbors who decried their language, religion, and culture, these immigrants rooted themselves in the fabric of the United States and forever altered their adopted country.
The monument in Philly shows the stages that these immigrants experienced in their journey to America.
Read more about Irish immigrants in the Coal Region
Memorial to victims of the Irish potato famine of the 1840s | Dublin, Ireland
Major Joseph Anthony | Civil War veteran and mining superintendent
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