From the Camp to the School

John Francis Maguire
1868
CHAPTER XXVI (11) start of chapter

Among the most prominent structures in New Orleans are the great schools conducted by the Redemptorist Fathers of that city; and among these good men is one—all zeal, all energy, all ardour—whose name is venerated in the South. Father Sheeran was one of the most devoted, not to say one of the bravest, of the Chaplains of the Southern army. As cool under fire as the oldest campaigner, one glance from Father Sheeran's eye would send the waverer dashing to the front. And now that, happily, the sword is returned to the scabbard, and the generous of North and South can meet again as brethren, if not as friends, Father Sheeran is, with his fellow-priests, actively engaged, indeed almost wholly engrossed, in the noble work of Christian education; which he and they promote with such success, that 1,400 children—the children chiefly of Irish parents—are educated in such a manner as to elicit the warmest and most elaborate praise from Protestant journalists. New Orleans possesses several important educational institutions, academical and parochial; but that of the Redemptorists is remarkable because of the well-known career of the famous Chaplain of the 14th Louisiana Regiment.

The Irish in America, first published in 1868, provides an invaluable account of the extreme difficulties that 19th Century Irish immigrants faced in their new homeland and the progress which they had nonetheless made in the years since arriving on a foreign shore. A new edition, including additional notes and an index, has been published by Books Ulster/LibraryIreland:

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