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by Vincent J. Quealy (Author)
A young Bridget Meade arrived-alone-in Boston on June 10, 1909, no doubt anxious and unsure about what awaited her in this distant and unfamiliar land. She was far from all that she had known, far from all that she had cherished and still quite unwelcome in this new place which had very little regard for poor and Catholic Irish immigrants. "The worst misfortune which ever happened to the United States" said Mr. Arthur Crew Inman of Boston's old Brahmin society "...is the Irish". Her life had changed utterly. She was then twenty years old.
Bridget's family remained in Miltown Malbay and, realizing his life-long aspiration, Bridget's father, Peter Meade, purchased the small farm, which he'd operated as a tenant farmer for many years before, in 1916 with a loan from The National Bank, "...just as the Trouble was coming" Ellen Meade wrote some years later. Trouble, indeed.
The Irish War of Independence soon came harshly to Miltown Malbay. Though Bridget Meade was now far and safely removed from its' dangers, residents of the small town in the West of Clare where she had lived until only a few years prior would soon suffer its' scourge. Bridget's family-the Meade family- would come to know particular hardship and sorrow.
