The Connection - Winter 2024

HONORING
IRISH IMMIGRANTS
When railroad contractor Philip Duffy hired 57 manual laborers in 1832 to build a track extension through heavily
wooded areas near Malvern, it's likely he thought of them not so much as fellow human beings (even though like
them he was an Irish Catholic immigrant) but as easily expendable labor. After all, "there was a lot of resentment
towards the presence of the Irish in the community," explains William Watson, a history professor at lmmaculata
University, which is located near the site. "People thought they were undermining the lowest levels of the economic
system by taking away jobs."
Further, the Irish migrants had arrived in the midst of a cholera epidemic, and many wrongly blamed them for
bringing the disease to America. "We know this particular outbreak started in Canada and made its way into the
Hudson Valley and New York City before hitting Philadelphia," Watson says. Sadly, when all 57 died shortly after their
work began, they were buried in an unmarked mass grave, and it was presumed that the immigrants had indeed
fallen prey to the disease.
And the thinking stayed that way for more than 150 years - until 1990 when Watson and his twin brother Frank, a
reverend and archivist, discovered some papers in a file. They had been left behind by their grandfather, Joseph
Tripican, who had served as secretary to Martin Clement, an assistant supervisor (and later president) of the
Pennsylvania Railroad.
It was Clement, says Watson, who first became obsessed with the story of a colony of workers who had died all
at once. He began pouring through every scrap of paper he could get his hands on in an attempt to find the mass
grave. In 1909, he found what he thought must be the spot and erected a stone monument. In the 1960s, Tripican
grabbed some of these materials before the railroad's archives were auctioned off.
Thanks to their research, along with that of several other instructors at lmmaculata, many now believe that some
of the migrants - including two women - may have been murdered. They dubbed their effort the Duffy's Cut
Project and began an excavation in 2004; five years later the first human bones were unearthed from the site. The
remains showed signs of blunt force trauma, according to bone expert and University of Pennsylvania Physical
Anthropologist, Janet Monge.
In March 2012, the skeletal remains of five people were reburied at Laurel Hill West with the Irish ambassador to the
United States in attendance. Every year since then, the Duffy's Cut Project has led a ceremony to honor and
explore this history. This year, the event will be held at 2 p.m. on March 3.