Clare blood spilled in Blue Ridge Tunnel

The Blue Ridge Tunnel in Virginia, USA, like many of the major construction projects of the 19th century, was completed at a high cost to human life.
Among the hundreds of Irish workers and members of their families who died during the 10 years of work were many from County Clare. Mary Ryan, a member of Clann Mhór: The Blue Ridge Railroad Project, explains how the group is now battling to protect the tunnel and contact relatives of the people who helped build it.
Clann Mhór is an all-volunteer, non-profit group based in Charlottesville, Virginia, dedicated to preserving the memory of 2,000 Irish famine emigrants and 100 enslaved Virginians who constructed the Blue Ridge Tunnel and connecting tracks between 1850 and 1860.
Now considered an engineering marvel, the tunnel was built 700 feet below the top of the mountain. Dynamite had not been invented yet; Irish workers used volatile gunpowder to drill and blast horizontally through one mile of solid granite and slate.
Few people in the Charlottesville area are aware that hundreds of Irish died during the tunnel construction.
The group has expressed their concern about a proposed “Rail to Trail” hiking path through the tunnel. They fear that authorities in charge will fail to recognise the labourers and to that end they are looking for just one personal story or photograph linking graves to a real person from Clare in the hope that it can convince officials the trail should be more than a playground for outdoor enthusiasts.
The tunnel was often a deadly trap. Explosions, rockslides, disease and exposure to extreme temperatures killed at least 139 Irish men. Deaths from pneumonia, tuberculosis, pleurisy and stroke were common in shanty houses along the tracks where many of the Irish lived.
A cholera epidemic in the summer of 1854 decimated entire families.
Scores of deceased Irish were buried near the tunnel in unmarked, forgotten graves. Others were buried at Thornrose Cemetery in the nearby hilly town of Staunton. Their gravestones lean against the wind on a grassy knoll and face east, toward Ireland.
Families or friends who arranged the burials made sure that the bond with Ireland would hold fast through the centuries – many stones are engraved with the name of an Irish county, parish, or townland of birth.
Clare names include James, Bridget, and Michael Carmody; John, Patrick, Thomas and Mary Hassett; Bridget Hassett Wholey; John O’Hare; Martin Maligan and cholera victim Mary Hoolern (spelling uncertain).
Two stones mark the resting places of Dan’l Croghan and Hannora Croghan of Drumline, near Shannon and Newmarket-on-Fergus. Census and payroll records in America indicate that Daniel was born around 1825 and may have been a skilled mason. He emigrated around 1849, at the height of the Great Hunger. He and his Limerick-born wife, Ellen Burke, lived in Staunton with Hannora and Thomas Croghan. An older couple, they may have been Daniel’s parents.
A younger Thomas Croghan who was born around 1820 also lived in the household. Daniel and Ellen settled permanently in Staunton, attended the newly built Saint Francis of Assisi Catholic church and had three children: Michael, Lena, and John William.
But these bits of data do not a story make. Clann Mhór is searching for details that would explain what life was like for the Croghan family before and after emigration. Using the services of a Staunton lawyer named JB Watts, Irish workers on the Blue Ridge Railroad sent between $4,000 and $5,000 to relatives in Ireland every year.
Griffith’s Valuation (1855 printing) for the parish and townland of Drumline, County Clare, indicates that the Croghans might have sent money and letters to John, Bridget, Michael and Timothy. These were the only Croghans living in Drumline at the time of the Valuation. Croghan letters were probably postmarked Staunton, Virginia. Other possible postmarks could be Covington, Waynesborough, Afton Mountain, Brooksville, Greenwood, Ivy, or Charlottesville, Virginia.
Clann Mhór would like readers who might have letters, photographs, or family stories related to any of the Clare names mentioned above to contact the organisation at 5 Elliewood Avenue, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903 USA. You can also email ClannMhor@gmail.com. For more about their goals and a brief history of the Irish who worked on Blue Ridge Railroad of Virginia, visit http://clannmhor.blogspot.com.