The Girls on Rose Hill by Bernadette Walsh Read Free Book Online Page A

were from my great-grandmother, Eileen O'Connor, and included reports to Kitty of the activities of the farm: the birth of a new calf, how much hay was cut, and hopes that the rain would hold off until it had been brought in. It seems nine times out of ten, the weather didn't hold. They were in rainy Ireland, I thought, how could they have been surprised? Eileen also kept Kitty up to date on her younger siblings' activities and the local gossip. I'd obviously never met my namesake, but through these simple notes I got a sense of her strength and her pious nature.
    What must it have been like for her to give birth to nine children, see two die and four others be lost to her through immigration? She wrote often to her eldest daughter, at a time when she likely could spare neither the time nor the few pennies for paper and postage. Eileen must have wanted to keep Kitty close to her, tied to Templeglantin, in spirit if not in body.
    It appeared that she was successful, at least initially, because Kitty wrote back cheery letters to her family in Templeglantin, and always asked detailed questions about each member. In one of her early letters, she was excited to hear that her sister Margaret would be joining her, although she warned her not to expect America to be the paradise that their neighbors, the Sheehans, had portrayed it to be.
    It was only after Margaret arrived in New York that the tone of Eileen's letters changed. Apparently Kitty had been selective in what she told her mother. Eileen believed that Kitty worked in a parish rectory, which was the job that Bridie Sheehan's daughter had arranged for her. The truth was, as Margaret must have told her mother, Kitty didn't last two weeks scrubbing for the cranky old pastor and his exacting young assistant. Instead, she found a job at Flannery's on Second Avenue in Manhattan, making sandwiches and serving drinks when the pub was busy. "I make twice what Father Healy paid me, for half the effort," Kitty wrote in her schoolgirl scrawl. "Now I can send you more money to pay for Maura's passage," Maura was next in line for the immigrant ship. Eileen may have accepted Kitty's ill gotten gains, but that didn't mean that she didn't lecture her about looking for a "more suitable position."
    The letters took on a more cheerful tone a few months later as they discussed Margaret's upcoming wedding. "My heart is pure broke that I have to miss Margaret's big day, but I know, dear girl, that you will do the family proud and stand in for us." She went on to comfort Kitty, who being three years older than Margaret, was still unmarried. "Pray to God daughter, that he may send you as fine as man as He found for your sister. Do not lose heart, dear child, for God is good."
    A few months later, Eileen's heart was truly broken when she heard of Kitty's betrayal of her sister. "I have walked the house these three nights, unable to sleep after hearing your sorry news from Bridie Sheehan. All of Kilvarren village and all of Brooklyn must know your shameful story. I cannot show my face in town, and your poor father is destroyed. But I will not talk of your sins, daughter, for the time to talk has passed. Margaret writes that you are to be wed. Hopefully God in His infinite mercy may bless this union and bless your child. That is what I pray for each and every night. Your good sister has agreed to stand with you. I pray that God gives her the strength to get through what for her will be a hard day. To see you in her dress, and she wearing yours, will be difficult, but I know Our Father will reward her soon, for not shaming her family and for being a good sister to you. A better sister than you deserve. But we will speak of that no more. Be sure to send pictures, so that we can show the Sheehans and our other neighbors. God Bless."
    Eileen must have gotten her picture, but there were no more letters in the drawer from her until Tim Murphy's death, although there were many persistently cheerful letters