Editing Montserrat (section)

==== Irish language in Montserrat ====
The Irish constituted the largest proportion of the white population from the founding of the colony in 1628. Most were [[indentured servant]]s; others were merchants or plantation owners. The geographer Thomas Jeffrey claimed in ''The West India Atlas'' (1780) that the majority of those on Montserrat were either Irish or of Irish descent, "so that the use of the [[Irish language]] is preserved on the island, even among the Negroes."<ref>Cited in: {{cite book |last=Truxes |first=Thomas M. |year=2004 |title=Irish-American Trade, 1660-1783 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |page=100}} See also: {{cite book |title=The West India Atlas or, A Compendious Description of the West-Indies |author=The late Thomas Jefferys, Geographer to the King |publisher=Robert Sayer and John Bennett |location=Fleet Street, London |year=1780}}</ref>

African slaves and Irish indentured servants of all classes were in constant contact, with sexual relationships being common and a population of mixed descent appearing as a consequence.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Rodgers |first=Nini |title=The Irish in the Caribbean 1641-1837: An Overview |journal=Irish Migration Studies in Latin America |date=November 2007 |volume=5 |number=3 |pages=145–156 |url=http://www.irishargentine.org/0711rodgers1.htm |access-date=25 March 2016 |archive-date=27 September 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160927012637/http://www.irishargentine.org/0711rodgers1.htm |url-status=usurped }}</ref> The Irish were also prominent in Caribbean commerce, with their merchants importing Irish goods such as beef, pork, butter and herring, and also importing slaves.<ref>{{cite book |last=McGarrity |first=Maria |year=2008 |title=Washed by the Gulf Stream: The Historic and Geographic Relation of Irish and Caribbean Literature |publisher=Associated University Presses |pages=33–34 |isbn=9780874130287}}</ref>

There is indirect evidence that the use of the Irish language continued in Montserrat until at least the middle of the nineteenth century. The [[County Kilkenny]] diarist and Irish scholar [[Amhlaoibh Ó Súilleabháin]] noted in 1831 that he had heard that Irish was still spoken in Montserrat by both black and white inhabitants.<ref name="De Bhaldraithe">{{cite book |editor-last=De Bhaldraithe |editor-first=Tomás |editor-link=Tomás de Bhaldraithe |year=1979 |title=[[Cín Lae Amhlaoibh]] |publisher=An Clóchomhar Tta |location=[[Baile Átha Cliath]] |page=84 |chapter=Entry 2700, 1 Aibreán 1831 [1 April 1831] |quote=Is clos dom gurb í an teanga Ghaeilge is teanga mháthartha i Monserrat san India Thiar ó aimsir Olibher Cromaill, noch do dhíbir cuid de chlanna Gael ó Éirinn gusan Oileán sin Montserrat. Labhartar an Ghaeilge ann go coiteann le daoine dubha agus bána. [I heard that the Irish language is the mother tongue in Montserrat in the West Indies since the time of Oliver Cromwell, who banished some Gaelic Irish families there. Irish speaking is common among both blacks and whites.] |language=Irish}}</ref>

In 1852, Henry H. Breen wrote in [[Notes and Queries]] that "The statement that 'the Irish language is spoken in the West India Islands, and that in some of them it may be said to be almost vernacular,' is true of the little Island of Montserrat, but has no foundation with respect to the other colonies."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0DFmyJVInw8C&pg=PA256|title=Notes and Queries: A Medium of Inter-Communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, Etc|date=15 July 1852|publisher=Bell|via=Google Books|access-date=20 September 2020|archive-date=3 October 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231003185126/https://books.google.com/books?id=0DFmyJVInw8C&pg=PA256#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 1902, ''[[The Irish Times]]'' quoted the ''Montreal Family Herald'' in a description of Montserrat, noting that "the negroes to this day speak the old Irish Gaelic tongue, or English with an Irish brogue. A story is told of a [[Connaught]] man who, on arriving at the island, was, to his astonishment, hailed in a vernacular Irish by the black people."<ref>''[[The Irish Times]]'' (Monday, 8 September 1902), page 5.</ref>

A letter by [[William Butler (British Army officer)|W. F. Butler]] in ''[[The Athenaeum (British magazine)|The Atheneum]]'' (15 July 1905) quotes an account by a [[Cork (city)|Cork]] civil servant, C. Cremen, of what he had heard from a retired sailor called John O'Donovan, a fluent Irish speaker:

{{blockquote|He frequently told me that in the year 1852, when mate of the brig Kaloolah, he went ashore on the island of Montserrat which was then out of the usual track of shipping. He said he was much surprised to hear the negroes actually talking Irish among themselves, and that he joined in the conversation...<ref name="De Bhaldraithe"/>}}

The British [[Phonetics|phonetician]] [[John C. Wells]] conducted research into speech in Montserrat in 1977&ndash;78 (which included also Montserratians resident in London).<ref name=Wells>{{cite journal |last1=Wells |first1=John C. |year=1980 |title=The brogue that isn't |url=http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/brogue.htm |journal=Journal of the International Phonetic Association |volume=10 |issue=1–2 |pages=74–79 |access-date=29 April 2017 |doi=10.1017/s0025100300002115 |s2cid=144941139 |archive-date=16 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230316223516/https://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/brogue.htm |url-status=live |url-access=subscription }}</ref> He found media claims that Irish speech, whether [[Anglo-Irish]] or [[Irish Gaelic]], influenced contemporary Montserratian speech were largely exaggerated.<ref name=Wells/> He found little in phonology, morphology or syntax that could be attributed to Irish influence, and in Wells' report, only a small number of Irish words in use, one example being ''minseach'' {{IPA|[ˈmʲiɲʃəx]}} which he suggests is the noun ''goat''.<ref name=Wells/>