Ireland to America The Last Generation

From Chapter 1:  On a particularly warm day in early July 1808, Will, Thomas, and Anne were gathered around the kitchen fireplace.  Will's face tensed anxiously.  Sweat beaded up on his forehead and made its way down the furrows of his cheeks, dropping off onto his shirt already wet from the heat of July.  The early morning coolness had tapered off and the warm afternoon had begun to settle into early evening.  Despite the warm weather, a fire crackled in the hearth.  Will was unable to sit for more than a moment before getting up to pace around the table.  He was a large man, unusual in his height.  His broad shoulders and muscular arms told of his years of hard work.  It was rare for Will to spend this much time in the kitchen, ordinarily Margaret's domain.  His young son and daughter picked up on the tension as they tracked him with their eyes.  In the small room to the back of the house, neighborhood women entered and left and one could hear the sounds of a woman in labor.  As Margaret keened and struggled, the children, Thomas and Anne, grew noticeably frightened.  Ellen Byrne, from the same cache of homes in Common Hall, came out of the back room and took the children to her house for porridge, scones, and a glass of warm milk.  Ellen was Anne's Baptismal sponsor along with John Phelan whose wife was currently attending Margaret.  Several women from Vicar Street came by Ellen's to ask how the labor was proceeding.  Conversation was casual and congenial as they also exchanged pleasantries and discussed the weather.  Ellen had kept the kettle water hot so as to offer tea and scones to all who dropped in.  Labor and the culmination in birth was a waiting game and the women were well acquainted with it.

From Chapter 17:  The Russell Baldwin eased out of the slip and began to pick up speed as it headed down the River Mersey and into the channel. With a wallop, it hit the choppy waters of the Irish Sea.  At first the vessel tipped, almost quietly, to the right as bodies in berths slid along with both hands holding onto the other side of the berth to keep from rolling out.  Just as quickly they flipped to the left with the same resulting thrust to their bodies.  "May the grace of God protect us!" was heard, almost as a scream, somewhere toward the prow.
    "Jesus, Mary, Joseph and Patrick!" came from another berth.
   "A mathair, ta me marbh!" screamed a young woman.   (Oh mother, I'm killed.)
   "My love to God, the devil is done and we will all be killed."
   Back in the berths with the men there were similar epithets with a slightly different leaving.  "Bedad, this is the greatest wonder ever I seen!"
   "We be ridin' the devil's horns, for sure."
  
From Chapter 42:  The old Capitol building on 1st Street was vacated when the new Capitol was built.  It became a boarding house for a time but had now been remodeled into a jail.  It stood in the center of four busy thoroughfares.  Frank and William were locked in a room together on the second floor which overlooked the Capitol.  They were forbidden to put their faces to the single window or take the risk of being shot.  The next day, a courier met Martin on his way to work.  "Sir, I have been requested to tell you that your son, Frank, has been imprisoned in the Old Capitol.  Ms. Rose Greenhow has also been arrested.  Your address, which I presume is also your son's, was written on the front of her diary."  He tipped his hat and disappeared into the street leaving Martin standing, dumbfounded and fearful, halfway between home and work.  He leaned against a lamppost, removed his hat, and wiped his forehead before turning back toward home.