Series 1 - Michael Kilcran memoir

61pp

Lawrence P. Kilcran created this copy on 9 February 1976 for distribution to family members. He provided this copy of the transcript to Kerby A. Miller in 1990. Miller later created his own transcript based on scans of the original journal provided to him by Michael Kilcran's granddaughter, Denese Wojcik, who later donated the original manuscripts to the Imirce project on 26 August 2026 [see collection P237].

Colum & Irene Kilcran's February 1976 typed transcript of Michael Kilcran's 'stockyards memoir' written ca. 1912.
Michael Kilcran was born around 1862 in Mohill, near Carrick-on-Shannon, County Leitrim and emigrated to Chicago, Illinois in 1882, following an uncle who paid for his passage. Kilcran wrote his 'stockyards memoir' in 1912 and wrote another memoir ca. 1913-1914 about his time in the Chicago Police Department. Upon arriving in Chicago, Kilcran worked a number of labouring jobs for stockyards and meatpackers between 1880 and 1892, when he then joined the Chicago Police Department. He worked for the Chicago police until 1912 and in that time was a plainclothes detective for 12 years, a patrol sergeant for 6 years, and a street patrolman for 2 years. He died in 1914.
Per Kerby A Miller: 'Kilcran's memoir covers the 12 years or so from his arrival in Chicago in 1880 to his joining the Chicago police force in 1892, although most of the memoir details his first year or so after his arrival, his searches for work and his various jobs (primarily in the stockyards). The principal themes of Kilcran's descriptions of those early years are: his disillusionment with many older Irish immigrants and the ways they mistreated ""greenhorns,"" such as himself; the brutal working conditions and exploitation imposed by many Irish-American and other ""bosses""; and the degraded and polluted social and physical environment of Chicago's poor neighborhoods. The traumatic effects on Kilcran of these early experiences are doubly revealed through his unusually vivid descriptions of nightly dreams, as well as his homesick and prayerful lamentations for his mother and Irish home'.

The original manuscript is held in collection P237. Kerby A. Miller's own transcript, created in 2020 from the original journal, is at P155/125/5. Miller's research related to Michael Kilcran can be found in P155/12/1/2 and P155/12/9.