Series 5 - Richard O'Gorman letters

2 sub-series

Kerby A. Miller created his transcripts of the O'Gorman letters from the original manuscripts held in the William Smith O'Brien Papers, National Library of Ireland [call number MS 445].

Materials pertaining to letters written by Richard O'Gorman in New York to Irish nationalist politician and Young Ireland leader William Smith O'Brien between 1852 and 1861. The letters span from the time O'Brien was serving a sentence of transportation to Tasmania through to his exile in Brussels.
Per Helen F. Mulvey (1953), ‘New York City in 1859: A Letter from Richard O'Gorman to William Smith O'Brien’, New York History 34, no. 1, p. 85-90 : ‘Richard O'Gorman, junior, was born in Dublin in 1820, the son of a prosperous merchant, one of the numerous Catholics of the middle class, who had come forward in Irish life after the lifting of the penal laws in the late eighteenth century. O'Gorman's family had taken a leading part in the Catholic Emancipation cause, but had later on fallen into disagreement with Daniel O'Connell. It was the Young Ireland movement of the 1840's which brought O'Gorman into Irish public life, and resulted eventually in his exile to the United States… … In America, O'Gorman first settled in St. Louis, but eventually came to New York where he began to practice law. He served two terms as corporation counsel beginning in 1865. In 1870, he was chosen Commissioner of Immigration, and in 1883, a judge of the Superior Court of New York city. He retired in 1890, and died on February 28, 1895.’
During his time in government, O’Gorman was part of the Tammany Hall political machine. Per Kerby A. Miller, ‘In 1858 his old Young Ireland comrade, Michael Doheny, had described O'Gorman as "sharp as a chisel and equally keen in his race for money." Financially as well as politically, O'Gorman had won his race. To be sure, the course had turned out to be much more devious than he had imagined as an idealistic and rebellious youth, but, as he wrote to Smith O'Brien in 1859, he had left that "honest fellow ... behind [him] in Ireland."’
In addition to transcripts and abstracts of O’Gorman’s letters to O’Brien, the series contains extensive research and writing on O’Gorman, correspondence between Miller and fellow researchers regarding O’Gorman, and correspondence between Miller and O’Gorman descendants.

Materials pertaining to O’Gorman’s Young Ireland colleague Michael Doheny, frequently mentioned in this series and also author of letters to William Smith O’Brien, are located in P155/48/6. Letters to O'Brien written by other emigrants are found in P155/62/4 and P155/65/35.