Saint Patrick’s Day

by Michael Pilligalli

Many people think that St. Patrick’s Day is a “modern” day occurrence to the patron Saint Patrick celebrating it all with a parade and lots of festivities, but it goes back many years before that in Ireland as a tribute to Saint Patrick for ridding the Emerald Isle of all its snakes.  It even had a part in America with the Revolutionary War as the story goes with this little ditty taking place at Valley Forge. 

The winter of survival strategies was coming to an end and many of the soldiers now found some time on their hands as the sole purpose besides fighting the revolution was to stay alive during the horrid winter of 1775/1777 and that was finally waning. The checker boards came out and games with cards, if available, were played and the dice were rolled to occupy any free time that the soldiers now realized they had. Our Irish immigrant soldiers were prepping for their honored day of March 17th to celebrate the occasion.  Groups of other soldiers were looking for a prank to play with the Irish soldiers and came up with a form of intrigue and mischief to play with their fellow soldiers on the special day.  Legend has it that a green and white stuffed version of St. Patrick was created by the non-Irish from straw and worn out garments of the soldiers and was secretly sneaked into Irish encampment area and propped up with Bishop’s hat and a shepherd’s crook on March 16th.  When the Irish awoke and viewed the green and white interpretation of their revered Saint Patrick at their encampment area, they saw scarlet!! This was taken as an afront to their Catholicism. And, it was decided that is was the work of the Protestant soldiers from Boston.  All parties knew that this could possibly turn out to be a more involved and volatile battle than the Battle of the Brandywine or Valley Forge.  It was going to be all out war with the Irish and the New England Protestants.  George Washington got word of the confrontation that was brewing and rode through the troops to try to quell the uproar.  He used his military experience to turn the episode into a laughing matter as best he could and proclaimed his admiration to the acclaimed patron saint.  He thought of what would serve as a peace offering to both sides of his united army and told the rebellious crowds that an extra ration of whiskey would be afforded to each and every soldier that day.  Later that day the whiskey was enjoyed and all sides laughed at the event that took place and friendships were reconnected between the groups of soldiers.