Present company: Chris Rose on a bond of generosity

‘The bond between the Choctaw and the Irish goes back more than 170 years.’

At long last it seems there is an end in sight to all the pandemic lockdown restrictions. We will all have things to remember from this difficult time. We will all have stories to tell.

I came across one in April last year, during the first lockdown. I remember reading about a collection in Ireland to raise money for the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, which had been badly affected by the first wave of the coronavirus.

Intrigued, I found that the Choctaw had originally lived in what is now Alabama, Florida, Mississippi and Louisiana. Their land was wanted by new European settlers and in 1831 the United States government evicted them, forcing the tribe to walk over 700 miles to a new reservation. Thousands of Choctaw people died due to the extreme cold and harsh conditions on what has become known as the Trail of Tears.

Not long afterwards the potato famine occurred in Ireland, following crop failures. Over a million people died, and the crisis prompted one of the first worldwide relief efforts. In 1847 a US Quaker charity had held a meeting near the Oklahoma reservation appealing for help for the starving Irish. Many Choctaw were present and, having experienced such great loss themselves, they wanted to help. Although they had little, they gathered $170, and sent it across the Atlantic Ocean to help feed the starving in Ireland.

This made headlines in Ireland and it also got a lot of coverage in the British press. It was regarded as extraordinary at the time, coming from so distant a culture. But in Ireland people felt a common bond with another people who, like themselves, had suffered so very badly.

The bond between the Choctaw and the Irish goes back more than 170 years and continues today. Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland, became an honorary Choctaw chief. In County Cork there is a statue of a giant set of steel eagle feathers representing a bowl of food for the hungry, evoking the story of how the Choctaw people came to the aid of the Irish in 1847.

I think now of how one group of people long ago reacted in their time of crisis and distress. Seeds were sown which bore fruit 170 years later, when that act of kindness was reciprocated. Looking at us today I ask: ‘What seeds will we sow in our time of crisis?’ Let us pray that they too will be seeds of kindness, hope and love.

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