My name is Beglan O’Brien and I am an independent newspaper correspondent, reporting on the momentous events of this terrible, and growing, coflict. But a bit about me. I am the son of Daniel Patrick O’Brien and Mary Frances McCarthy. That my father married a McCarthy is hardly surprising as Cork is full of them and that is where I was born, specifically, in the village of Dunmanway up the river B
andon. I am the fourth child of six that survived to adulthood. Two have died since. My father is, or was, a stone mason who was insufficiently employed in Dunmanway and so shifted his family to the city of Cork just before the starving time. It is fortunate he did since what little relief there was arrived first at the great ports. I was enrolled for a time at a national school, which provided me with a rudimentary education, but soon left it when I was apprenticed to a printer who published a popular broadsheet. This was the making of me, because whenever there were holes in the sheets, I filled them with whatever came into my head. My master was much pleased. All the more surprising, then, when our journeyman left and I was passed over for his place. I burned with the humiliation and so determined to make the great leap. I would go to America. My elder brother Garrett had already immigrated to New Orleans where he was employed as a clerk in our uncle Ewen’s dry goods store. His letters were filled with enthusiasm for his new city but I thought it best if I struck out for New York. I knew there were many of my fellow countrymen there as well as a plentiful supply of newspapers. Surely there would be a place for me. I was not mistaken. Within a month of landing in June of 1854, I secured a modest situation at the New York Tribune running copy, then two months later a position haunting local police stations and finally a most satisfying posting pursuing scandal, corruption and other sensational news across the whole of the city. By the spring of 1858 I was the Tribune’s sole correspondent in Washington, but soon had a falling out over constant interference with my work. No matter. I had made many contacts and these became the core of what would become a large client list. When the war came, I was a well-respected independent reporter able and willing to follow the story wherever it might lead. Cast of Characters
Daniel Patrick O'Brien - father
Mary Frances (McCarthy) O'Brien - mother
Garrett O'Brien - brother, volunteer in the 13th Louisiana Infantry (Confederate)
Ewen McCarthy - uncle, dry goods store owner in New Orleans
Sargent Maartin van Dijk - friend, volunteer in the 43rd New York Infantry
Army Chaplin Father Rémy LaBelle - priest
Peter Able - landlord
Rosaleen McCarthy - aunt
The Gentleman - covert loyalist
Hérbert Montpetit - friend, Union provisioner
Elizabeth Smith - Quaker lady friend, volunteer nurse
