It is little wonder, then, that when the Irish President visited Newfoundland in 1996 as part of "Irish Week," he commented on how much Newfoundland reminded him of Ireland. Newfoundland, he said, was "just like home."

Why did the Irish come to Newfoundland? When did they first arrive? A clue can be found in the Irish Gaelic name for Newfoundland: Talamh an Eisc: "The Island of Fish." Starting in the mid seventeenth century, thousands of Irish came to Newfoundland to work in the migratory or "summer" fishery. They came out in the spring and returned to Ireland in the fall. The ships they worked on were owned by British merchants and based in England. More will be said about this later.

By the late 1700s the migratory fishery was coming to a close. Many Irish were staying year round in Newfoundland. They settled mainly in St. John's and throughout the Avalon Peninsula:

By 1836 there were 38,000 Irish on the island--half the population of Newfoundland. More than 70% lived in St. John's and its near hinterland, between Renews and Carbonear. There were probably more Catholic Irish crowded into this restricted strip of shore than in any comparable Canadian space.⁶

There were so many Irish in Newfoundland that until the 1820s the most common language on the Avalon Peninsula was not English, but Irish (Gaelic).⁷

Life in Newfoundland was not always easy for the Irish. But many Irish immigrants thought anything was better than staying in Ireland. This was not because they did not love their native country. But many things made it impossible for them to stay.