At Home and Abroad

A project to build a beautiful world class Memorial Space around the Black Rock on the Montreal side of the Victoria Bridge. Fergus Keyes talks about recent developments.

This space would remember the 6000+ Irish immigrants, fleeing the Great Hunger in Ireland, that died and were buried in the area in 1847.

It would also honor the many Montrealers of every language, religion, and heritage that provided help and comfort to these dying Irish. Many of these “caregivers” also gave their life in this great humanitarian effort.

Members of the Montreal local Irish community are optimistic about the prospects for a proposed memorial park to honour Montreal’s Irish famine victims after meeting with Mayor Valérie Plante.

Mayor Plante expressed willingness to reroute part of Bridge St. so the park can be created on the site where up to 6,000 Irish immigrants died of typhus in 1847-48.

Mayor Plante also indicated she might be willing to reconsider her controversial proposal to name the future Réseau express métropolitain (REM) station in nearby Griffintown after late premier Bernard Landry, according to people who attended.

“She said, ‘Yes, it’s our intention to move Bridge St. Yes, we’re 100 per cent committed to do a study on moving Bridge St.,’ ” said Victor Boyle, a director of the Montreal Irish Memorial Park Foundation, who attended the meeting with co-director Fergus Keyes. The foundation has been fighting for more than a decade to create a commemorative park on the site

http://www.montrealirishmonument.com/