In September 1828, societies of the ‘Friends of Ireland’ were founded throughout the United States and British North America for the purpose of raising funds and disseminating propaganda in support of the O’Connellite campaign for Catholic emancipation. In March 1831, the societies were briefly revived to agitate for repeal of the Union. The first Irish diasporic social movement to appear in Britain’s overseas empire, the British North American Friends of Ireland enjoyed greatest support in French-speaking Lower Canada, where for a time sympathetic local patriotes perceived a common cause with their new Irish neighbours. This article explores the transatlantic reciprocal interactions, cross-ethnic alliances and regional distinctions which characterised early O’Connellism in Lower Canada. It follows its initial successes to its virtual collapse in the early 1830s, as an increasingly polarised Lower Canada slid towards rebellion. Comparisons are employed with similar agitation elsewhere in British North America, in the United States, and in Ireland. It is argued that instrumentalist explanations for Irish diasporic nationalism, typically drawn from studies of post-famine Irish-America, do not convincingly account for the appearance and form of O’Connellite nationalism in British North America.

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爱尔兰之友：下加拿大的早期奥康主义

1828 年 9 月，“爱尔兰之友”社团在美国和英属北美成立，目的是筹集资金和宣传支持奥康奈尔派的天主教解放运动。1831 年 3 月，各社团短暂恢复，以鼓动废除联邦。作为第一个出现在英国海外帝国的爱尔兰侨民社会运动，英国北美爱尔兰之友在说法语的下加拿大地区获得了最大的支持，该地区一度同情当地人爱国者与他们的新爱尔兰邻居有共同的事业。本文探讨了下加拿大早期奥康奈尔主义的跨大西洋互惠互动、跨种族联盟和地区差异。随着日益两极分化的下加拿大滑向叛乱，它在最初的成功之后于 1830 年代初期几乎崩溃。在英属北美、美国和爱尔兰的其他地方进行了类似的比较。有人认为，对爱尔兰侨民民族主义的工具主义解释，通常来自对后饥荒爱尔兰-美国的研究，并不能令人信服地解释奥康奈尔民族主义在英属北美的出现和形式。