Saint John: Canada’s (self-proclaimed) most Irish City

March 16, 2016

Saint John, New Brunswick’s peaceful shores have been a welcome sight for hundreds of thousands of immigrants. This includes the Irish, who at one time made up half the city’s population.

As Canada’s (self‐proclaimed) most Irish city, Saint John has over two centuries of Irish history beginning with the arrival of Irish American Loyalists around 1783. In the 19th century, Saint John was a major metropolitan city, offering jobs, family connections and employment opportunities. It only made sense for it to be a focal point for immigration. In 1815, after the Napoleonic Wars, thousands of unemployed Irish workers and ex‐servicemen in the British Isles took advantage of cheap fares to Saint John associated with returning timber ships.

Active immigration from Ireland continued to establish Saint John as a centre for the growing immigrant trade in the early nineteen hundreds. The largest influx of Irish immigrants arrived in Saint John between 1845 and 1847, during the Great Potato Famine.