• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Vintage American

Postcard art sharing fun, beautiful and entertaining images of early 1900s America

  • Home
  • Currier and Ives
  • Holidays
  • Types
  • States
  • Blog
  • Store
Vintage American Holiday St. Patrick's Day Ellen Clapsaddle – The Wearing of the Green Vintage Postcard
The Wearing of the Green Vintage Postcard

Ellen Clapsaddle – The Wearing of the Green Vintage Postcard

Last Modified: June 10, 2018

This is a vintage signed Ellen Clapsaddle St. Patrick’s Day postcard showing a lovely Irish Lass with a Victorian dress and large, green Victorian hat over auburn hair. The postcard wishes a St. Patrick’s Day Greeting by mentioning “The Wearing of the Green” and is really a beautiful St. Patrick’s Day postcard that would have been sent at the turn of the 20th century. In those days, any person of Irish descent would know the term, “The Wearing of the Green” had special significance in Irish history. Ellen Clapsaddle has captured the sentiment in a lovely and elegant way.

In 1695, Britain passed laws regarding the Catholic people of Ireland. They were forbidden from schooling their children, from voting, owning land, they could not own a horse, serve on a jury, they could not be a public official, become a soldier or enter into the law in any capacity.

These laws brought a feeling of oppression to Ireland and many people stopped wearing their traditional family kilts, playing the bagpipes, or singing and dancing the songs of their past.

The Irish dancing that is so popular today shows the dancers being quit stiff from the waist up. This was due to the fact that if in looking through a window into a home, an English soldier could not see that they were dancing a “jig” as they looked stiff and still – only the feet were moving.

During the 1700s, a band of soldiers in the British Army known as “The Irish Volunteers,” led by a Protestant, Henry Grattan, became quite popular and powerful. They used their influence to lobby for the removal of the restricting laws against Irish Catholics and trade with Ireland. Henry Grattan felt that the Protestant Irish could not be truly free until the Catholic Irish were no longer slaves.

The Irish Volunteers took to wearing the Shamrock on their uniforms. England saw this as an act of rebellion and a law was passed that anyone wearing the Shamrock would be hung. From this history comes the song called, “Wearin’ of the Green” which has popularized this saying among the Irish.

But, Queen Victoria lifted this ban after the Irish Volunteers had stunning victories in the Boer War in South Africa. She sent a message out to all her troops in regards to her “brave Irish soldiers.” The message was that on St. Patrick’s Day, all ranks of her Irish regiments were to wear a Shamrock in commemoration of the bravery of the Irish troops in South Africa.

Today still, the British Royal Family presents a Shamrock to the Irish Guards in the British Army.

Filed Under: St. Patrick's Day Tagged With: Ellen Clapsaddle, Irish, irish lass postcard, old postcards, postcard, St. Patrick's Day postcard, St. Patty's Day postcard, vintage postcards

Vintage American Holiday St. Patrick's Day Ellen Clapsaddle – The Wearing of the Green Vintage Postcard

Primary Sidebar

Our Products

Blue Flower Cross Christian Binder
Blue Flower Cross Christian Binder
Shaws Hot Springs Postcard
Shaws Hot Springs Postcard
Pagosa Spring Button
Pagosa Spring Button
See More

Recent Posts

  • The Last Supper
  • Greetings From Florida
  • Starry Halloween Night
  • Girl With Candle
  • Unique Neck Ties – Get Fun and Vintage Inspired Ties

Tags

California california postcards Christian postcard Christmas postcard city streets postcards Colorado Colorado postcards Currier and Ives Easter chick postcard Easter postcard Ellen Clapsaddle flowers Fourth of July Fourth of July postcard Halloween postcard holiday postcard Independence Day postcard lithograph reprint locomotive Memorial Day Nevada New York New York postcard Niagara Falls Niagara Falls postcard old locomotives old postcards old train postcard patriotic postcard Pennsylvania Pennsylvania postcard Pittsburgh postcard railroads Rocky Mountains St. Patrick's Day postcard State History trains valentine love valentine postcards Victorian children postcard vintage postcards Washington DC waterfalls winter postcards

Footer

  • Owned by ARose Books
  • Our Printer
  • About Us
  • Privacy Policy
  • Site Map
  • Cookie Policy (US)

Copyright © 2007–2025 Vintage American

Manage Cookie Consent
We use cookies to optimize our website and our service.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}