It's not as if the Irish presence in Latin America is confined to the San Patricios. One of Chile's founding fathers was the wonderfully named Bernardo O'Higgins, and an Irish battalion found its way into the Venezuelan War of Independence. Much earlier Juan and Tomás Farrel had been members of the expedition that arrived in the River Plate in 1536 and founded Buenos Aires.
And it's also not as if the San Patricio Battalion, which wasn't entirely made up of US army deserters, was the only link between the Irish and Mexican nationalists. Irishmen had settled in Mexican Texas before the Revolution of 1835-36 and remained loyal to Mexico since they saw themselves as Mexicans through marriage, commercial contacts, owed their land grants to the Mexican government, and had closer ties to their Catholic Mexican neighbours than Protestant Americans pushing for autonomy.
Irish immigrants who left their homeland during the Potato Famine of 1845 to begin new lives in America probably weren't totally chuffed to find themselves drafted into fighting in the Mexican-American War under conditions of bigotry that were uncomfortably close to what they'd left behind in Ireland.
Encouraged by Mexican offers of land grants, promises of promotion and Catholic partisanship hundreds of Irish crossed over to the Mexican side to fight under a green banner emblazoned with an Irish harp and a shamrock under the leadership of John O'Reilly, a deserter from the British army in Canada. The San Patricios won decorations for courage in the battle of Buena Vista, and suffered heavy casualties in Churubusco, after which seventy-two survivors were court martialled and fifty hanged.
That’s enough background. What it’s all about is, of course, the music, which comprises a couple of bespoke compositions and a musical tour of Mexico that explores the ways Irish instruments can integrate themselves into traditional Mexican material.
Actually, it works pretty well as a listening experience from the opening La Iguana with guest vocals from Lila Downs to the Finale, where The Chieftains are joined by Banda de Gaita de Batallón, along with just about everybody who’s turned up along the way.