The Great Famine in Ireland (1845-1848) was one of the darkest periods in Irish history. The disaster is estimated to have killed between 500,000 and 1 million people, plunging the island into a climate of extreme poverty. Murderous and harrowing, it left its mark on the 19th century with its considerable losses, and encouraged emigration to the new continent. Beyond the tragic human circumstances, the Great Famine also saw the emergence of a brutal conflict: a complex political conflict in which the British Empire preferred to play the card of indifference while a country under its domination demanded its help…
An Irish home before the Great Famine – Public domain
We are in the 1830s. At the time, Ireland was under British rule… An occupation that has lasted since the 16th century, where the Irish suffer daily discrimination and social rejection. The predominantly Catholic Irish people experienced a climate of repression. Many live below the poverty line and experience misery.
However, at the time, Great Britain was exploiting the island’s resources to the full. The British government sees Ireland as the perfect territory for agriculture and food production of all kinds…
That’s why over 95% of Irish land is under British occupation. The latter employ the Irish to farm their land, raise livestock… and then ship the goods by the cargos to England… feeding up to 2 million Britons from these precious Irish resources alone!
Cereals, vegetables, meat, eggs, cheese, milk, salmon, alcohol, wool… At the time, England was using Ireland as its “shopping basket”… ignoring the prevailing misery of the Irish, who, despite being expected to live as equals with the British, seemed to be regarded as a sub-race to be governed.
So the Irish have to make do with what little the English leave them.
At the time, many Irish tenant farmers and peasants rented out plots of land to wealthy British landowners. They then tried to grow potatoes, an essential means of subsistence for their daily lives. Tasty and nutritious, it ensures the survival of the poorest… Although money may be tight, families are living on full stomachs.
Potatoes affected by late blight – © nskyr2
1845: A parasitic fungus, mildew, which travelled in the holds of ships from South America, spread to Irish cultures.
Its proliferation is surprisingly rapid. It destroys everything in its path, and the humidity allows its massive spread to most potato plants.
Parasitised by mildew, the potato tuber then becomes unconsumable: it wilts and rots, prohibiting any form of partial recovery.
This natural disaster plunged Ireland into a large-scale food shortage, accentuating the existing rural misery, starving the population and depriving them of any possibility of subsistence. The populations most affected are those in the west of Ireland.
The latter, already impoverished, are crammed into insalubrious thatched cottages made of mud and straw. Families are often large, and men, women and children find themselves embraced by hunger. They are forced to work even harder for the landowners, who promise to give them poor-quality grain in exchange for this hard labor.
As a result, the Irish managed to survive… at first…
In 1846, blight returned even more strongly than in 1945… It was at this point that the Famine hardened. There was no longer enough food to feed everyone… The Irish are on their knees. Some try to turn to fishing, others gather seaweed, while others beg… But the harshness of winter brings the final blow to the population.
Hunger makes the Irish extremely weak and causes countless diseases such as typhus, cholera and typhoid fever… Hundreds of the dead are buried in mass graves… Children see their parents die, and vice versa…
A scene from the Great Irish Famine – Public Domain
The representatives of British power in Dublin then alerted London… We need to act, and fast… But for England, it’s all an exaggeration… And the government has spent enough on the Irish cause… The empire preferred to leave things as they were, true to its liberal doctrine of the time.
Worse still, it is rumored that some of Britain’s top leaders see the Great Famine as an opportunity to transform Ireland by attacking the poorest… For some, Ireland needs to evolve, and model its operation on that of Scotland or Wales.
The decision was then taken to stop distributing grain in exchange for work… The Irish are sinking ever deeper into poverty… and are looking for any form of action that will enable them to earn enough to eat…
Meanwhile, England continues to export food from Ireland to London, favoring the British over the Irish…
Growling discontent.
The Irish then tried to protest and rise up… But the strong British military presence on Irish soil plunged the population into a form of resignation… The latter, unable to pay their rents, are gradually being evicted by British landowners…
To survive, they steal, rape and try to survive by any means necessary… Some women prostitute themselves, some eat dead animals (dogs, cats….)… Some cases of cannibalism have even been reported…
England decided to organize soup kitchens, distributing soup to the Irish and asking them to choose between starvation and conversion to Protestantism.
As a reminder, most Irish people were Catholics at the time. And England never ceases to impose Protestantism wherever possible.
Soup kitchens were organized under the aegis of Protestant clerics, determined to encourage the most disadvantaged to join the Protestant faith. The slogan “Take the Soup” became famous throughout Ireland… while at the same time causing a scandal.
Thousands of Irish chose to take the soup and convert. They are nicknamed “jumpers“.
In reality, “suspicionism” is a rare phenomenon that was far from widespread in the country, but it left a lasting mark on the popular memory of the famine. It has also tainted the memory of the relief work of many Protestants who helped without proselytizing.
Le Ballinglass Incident – Domaine Public
The situation in Ireland is no longer tenable and is spreading beyond its borders. The Catholic Church decided to mobilize: Italy sent money, as did the United States and France…
International opinion is outraged by the UK’s inaction… But the London government won’t budge an inch. She organizes a few soup kitchens where she distributes cheap cereals: oats, corn… But that’s not enough.
In 1847, mildew did not return. Great Britain considers the Great Irish Famine over… Wrongly.
The year 47 was to be the worst for Ireland: the winter was terrible, and misery and hunger were still with us. Food is in short supply, while London closes down soup kitchens, leaving over 4 million Irish people still suffering from hunger. Worse still, London continued to send what little food was available from Ireland to England…
At the same time, a law was enacted: no more aid was to be given to Ireland… unless it was financed by Irish local taxation… Coup de grâce: the law states that no aid can be given to Irish people owning more than a quarter of an acre of land. It’s a fatal blow for the local population, who are forced to give up their land, their homes and the little they had left…
In fact, over the course of seven years, more than half a million Irish people were evicted from their homes. Evictions are carried out with cruelty and violence. The British throw the Irish out… making a mockery of law and justice. (cf Le Ballinglass Incident). Worse still, the British are deliberately destroying the roofs of the evictees’ homes: a way of rendering the property uninhabitable and forcing the population to leave.
The Irish are reduced to camping in ditches, on beaches… wherever they can. The Irish climate put an end to their resistance: the cold and rain condemned them to death. These expulsions just mean making them die a little further away… a little faster…
The Irish try to get into workhouses – Public domain
To survive, all means are good. The Irish have little choice but to turn to workhouses. These were institutions offering room and board, on condition that they committed themselves to forced labor and confinement.
At the time of the Great Irish Famine, there were 130 of them… spread all over Ireland. Built in 1842, they had a maximum capacity of 100,000 people…
But at that time, between 1847 and 1848, over a million Irish people were trying to find their place in these houses… Few of them manage to integrate them… creating dramatic queues at the entrance to these establishments…
Inside these workhouses, conditions are particularly difficult and are based on a single doctrine: work for a living. Families are separated: men, women and children live in separate quarters. They have to do work worthy of convicts. It’s a kind of penal colony where you enter of your own free will… but from which you can never leave.
Despite the distribution of food and the regular visits of welfare doctors, not all the residents could be saved. The mortality rate in these homes remains high, and many children die in them. The dead are buried in mass graves in the workhouses themselves.
It is estimated that over 200,000 people died in these workhouses during the famine.
The Great Irish Famine – Public Domain
Faced with so much misery, the Irish saw America as an ideal solution to escape the famine.
Ready to try anything, they piled into boats bound for more promising territories.
Although some died from storms and illnesses resulting from long sea voyages, thousands of Irish made their way to the American coast, forming a veritable Irish diaspora that still exists today.
For them, the United States offered a real dream of starting over: this famous “American Dream” opened up new prospects, both in economic terms and in terms of the fight for Ireland… For they saw in the United States the possibility of total freedom from British domination. And they’re ready to fight for their island from afar.
In the space of 10 years, it is estimated that :
Despite their misery, they found what they had come for: work and food. Difficult and dangerous jobs for the men, while the women find themselves working as seamstresses, cooks or domestic servants. This should enable them to survive in better conditions than those who stayed in Ireland.
For these expatriates, the time has come to show solidarity. Although thousands of miles from Ireland, they are still firmly committed to supporting those left behind.
To this end, the emigrants sent funds to the independence fighters back home, and founded the Fenian movement, an active organization whose aim was to carry out violent operations against the British government, in order to obtain total independence for Ireland.
Their aim: to use the Irish famine as a powerful argument to put an end to British exactions, rescue the Irish on the spot… and obtain the creation of a fully-fledged Irish state, free from the British yoke. For them, the Famine had to stop, and the Irish people had to refuse oppression. It’s time for the island to choose its destiny…
However, the Great Famine began to recede in 1848. Downy mildew is retreating, and some regions are seeing a marked improvement in the situation. Nevertheless, although the Great Irish Famine is estimated to have lasted 3 years, it would have lasted much longer… Some regions took longer to recover from the tragedy, and it is estimated that the Famine was prolonged in certain parts of Ireland before disappearing only around 1851…
The Great Famine lasted 4 years, but its consequences spread over more than a decade. Human losses were estimated at between 500,000 and 1 million.
Refugees were estimated at 2 million, and emigrants at 2 million. This tragic outcome left an indelible mark on Ireland: it was the consequence of a natural disaster, combined with centuries of British political exactions on Irish soil.
Even today, this tragic episode in Irish history has left an indelible mark on the minds of the Irish people.
Forced emigration has enabled the Irish to develop a diaspora throughout the world. Famous names such as John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Joe Biden are successful direct descendants of Irish immigrants. So the Great Irish Famine not only affected Ireland, but the whole globe!
