Lady Wilde
Irish emigration had long been a factor in the development of the new world, but this trickle out of Ireland became an exodus when famine struck in 1846 and 1847. During the years of The Great Famine, the population of Ireland was halved, as a river of starving Irish flowed across the seas into the New World.
One of the best books on the development of the famine was written by Colm McAteer, and it shows how, as Ireland became more developed, the arrival of potato farming allowed the rural population to continue to climb until it became completely dependant on the crop. When the potato blight struck, the population was in a state of heightened vulnerability.
The famine was the result of a massive country-wide attack by "Late Blight", a fungal disease well known to potato farmers, even now. The suddenness and ferocity of the attack are best described in the following excerpt from the diary of Miss Frances Cobbe, of Dublin:
"I happen to be able to recall precisely the day, almost to the hour, when the blight fell on the potatoes and caused the great calamity. A party of us were driving to a seven o'clock dinner at the house of our neighbour, Mrs. Evans, of Portrane. As we passed a remarkably fine field of potatoes in blossom, the scent came through the open windows of the carriage and we remarked to each other how splendid was the crop. Three or four hours later, as we returned home in the dark, a dreadful smell came from the same field, and we exclaimed, 'Something has happened to those potatoes; they do not smell as they did when we passed them on our way out'.
Next morning there was a wail from one end of Ireland to the other."
The results were catastrophic. In a few years, four million Irish perished of disease and starvation, or climbed aboard "coffin ships" headed for the New World. Many of these were lumber ships, and were glad of a paying cargo to take back, instead of sailing back empty. Others were old slaving ships, hurriedly pressed back into service, to capitalize on the opportunity for fast profits. Few ships of either class were well suited to the task of carrying people, and they often lost many of their passengers to disease and starvation.
The effect of the Irish exodus on the New World is the stuff of history. But when it was over, Ireland was left half empty. Deserted cottages stood undisturbed, their doors ajar, empty vessels on the shelves within, and the sound of the harp vanished from the fields for all time.
Skeletoned in darkness, my dark fathers lay
Unknown and could not understand,
The giant grief that trampled night and day,
The awful absence moping through our land.
Upon the headland, the encroaching sea
Left sand that hardened after tides of Spring.
No dancing feet disturbed its symmetry,
And those who loved good music ceased to sing.
Brendan Kennelley
(Some of these abandoned cottages still exist, but many were demolished, and the stone reused in walls and new buildings. As we walked past a stone wall in the hills, Colm McAteer pointed out some stones which had been squared at the ends and sides. Walls are made from field stone, so a squared stone would have come from a building, and sure enough, there was a ruin close by. If you are looking for the house of your ancestors, keep an eye on the stone walls in the vicinity.)
The Great Famine did more than destroy; it forever changed
the "collective consciousness" of the Irish people. Ireland
today leads the world in contributing to famine relief, at least
on a per capita basis. The Irish are not only generous with
their money and food, but with their own hand. Irish organizers
have earned a reputation for their work in foreign lands.
Desmond Egan
Former Prime Minister Mary Robinson said of the effect of the Great Famine on her people:
"more than any other, shaped us as a people. It defined our will to survive. It defined our sense of human vulnerability. It remains one of the strongest, most poignant links of memory and feeling that connects us to our diaspora. It involves us still in an act of remembrance which increasingly, is neither tribal nor narrow."
Sadly, it is now known that throughout the entire famine period, Ireland continued to export food to England.
Lady Wilde
of Clan Mhac an t'Saoir |
COLOUR: on to Dunree Head.