I gave a speech in Drogheda, Ireland, yesterday on the impact of the famine in America. I was one of several speakers, including Prime Minister Enda Kenny, who is speaking today on the occasion of the national commemoration of the greatest European catastrophe of the 19th Century.
Here is an excerpt of some of my remarks:
“Missing Friends was the series every week in John Boyle O’Reilly’s Boston Pilot newspaper which allowed Famine era immigrants to America to seek out families and freidns who had gone before them.
It was the Facebook of its time. Famine emigrants rarely wanted to discuss the horrific nature of the voyage or the awful conditions they had to endure.
On Missing Friends, however, we hear their voices resonate.
It is not surprising they never wanted to talk about it and who could blame them they were ripped from their families, catapulted across the bitter bowl of tears arrived penniless, many speaking no English.
Here are some of their voices from the past.
“Of JOHN QUILMAN, late of the parish of Inch, co’y Tipperary, who sailed from Waterford with his family last April. His daughter, Mary Harrington, wishes him to know that her husband, James Harrington, died on their passage to this country; also her two children since. She is now in Troy and wishes to know where her father is. Any information respecting him will be thankfully received by Mary Harrington, care of S. Duffy, or Mrs. Daly, Fifth street, Troy, N. Y.
27 November 1847
Of ANTHONY and PATRICK WATERS, natives of co. Mayo. They are informed that their sister, Mary, who was married to Patrick Boyle, is anxious to hear from them. Her husband died on the passage. Should this meet their eye they will write to her immediately, care of the editor of the Pilot,Boston, Ms.
4 December 1847
Of BERNARD MURPHY, who emigrated from Co. Armagh, parish of Grangemore, townland of Aughmagorgan, in April last, with his father and 2 sisters. He was parted from his father at Quarantine Island, below Montreal. It is supposed he went to Kingston. Any information respecting him will be thankfully received by his father who is now living in Dover. If by letter, address Patrick Grimes, Dover, N. H., or John Doran, No. 6 Canal street, Boston, Ms.
11 December 1847
Of CATHERINE GILLEN, who landed in Boston last spring, with her father and family. She was sick and went to hospital and has not been heard from since. Any one knowing anything of her would confer a favor on her father, Hugh Gillen, by writing a letter to him in care of John Devlin, Pawtucket, R.I.
18 December 1847
Of BRIDGET CARROLL, a native of Killacooly, parish of Drumcliff, co. Sligo, who was taken into Grosse Isle hospital, below Quebec, in June last, and has not been heard from since. Any information respecting her will be thankfully received by her brother, Patrick Carroll, care of Mr. Samuel Downer, Second street, South Boston, Ms.
1 January 1848
Of PETER and ELLEN CARR, natives of county Down, parish of Gervathey, who left home in April and landed in St. John, 4th July. They came in the ship Ambassadress. Ellen had the fever and was taken to Patridge Island, and Peter remained with her. Any information of them will be thankfully received by their brother, JohnCarr, Lawrence City, Ms.
Of DENNIS MCCARTHY, late of Killmichael, co’y Cork, who sailed from Liverpool on the 1st of last May, and left his wife, Ellen Ahearn, in Quarantine near Quebec, in June. She is now in Troy, N. Y., and wishes to know his whereabouts. Any information respecting him will be thankfully received by addressing a line to Ellen McCarthy, care of Stephen Duffy, Troy, N. Y.
'Son missing' John Fallon ‘had light hair, blue eyes; was about four feet, four inches in height; wore a blue spencer, a new scoop shovel cap, a fancy pants and had a freckled face.'
The voices of these emigrants resonate still.
As we can see many of the emigrants themselves were in despair, their dreams of a new life shattered by the reality of what awaited them. Only the Blacks in chains fare worse than the Irish.
As one famine emigrant put it plainly 'We thought we could not be worse off than we were; but now to our sorrow we know the difference. At home we had the chance of a doctors care and the certainty of the spiritual administration of a priest. Should death overtake us there we would be buried beside our beloved dead, in consecrated Irish ground, with the prayers and last blessing of our church. Here we have nothing.'
In April, 1847, Stephen E. De Vere, a compassionate landlord, travelled as an emigrant to Canada in a converted lumber and cargo boat. His description of conditions is appalling.
'Before the emigrant has been a week at sea he is an altered man. How could it be otherwise? Hundreds of poor people men, women, and children of all ages from the drivelling idiot of ninety to the babe just born, huddled together without light, without air, wallowing in filth and breathing a fetid atmosphere, sick in body, dispirited in heart, the fever patients lying between the sound, in sleeping places so narrow as almost to deny them the power of indulging, by a change of position, the natural restlessness of the disease. The food supply was of the poorest quality. Drinking water was mixed with vinegar to kill the stench.'
Yet they changed America, among the famine emigrants Patrick Kennedy, great grandfather of an American presdient, later Micheal Regan ditto, and indeed, Fulmouth Kearney ... William Ford, 1846 father of Henry Ford, the man who changed America, to name but a few.
In the American Civil War, 250,000 fought for the Union. They helped create the American political system, built the Catholic Church, changed the face of Ireland and America. Their legacy is with us all today.
The poet Evan Boland said it best:
“Like oil lamps, we put them out the back —
of our houses, of our minds. We had lights
better than, newer than and then
a time came, this time and now
we need them. Their dread, makeshift example:
they would have thrived on our necessities.
What they survived we could not even live.
By their lights now it is time to
imagine how they stood there, what they stood with,
that their possessions may become our power:
Cardboard. Iron. Their hardships parceled in them.
Patience. Fortitude. Long-suffering
in the bruise-colored dusk of the New World.
And all the old songs. And nothing to lose.”
43 Comments
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Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.eiriamach | May 17, 2012, 08:40 AM EDT
"History tells of a 'hidden Ireland', of a native character behind the Anglicised facade. I was beginning to understand that there was a hidden Irish-America too. There was not only Cardinal Spellman but Bobby Kennedy; not only Charles Coughlin, but the Berrigan brothers; not only George Meany, but Elizabeth Gurley Flynn. The figures in American life who most repelled and most attracted me, who warred for my soul, seemed all to be Irish"-- Tom Hayden, "The Famine of feeling." Hayden begins his essay, "Unlike the horrific experiences of other people, there has been an ocean of silence over the trauma these millions of Irish suffered." WHO is living in denial, Bythebay, and who needs to make sense of a complex, repressed past? Hayden warns, "A Famine repressed, however, breeds an incipient hunger of its own, a hunger to know, to grieve, to hold accountable, to resolve, and to honour. This hunger for memory is stirring." The Irish-descended Americans who repelled and attracted Hayden in his youth are still with us today, posting on Irish Central-- American bigots and American progressives. Who among us have not resolved the past?
Bythebay | May 16, 2012, 03:44 PM EDT
kinvara7, thank you, that's 21st Century Ireland!!
Bythebay | May 16, 2012, 01:34 PM EDT
eiriamach, I can't guess where you've been sequestered but let me inform you the history of 19th century Ireland has always been uncovered and available for all the public to see as is our history back before that for hundreds of years and into contemporary Ireland. All primary original sources too mate. The Workhouses in Ireland weren't all run by Protestants at all, Catholics ran them as well. There was absolutely no requirement for the inmates as you call them to convert to Protestantism. All of those records are available to the public and have been. Irish generosity for the hungry and oppressed peoples wasn't sparked by the Famine, Irish people have always helped the oppressed peoples of Africa, Asia and the Middle East and elsewhere including South America long before and long after the Famine. Ireland has always been neutral and doesn't participate in war either. Our Defense Forces are peacekeepers, an example many other countries of the world should emulate!
Bythebay | May 16, 2012, 01:07 PM EDT
Ciara, yes many of those in the US use it to promote hatred which is totally unproductive. ireland and the United Kingdom get on very well which is the reality today and both look forward to continuing cordiality. .
BrianO | May 16, 2012, 10:22 AM EDT
Ciara "they", take a breath, I'm sure it's a beautiful day in your part of the world, I for one am thankful not to have had to experience the hardships of the past.
ciaradexy | May 15, 2012, 02:30 PM EDT
Kinvara, thats of no interest to Americans! They want to know about irish and English fighting and people eating others. Educated lot!
kinvara7 | May 15, 2012, 12:20 PM EDT
There were a couple of news stories recently which I think Irish Central missed. Both stories involve Ireland and America so I think they would have been worthy of coverage. A leading US government agency has adopted a set of web tools and standards developed in Ireland by NUI Galway’s Digital Enterprise Research Institute (Deri). The US portal Data.gov, which has been billed as an Obama administration priority in facilitating public access to federal government datasets, is using Deri technologies to link web-based information. Furthermore, there was the story of the James Webb Space Telescope, the replacement for the Hubble Space Telescope, is due to be launched in 2018. Ireland is a major contributor to this project through the development of the Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI). Prof Tom Ray of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies is a co-principal investigator for this instrument. He and his team at the institute’s astronomy and astrophysics section built infrared beam splitters and filters that will help the instrument see distant galaxies and watch planets form. The instrument is the first of four main instruments to be handed over to Nasa for shipment to the US and integration into the space telescope at the Goddard Space Centre in Maryland.
kinvara7 | May 15, 2012, 11:48 AM EDT
@MaryM232: Thank you for contributing to the 'ignorance on display on irishcentral.com'.
eiriamach | May 15, 2012, 08:46 AM EDT
"At home we had the chance of a doctor's care and the certainty of the spiritual administration of a priest." At home, those afflicted by the fever or irreversible starvation had a fair chance of dying on the road or in a work house run by Protestant officials who often required that Catholic inmates convert. Having an RC priest for last rites was no certainty, according to accounts I've read. BytheBay, I do admire the willingness of the Irish government and most of the people to contribute to global famine relief and to rescue refugees from poverty and oppression. But I don't see why we should not also continue to uncover the history of mid-19th century Ireland and its immigrants. Doesn't that history account to a great extent for Irish generosity in famine relief?
MaryM232 | May 15, 2012, 08:40 AM EDT
This proud US citizen, who stopped being proud of her Irish ancestry after she had her eyes opened after the disgusting comments of OIrish pig at the trough Bertie Ahern, and the ignorance on display on irishcentral.com, has one thing to say on this entire nonsese, stop trying to milk the famine, you pigs. Now, not all the Irish in Ireland prior to and during the famine, were good people, but from what my grandmother told me, there were far more good and decent Irish people in Ireland then, than there have been since. She believed the good and decent, the heart and soul of Ireland was lost during the famine years, and the dregs were all that were left. You disgusting pigs saw Ireland become wealthy, and yet you squandered it, like pigs in swill you rolled around in your greed and corruption, stinking up the place. Since then, your attitude is that you're entitled to bleed the US taxpayers dry. The new Irish are a disease, and they need to be forced to stay in their cesspit Ireland and clean their own mess up. No one is going to bail them out. So stop waving the famine begging bowl around, no one cares any longer. You're a fat, greedy, stupid, self pitying lot, and we're fed up with you.
antoman | May 15, 2012, 04:33 AM EDT
@Brenn69- Very well said. Thank you.
bunkerhill | May 14, 2012, 06:04 PM EDT
Well apparently I am not allowed to post on this website, but that's okay. I'm American and not used to censorship.
sirpeter | May 14, 2012, 05:41 PM EDT
Five idiotic comments in a row.Full moon time again.
Bythebay | May 14, 2012, 03:50 PM EDT
When you see they had to bring them in from New York/Long Island you know there was a lack of interest in it. Mary Robinson hasn't lived in Ireland in years. While she fought to save Georgian Dublin people were starving in the tenements. Add a couple of Provos to it and you get quite a spectacle. Irish taxpayers shouldn't be paying for their self-promotion. That is truly an outrage.
dibble2008 | May 14, 2012, 02:53 PM EDT
Kenny is causing the same poverty with his European pro wealthy pro money policies. We the poor are struggling like never before. Its a insult getting kenny to speak about the famine. I find it totally offensive as an Irish man struggling to make a living. he is an obstacle to justice fairness in ireland and we will get rid of him for good at the next election because he lied to get into power and broke every single promise he made. Hypocrite is all he is and he does not speak for the irish. 99 per cent of the People want him and his failed party out.
Bythebay | May 14, 2012, 02:20 PM EDT
The reps from 30 countries were Ambassadors from other countries in Ireland who were invited to the Commemoration. About 1000 people were there, primarily politicians and their supporters taking the opportunity to promote themselves.
Bythebay | May 14, 2012, 02:17 PM EDT
On Saturday the US conducted collections for your food pantries through your Postal Service. You can honor your Famine emigrants by dovetailing with that and helping to alleviate hunger in the US and countries of the world.
yvonne33 | May 14, 2012, 07:32 AM EDT
It really is ironic that Enda Kenny went to a commemoration about the famine. There is a slow famine occurring in many families in Ireland. Ask the woman who was forced to burn shoes to keep her children warm-or the reported 25% of Irish children who are going to bed hungry. It is all very well commemorating an atrocity that occurred 162 years ago, the real tragedy is today, when our young people are forced to leave to look for work. The elite of this country never go hungry, their children always find jobs-it's who you know not what you know in this corrupt little statelet. I used to blame the British, but it's our own Irish leaders who sold everything out to Europe, I don't know when the Irish people are going to rise up against these corrupt self serving puppets of Europe, but let's hope it is sooner rather than later.
IrelandNorth | May 14, 2012, 06:36 AM EDT
Ireland was England's granary under British rule. The enlightened self interested English landlord of Strokestown Estate in County Roscommon (now 'Famine'(?) (sic) Museum) in Connacht/western Ireland, sponsored his peasant famer tenants to emigrate - because it made more economic sense! The profit to be made from sheep-grazing over share-cropping was greater, with a bigger market for mutton than spuds. Laissez-faire economics prevailed. Sheep ate less, bred less, and were distinctly less revolutionary. The blighted potatoe as the staple-diet of the Irish poor, may well have been deliberately orchestrated as a population cull of the Irish, or at least deliberately unresponded to. Not unlike white some Europeans (many Irish?) who slaughtered buffalo and bison stock to exterminate native Americans, and make way for the railroad. The trouble with the English ruling class specificaly is/was that they gained the whole world (British Empire)and lost their own souls. Understanding English class rule in Ireland goes a long way to explaining the inevitable political violence that was a regrettable consequence of it. Alas, the political economy that inspired the great hunger endures with like consequence globally.
GeorgeDillon | May 14, 2012, 02:37 AM EDT
Ciarabythebay: "if you look at the US and Canadian census records from the time you'll see the emigrants spoke English.". More nonsense. It is impossible to tell from the records what was the first language of any individual. Or are you telling us that in a country where half the population spoke Irish that only the English-speakers emigrated? What an idiot.
Brenn69 | May 14, 2012, 12:07 AM EDT
Actually, there never was a famine in Ireland, only a potato blight that happened at the same time the Irish were evicted and homeless and suffering consequently from disease & starvation. There was plenty of barley and oats and other grains, vegetable, meat, fish and other foods in abundance, all shipped out of Ireland under armed guard whilst the Irish starved or emigrated out of desperation. It's an insult to the Irish, both dead and alive, to call the time of The Hunger (An Gorta Mór) a "Famine." It's wrong to call it a famine, just plain wrong, and disrespectful, and stupid and shameful.
ciaradexy | May 13, 2012, 06:44 PM EDT
Handsome68, lovely sentiment.
Bythebay | May 13, 2012, 06:12 PM EDT
Ireland remembers the Famine constructively by committing one fifth of our overseas budget to hunger relief. The US has 8.5 million people go hungry every day, do something about your own victims of hunger.
Bythebay | May 13, 2012, 05:59 PM EDT
KevinKehoe, the British Prime Minister Tony Blair issued an apology for the Famine in 1997. It's well over, move on mate to more constructive activities.
Bythebay | May 13, 2012, 05:54 PM EDT
KevinKehoe, there were many deaths during the potato blight of the 1840's in Great Britain and all across Europe.
Bythebay | May 13, 2012, 05:40 PM EDT
handsome68, if you look at the US and Canadian census records from the time you'll see the emigrants spoke English.
handsome68 | May 13, 2012, 05:16 PM EDT
Had a little computer trouble (earlier). I had meant to write: "I have had two visits to Grosse Ile... (etc.)." Sorry about that.
handsome68 | May 13, 2012, 05:12 PM EDT
wo visits to Grosse Ile, a day trip from city of Quebec. The new arrivals, both sick and well, the graves of the famine victims, -- Catholics, Jews, and/or Protestants, -- were well taken care of by the probably mostly French speaking natives. I like to think of the Irish speakers being comforted in every way by the French-speakers. God bless, and God rest them all.
ciaradexy | May 13, 2012, 04:54 PM EDT
Kevin, if you actually listened to Endas speech today from Drogheda then youd have heard him say that there was plenty of food being exported and plenty of sated full bellies in the country while the poor peasant classes died or migrated.
KevinKehoe | May 13, 2012, 04:41 PM EDT
Definition of famine [noun] “Extreme scarcity of food” Fact there was no scarcity of food in Ireland at the time, it was harvested and shipped out by the Irish elite and there British counterparts under armed guard and the native Irish were deliberately starved to death. The same potato blight spread throughout Europe and Britain and no one died. The forced dependency on the potato could have easily been reversed but the mass murders of the day would have none of it. Good oul Enda and the Irish media keep one of biggest Lies in history going and its an insult to the memory of those who suffered. Shame on all you so called Irish who keep this Lie alive and well. Undo the Lie and then we can move on.
MaryM232 | May 13, 2012, 04:36 PM EDT
The Irish famine is long over, yet still the Oirish never stop acting as though they're entitled to lie, cheat and steal. You have corrupt morons who elected corrupt Irish political leaders in Ireland, and then complain about how they're looting Irish taxpayers, but who have no problem with illegal Irish aliens looting US taxpayers. I say the lot of you should go back to your Irish cesspit and stay there. We're fed up with the filth.
slainte9 | May 13, 2012, 02:13 PM EDT
"As we can see many of the emigrants themselves were in despair, their dreams of a new life shattered by the reality of what awaited them. Only the Blacks in chains fare worse than the Irish." The most proposterous thing ever written. You might say this about those who stayed behind and starved. America wasn't a walk in the park, but my ancestors fared vary well in America. And I have lots of letters from the era to back that up.
ciaradexy | May 13, 2012, 01:47 PM EDT
Well said Bythebay. It was great to see reps from 30 countries at the memorial in Drogheda but the yanks need to realise that this is still happening all over the world. Maybe if they helped those who are suffering now the world might be a better place.
Mickwall | May 13, 2012, 01:45 PM EDT
Thank you Niall for keeping the issues of the Great Hunger in your readers minds. Please continue to do so. Particularly to promote a clean up of the forgotten Famine graveyards. Next year is The Gathering and just like our own families might clean up the graves of their own relations for their visit home who will do it for the Hunger victims descendants? We need a Big Clean Up for the return of thousands of the Victims descendants.
Bythebay | May 13, 2012, 01:22 PM EDT
Chest pounding in the US about the Irish Famine, which has continued for many years accomplishes nothing. Do as Ireland does and focus on other countries of the world which are now experiencing Famine and help them. It will make you feel much better!
eiriamach | May 13, 2012, 12:56 PM EDT
BytheBay, the descendants of the Famine survivors have carried along the silence of the immigrants for generations. Only recently have we begun to find out about their stories. Sure, there's much we'll never know, but I, for one, need to know more than I know now, so it's not yet time for me to move on. As Terry Eagleton wrote, "The cataclysm stunned many of its victims into traumatized muteness" (Heathcliff and the Great Hunger: Studies in Irish Culture, 13).
Murph46 | May 13, 2012, 12:31 PM EDT
My kind o'gal maryosullivan,give bythe buttinski hell any time ya can-I'm with ya,and Georgie,the Union won ,you know of the predisposition for winners!
GeorgeDillon | May 13, 2012, 12:27 PM EDT
"In the American Civil War, 250,000 fought for the Union" What about those brave Irish who fought for the CSA? Don't they count?
maryosullivan | May 13, 2012, 11:46 AM EDT
Bythebay; Try using your weasel words on the Jewish population
Bythebay | May 13, 2012, 11:43 AM EDT
Americans spend an inordinate amount of time focusing on the Famine. Time to move on folks.
LoyalCitizen | May 13, 2012, 11:00 AM EDT
Leaving Irish People to starve while looking after the elite is still alive and well in modern Ireland...........For the last fifteen years successive so called Irish Governments have been financing pretentious American Corporations while stealing from Social Welfare Recipients by using opinions illegally.............Those employed in law do nothing about the crimes..............Old habits die hard.
Murph46 | May 13, 2012, 10:20 AM EDT
Their misfortune helped in many ways to shape a new country,I as an AmerIrish am proud of those who survived and prospered ,and RIP to those who didn't.
SeamusMor | May 13, 2012, 10:12 AM EDT
"At home we had the chance of a doctors care and the certainty of the spiritual administration of a priest. Should death overtake us there we would be buried beside our beloved dead, in consecrated Irish ground, with the prayers and last blessing of our church. Here we have nothing."