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The Great Famine in IrelandThe Great Famine in Ireland

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Before the Famine

• During the 1100s, Ireland was a united country

• Subsequently it was conquered by England in the 1200s

• The Irish Catholics who stayed behind were given the less fertile land

• English landlords brought in Protestant Scottish and English settlers into the northern parts of Ireland and pushed out the local Catholic farmers

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1212THTH CENTURY CENTURY

• Before 12Before 12thth century century– N.I. & Republic of Ireland = N.I. & Republic of Ireland =

IRELANDIRELAND

• In the 12In the 12thth century century– Ireland conquered and colonised Ireland conquered and colonised

by Englandby England

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Why are these people fighting?

• In the 1500s, Ireland was conquered by King Henry VIII and England.

• He split England away from the Catholic Church.

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Why are these people fighting?

• King Henry took land in Northern Ireland from Catholic nobles and gave it to his English and Scot friends.

• People are still mad about this.

England

Northern Ireland

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8

The English in Ireland•The English have been present in Ireland since the time of the Norman Invasion.

•The Reformation brought change that would effect both England and Ireland.

•Henry VIII of England broke all ties with the Roman Catholic Church in the 1530’s and declared himself the head of the Church of England.

• The Irish people living under English rule, remained Catholic and continued to recognized the Pope as their spiritual leader.

•This caused a division between English Protestants and Irish Catholics.

•The Irish allied themselves with Catholic Spain and fought for their independence.

•The Irish and their Spanish allies were defeated by the English at the Battle of Kinsale in 1601.

•The English government seized lands and Irishmen were forced to work for their new English landlords and made to rent plots of land they once owned.

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Under James I: Ulster Plantations• Before plantation Ulster was the most Irish and most Catholic province of Ireland.

During the Nine Years’ War (1594-1603), a revolt led by Hugh O’Neill, Earl of Tyrone became a nationwide threat to English rule.

• After O’Neill’s defeat, the English Crown promoted the rights of Irish freeholders to undermine the power of the great lords.

• In 1607 O’Neill was called to London but instead, fearing imprisonment, he fled to continental Europe with most of the aristocracy of Ulster.

• After the “Flight of the Earls”, the Crown abandoned the freeholders and went for a full-scale plantation by British Protestants.

• 1609, six years after the accession of James VI. of Scotland to the throne of England as James I a scheme was matured for planting Ulster with Scotch and English, and the following year the settlement began.

• The actual settlers were mostly Scotch, and the Ulster plantation took the character of a Scotch occupation of the North of Ireland

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Ulster Plantation

EstablishedUnder

King James I

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% Of Land Owned by Catholics in Ireland

[in green]

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Cromwell and Ireland• In August 1649, Cromwell and 12 000 soldiers arrived

at Ireland• For the next ten years, a third of the Irish population

was either killed by the soldiers or died of starvation• Catholic boys and girls were shipped to Barbados and

sold as slaves• Catholic land was given to Protestants, which led to

much strife, even to this very day, for the Protestants and Catholics in Ireland still break out into murderous riots, and cannot even walk around in the other’s neighborhoods

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Cromwell and Ireland• In 1649 Cromwell came to Ireland, striking first at

Drogheda. • Drogheda is seen in Irish nationalist legend as

anti-Irish racism, but the garrison there was commanded by an English Catholic and largely under English officers, Royalists.

• Inflamed by an initial setback, Cromwell showed little mercy to the soldiers and priests, killing 2000 of them and having more shipped to Barbados.

• Cromwell may have believed he was taking revenge for 1641, although Drogheda had not been involved – it was within the English Pale.

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Cromwell’s View on Catholics in Ireland

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Ireland 1649• Government policy was to crush all Catholics. • Cromwell marched south. • Some surrendering garrisons were treated well, but

Wexford suffered 2000 casualties including 200 women and children in the marketplace.

• Cromwell dispossessed landowning Irish Catholics and shared their land amongst his soldiers and financiers.

• The transportation of those landowners to a barren province was known as ‘the curse of Cromwell’.

• Those left behind, tenants and labourers, still felt humiliated.

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Cromwell Bombards Ireland

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Ireland August 1649• Such religious zeal was involved that the

Catholic church was swept aside. • All Catholic estates were confiscated and their owners

relocated, if they could prove they had not rebelled.• Protestant clergymen and schoolmasters were sent over, and

there were strenuous efforts to get the Irish into Protestant churches, although language was a barrier.

• However, many Protestant churchmen already in Ireland were reluctant to work within Cromwell’s framework. Cromwell’s regime did not last long, and more moderate people (including his son Henry) came to the fore.

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'In the heat of action, I forbade them to spare any that were in arms in thetown, and, I think, that night they put to the sword about 2,000 men. Divers of theofficers and soldiers being fled over the Bridge into the other part of the Town,where about one hundred of them possessed St Peter's steeple [and two otherTowers]... I ordered the steeple of St Peter's to be fired where one of them washeard to say in the midst of the flames: 'God damn me, God confound me: I burn.I burn’ .... The next day, the other two Towers were summonsed…. When theysubmitted, their officers were knocked on the head, and every tenth man of thesoldiers killed, and the others shipped [as slaves] to the Barbadoes... The lastLord's Day before the storm, the Protestants were thrust out of the great churchcalled St Peter's and they had a public Mass there; and in this very place nearone thousand Catholics were put to the sword, fleeing thither for safety. I believeall the friars were knocked promiscuously on the head but two; the one of whichwas Fr Peter Taaff... whom the soldiers took and made an end of; the other wastaken in the round tower, under the repute of lieutenant, and when he understoodthat the officers in the Tower had no quarter, he confessed he was a friar; butthat did not save him.’

Cromwell Primary Source on Ireland

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• Catholic Political Cartoon on Oliver Cromwell

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Irish Protestant Perspective of Oliver Cromwell Mural in Belfast

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King James II and Ireland

• Northern Ireland became predominantly Protestant

• King James II (Catholic) came to the throne and tried to defeat the Protestants

• He failed and was defeated by King William of Orange in the Battle of Boyne in 1690

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1690 (171690 (17thth CENTURY) CENTURY)

• King James II of England, a Catholic• Forced to flee to north of Ireland. Why?• Because he failed to force Catholicism on the

Protestants in England• There, he tried to defeat the locals• New King of England, William of Orange

PROTESTANTPROTESTANT arrived in north of Ireland and defeated King James

• Battle of Boyne• King William remains a hero to Protestants to

this day

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William and Mary and Ireland

• Penal Laws were implemented against the Catholics by the Protestants to ensure that they had complete control of Ireland– No Catholic can buy land– No Catholic shall be allowed to vote– No Catholic can join the army– No Catholic may receive higher education

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Penal LawsAfter the Treaty of Limerick (1691), the Irish Parliament, filled with Protestant landowners and

controlled from England, enacted a penal code that secured and enlarged the landlords' holdings and degraded and impoverished the Irish Catholics.

*As a result of these harsh laws:

• Catholics could neither teach their children nor send them abroad;

• persons of property could not enter into mixed marriages;

• Catholic property was inherited equally among the sons unless one was a Protestant, in which case he received all;

• a Catholic could not inherit property if there was any Protestant heir;

• a Catholic could not possess arms or a horse worth more than £5 ;

• Catholics could not hold leases for more than 31 years,

• and they could not make a profit greater than a third of their rent.

• The hierarchy of the Catholic Church was banished or suppressed,

• and Catholics could not hold seats in the Irish Parliament (1692), hold public office, vote (1727), or practice law.

• Cases against Catholics were tried without juries, and bounties were given to informers against them.

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Penal LawsPenal Laws

The Irish countryside, with its green pastures and wonderful farmland, had been turned into English plantations. Land-owning Irishmen who worked for themselves became English tenants overnight.

Worse, “Penal Laws" governing the conduct of Irish Catholics were enacted. Over the years, those restrictive laws diminished the ability of the Irish people to flexibly manage their own affairs. Laws like these set in motion a disaster-in-the-making.

The Irish Catholic was forbidden the exercise of his religion.He was forbidden to receive an education.He was forbidden to enter a profession.He was forbidden to hold public office.He was forbidden to engage in trade or commerce.He was forbidden to live in a corporate town or within five miles thereof.He was forbidden to own a horse of greater value than five pounds.He was forbidden to purchase land.He was forbidden to vote.He was forbidden to keep any arms for his protection.He was forbidden to hold a life annuity.He could not be a guardian to a child.He could not attend Catholic worship.He could not himself educate his child.

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Penal Laws

*Under these restrictions many able Irishmen left the country, and regard for the law declined; even Protestants assisted their Catholic friends in evasion.

*In the latter half of the 18th cent., with the decline of religious fervor in England and the need for Irish aid in foreign wars, there was a general mitigation of the treatment of Catholics in Ireland, and the long process of Catholic Emancipation began.

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Lord Lieutenant (Viceroy).

Ministers

Chief Secretary

Irish Parliament

Administered Ireland – often a member of the

aristocracy and a cabinet member.

Were usually always English – known as the

‘Castle’.

Responsible for pushing government legislation

through the Irish Parliament.

Until 1782 could only pass laws approved by

the English. Thereafter, could introduce their

own laws.Lesson 1

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32

Ireland During the 1800’s•Irish-Catholics struggled to earn more rights and had some success, however living conditions improved little for the Irish.

•Most Irish people lived in poverty and two-thirds of the Irish were dependent upon agriculture as a source of income.

•Most of the land in Ireland was owned by English landlords.

• These landlords planted crops to be harvested and sold in England.

•Corn, for example, was grown in Ireland and exported to England.

•So much of the harvest was exported that very little was left to be consumed by the Irish.

•The grain available for sale in Ireland was often too expense for the Irish farmer to purchase.

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1919thth CENTURY CENTURY

• For years, Catholic Irish fought against Protestant Scottish and English settlers without success

• 1800 : Ireland became part of UK• Hostilities between Catholics and Protestants

did not end• Late 1800s : some local Irish demanded HOME HOME

RULERULE (like our concept of self-government)(like our concept of self-government)

• Fighting often broke out

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34•Irish society was dominated by the wealthy English landowners and most Irish were at the bottom of the social pyramid. Irish farmers could rent land from English landlords by working the landlords farm in exchange for a plot of land to work for himself.

•There were also large numbers of farmers that traveled from farm to farm looking for work.

•However, “in 1835, an inquiry found that over two million people were without employment of any kind.”(8)

•Poor farmers who could not afford to rent large farms could rent small plots to grow enough food to feed their families.

•The crop of choice was the potato.

•The potato was introduced to Ireland in 1590 and could grow in poor conditions.

• Potato crops required very little care which was significant because poor farmers had to spend most of their time working for their landlords.

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Population Growth• At the beginning of the 1800s, Ireland had a

population of over 8 million people, and was one of the most densely populated regions.

• Between 1799 and 1841, it had increased by 172%.

• This was due to:– A healthy diet of potato plus milk– Early marriages– High birth rate– High infant survival rate

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Pressures on Land • In County Mayo, there were 475 people for every

square mile of farmland.• 80% of the Irish people lived in the countryside

and worked the land• Land did not belong to them; it belonged to 20,000

English landlords.• Each landlord had 1000 acres of land that was

divided into farms and rented out to the Irish Catholic tenant farmers

• If you did not pay your rent, you would be evicted

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Subdivisions of Land• Sub-division created many small farms in Ireland as

this practice continued with each generation• In 1845, almost 200,000 farming families lived on

less than 5 acres of land per family.• In 1845, 135,000 farming families lived on less than

1 acre of land.• Whiles the farms got smaller, their rents increased

by 100%.

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Importance of the Potato• Due to the limited amount of land per family, the

potato was relied heavily upon.• On one acre of land, you could produce 8 ¾ tons of

potatoes a year.• It would take almost four acres of land to produce

the equivalent in wheat.• The potato could grow on most types of land, even

bogland.• Crop rotation was not necessary• The potato was also nutritious and had many uses.

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Large estates were owned by the British and run by agents, and these were under pressure to maximize income from rents for the benefit of absentee landlords.

Many agents were corrupt; all were committed to the greatest possible exploitation of the estates and their tenants.

One of the consequences was that Irish agriculture adoptedthe potato as the staple food-crop of the peasantry, and economic forces acted to bring about what would provea disastrous dependency ona very few varieties.

The PotatoThe Potato

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To Irish, potato-growing, land renters, the potato was everything. It was both food and cash. Part of the crop was sold to pay the rent and buy what the family needed. The rest of the crop fed the family. There was very little, if any, crop diversity.

The PotatoThe Potato

An Irish potato crop failure in 1845 would not merely harm a family’s financial well-being. It would jeopardize that family’s ability to provide for basic physical needs. And if the reason for the failure was a potato blight that affected the whole country, the negative impact could have national proportions.

That’s just what happened to the Irish peoplebetween the years of 1845-1849.

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Importance of the Potato• The potato when supplemented with milk provided most of the

calories and vitamins needed for a healthy life.• Poverty may have been a problem in Ireland, but the children grew

healthy and strong, and fatal illnesses were rare.• Per 10 pounds of potatoes:

– 3000 calories– 45 grams of protein– 1.92 milligrams of calcium– 21.34 milligrams of iron– 1,600 milligrams of vitamin A– 444-1,218 milligrams of vitamin C

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In 1845, the fungus Phytophthora infestans arrived accidentally from North America.

A slight climate variation brought the warm, wet weather in which the blight thrived.

Much of the potato crop rotted in the fields. Because potatoes could not be stored longer than 12 months, there was no surplus to fall back on.

All those who relied on potatoes had to find something else to eat.

The PotatoThe Potato

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The Blight• Winds from southern England carried the fungus to the countryside around

Dublin.• The blight spread throughout the fields as fungal spores settled on the

leaves of healthy potato plants, multiplied and were carried in the millions by cool breezes to surrounding plants.

• Under ideal moist conditions, a single infected potato plant could infect thousands more in just a few days.

• The attacked plants fermented while providing the nourishment the fungus needed to live, emitting a nauseous stench as they blackened and withered in front of the disbelieving eyes of Irish peasants.

• There had been crop failures in the past due to weather and other diseases, but this strange new failure was unlike anything ever seen.

• Potatoes dug out of the ground at first looked edible, but shriveled and rotted within days.

• The potatoes had been attacked by the same fungus that had destroyed the plant leaves above ground.

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• THE LUMPER IS A WHITE POTATO THAT WAS COMMONLY GROWN IN IRELAND BECAUSE IT PRODUCED A LARGE CROP AND GREW ON POOR SOIL.

• HOWEVER , IT WAS ALSO PRONE TO DISEASE- THE BLIGHT. IT ARRIVED, IN 1845, FROM EUROPE AND QUICKLY SPREAD.

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Potato FungusPotato Fungus

The next spring, farmers planted potatoes again. The potatoes seemed sound, but some harbored dormant strains of the fungus. When it rained, the blight began again. Within weeks the entire crop failed.

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Visual sources 2/5 Lesson 12

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• THE FUNGUS HIT THE POTATOES FIRST, BEFORE SHOWING BLOTCHES ON THE LEAVES AND STEMS. EVEN POTATOES THAT SEEMED FINE WHEN DUG UP, ROTTED LATER.

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Views on the Blight• By October 1845, news of the blight had reached London. British Prime

Minister, Sir Robert Peel, quickly established a Scientific Commission to examine the problem.

• After briefly studying the situation, the Commission issued a gloomy report that over half of Ireland's potato crop might perish due to 'wet rot.'

• Meanwhile, the people of Ireland formulated their own unscientific theories on the cause of the blight.

• Perhaps, it was thought, static electricity in the air resulting from the newly arrived locomotive trains caused it.

• Others reasoned that 'mortiferous vapors' from volcanoes emanating from the center of the earth might have done it.

• Some Catholics viewed the crisis in religious terms as Divine punishment for the "sins of the people" while others saw it as Judgment against abusive landlords and middlemen.

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Views on the Blight

• In England, religious-minded social reformers viewed the blight as a heaven-sent 'blessing' that would finally provide an opportunity to transform Ireland, ending the cycle of poverty resulting from the people's mistaken dependence on the potato.

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The Great Hunger

1845-1849 Famine Hits Ireland

The Great Hunger

1845-1849 Famine Hits Ireland

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 THE FAMINE YEAR (THE STRICKEN LAND) By Jane Francesca Wilde

Weary men, what reap ye? -- Golden corn for the stranger.What sow ye? -- Human corpses that wait for the avenger.Fainting forms, hunger-stricken, what see you in the offing?Stately ships to bear our food away, amid the stranger's scoffing.There's a proud array of soldiers -- what do they round your door?They guard our masters' granaries from the thin hands of the poor.Pale mothers, wherefore weeping -- Would to God that we were dead;Our children swoon before us, and we cannot give them bread. We are wretches, famished, scorned, human tools to build your pride, But God will yet take vengeance for the souls for whom Christ died.Now is your hour of pleasure -- bask ye in the world's caress;But our whitening bones against ye will rise as witnesses,From the cabins and the ditches, in their charred, uncoffin'd masses,For the Angel of the Trumpet will know them as he passes.A ghastly, spectral army, before the great God we'll stand,And arraign ye as our murderers, the spoilers of our land.

Poetry During the FaminePoetry During the Famine

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• BY OCTOBER 1845, ONE THIRD OF THE CROP HAD BEEN LOST AND 87,000 PEOPLE HAD DIED OF HUNGER. FOOD PRICES ROSE QUICKLY AND THOSE WHO NEEDED FOOD MOST, COULD NOT AFFORD IT.

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•  "I ventured through that parish this day, to ascertain the condition of the inhabitants, and although a man not easily moved, I confess myself unmanned by the extent and intensity of suffering I witnessed, more especially among the women and little children, crowds of whom were to be seen scattered over the turnip fields, like a flock of famished crows, devouring the raw turnips, and mostly half naked, shivering in the snow and sleet, uttering exclamations of despair, whilst their children were screaming with hunger. I am a match for anything else I may meet with here, but this I cannot stand."- Captain Wynne, Inspecting Officer, West Clare, 1846

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"Our accounts from the northern parts of this country are most deplorable. What the poor people earn on the public works is barely sufficient to support them. All their earnings go for food; and the consequence is, that they have nothing left to procure clothing. Since the extreme cold set in, sickness and death have accordingly followed in its train. Inflammation of the lungs, fevers, and other maladies, resulting from excessive privation, have been bearing away their victims. Many have died in the course of last week; and the illness in every case was traceable to the want of clothing and firing, if not of sufficient food."

December 16, 1846

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“Famine, the most pinching, has added its horrors to the misery previously unbearable. Fathers see those they love slowly expiring for the want of bread. Men, sensitive and proud, are upbraided by their women for seeing them starve without a struggle for their rescue. Around them is plenty; rickyards, in full contempt, stand under their snug thatch, calculating the chances of advancing prices; or, the thrashed grain safely stored awaits only the opportunity of conveyance to be taken far away to feed strangers.”

Food RiotsFood Riots

Note: The following article is taken from Pictorial Times, October 10, 1846.

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Many had no houses in which to live. When they could not pay rent to their landlords, family after family were evicted from their homes. It did a family little good to defend their home.

EvictionEviction

The poor in Ireland became homeless.

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To make sure the evicted would not return as squatters, landlords tore off the thatched roofs and burned them.

Unable to pay rent, thousands of families were evicted from their dwellings.

Starving people with their possessions on their back, walked with their children to nowhere. Many dropped dead on the roads.

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“Many of the cabins were holes in the bog, covered with a layer of sod, and not distinguishable as human habitations from the surrounding moor, until close down upon them. The bare sod was about the best material of which any of them were constructed. Doorways, not doors, were usually provided at both sides-back and front-to take advantage of the way of the wind. Windows and chimneys, I think, had no existence.”

Many homeless, Irish people built hovels on the moors.

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• 1847 SAW THE GREATEST NUMBER OF DEATHS IN IRELAND.BY NOW OVER £5MILLION HAD BEEN SPENT ON RELIEF SCHEMES.(AID) OVER 3 MILLION PEOPLE DEPENDED ON THIS AID.

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•English officials most directly involved in Irish relief “believed in the economic principles of laissez-faire, or non-interference by the government.”

•The government did provide help to those suffering from the resulting famine, but the Irish criticized the actions taken by the English authorities as being slow and inadequate to deal with the problem of widespread starvation.

• The government simply did not react quickly enough to deal with the famine.

•Between 1845 and 1855 nearly a million Irish had died from starvation and nutrition related diseases.

• “Black ’47” was the worst year of the famine, nearly 400,000 died.

• Ironically, Ireland was exporting more than enough food to feed the starving.

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Laissez-Faire and Aid• In the first year of the Famine, deaths from starvation were kept down due to

the imports of Indian corn and survival of about half the original potato crop. • Poor Irish survived the first year by selling off their livestock and pawning

their meager possessions whenever necessary to buy food.• Some borrowed money at high interest from petty money-lenders, known as

gombeen men. • They also fell behind on their rents. • The potato crop in Ireland had never failed for two consecutive years. • Everyone was counting on the next harvest to be blight-free. • But the blight was here to stay and three of the following four years would be

potato crop disasters, with catastrophic consequences for Ireland.

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Laissez-Faire and Aid• In deciding their course of action during the Famine, British government

officials and administrators rigidly adhered to the popular theory of the day, known as laissez-faire (meaning let it be), which advocated a hands-off policy in the belief that all problems would eventually be solved on their own through 'natural means.'

• Great efforts were thus made to sidestep social problems and avoid any interference with private enterprise or the rights of property owners.

• Throughout the entire Famine period, the British government would never provide massive food aid to Ireland under the assumption that English landowners and private businesses would have been unfairly harmed by resulting food price fluctuations.

• In adhering to laissez-faire, the British government also did not interfere with the English-controlled export business in Irish-grown grains.

• Throughout the Famine years, large quantities of native-grown wheat, barley, oats and oatmeal sailed out of places such as Limerick and Waterford for England, even though local Irish were dying of starvation. Irish farmers, desperate for cash, routinely sold the grain to the British in order to pay the rent on their farms and thus avoid eviction.

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Aid• With the threat of starvation looming, Prime Minister Peel made a

courageous political decision to advocate repeal of England's long-standing Corn Laws.

• The protectionist laws had been enacted in 1815 to artificially keep up the price of British-grown grain by imposing heavy tariffs on all imported grain.

• Under the Corn Laws, the large amounts of cheap foreign grain now needed for Ireland would be prohibitively expensive.

• However, English gentry and politicians reacted with outrage at the mere prospect of losing their long-cherished price protections.

• The political furor in Britain surrounding Peel's decision quickly overshadowed any concern for the consequences of the crop failure in Ireland.

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Aid• A Relief Commission was established in Dublin to set up local relief

committees throughout Ireland composed of landowners, their agents, magistrates, clergy and notable residents.

• The local committees were supposed to help organize employment projects and distribute food to the poor while raising money from landowners to cover part of the cost.

• The British government would then contribute a matching amount.• However, in remote rural areas, many of the relief committees were taken

over by poorly educated farmers who conducted disorganized, rowdy meetings.

• Local landowners, upon seeing who was on the committees, balked at donating any money.

• There were also a high number of absentee landlords in the remote western areas with little first-hand knowledge of what was occurring on their property.

• They also failed to donate.

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Aid• The shaky Irish relief effort soon came under the control of a 38-year-old English

civil servant named Charles Edward Trevelyan, Assistant Secretary of the British Treasury.

• Trevelyan was appointed by Prime Minister Peel to oversee relief operations in Ireland and would become the single most important British administrator during the Famine years.

• He was a brilliant young man of unimpeachable integrity but was also stubborn, self-righteous, overly bureaucratic, and not given to a favorable opinion of the Irish.

• Unwilling to delegate any authority in his day-to-day duties, he managed every detail, no matter how small.

• All communications arriving from his administrators in Ireland were handed directly to him, unseen by anyone else.

• Important decisions were thus delayed as his workload steadily increased.

• He often remained at his office until 3 a.m. and demanded the same kind of round-the-clock commitment from his subordinates.

• .

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Aid• Trevelyan would visit Ireland just once during all of the Famine years, venturing

only as far as Dublin, far from the hard-hit west of Ireland. • Remoteness from the suffering, he once stated, kept his judgment more acute

than that of his administrators actually working among the people affected• In the spring of 1846, under his control, the British attempted to implement a

large-scale public works program for Ireland's unemployed. • Similar temporary programs had been successfully used in the past. • But this time, Trevelyan complicated the process via new bureaucratic procedures

that were supposed to be administered by a Board of Works located in Dublin. • The understaffed Board was quickly swamped with work requests from

landowners. • At the same time, local relief committees were besieged by masses of

unemployed men. • The result was confusion and anger. • British troops had to be called in to quell several disturbances.

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Aid• Meanwhile, Prime Minister Peel came up with his own solution to the food

problem.• Without informing his own Conservative (Tory) government, he secretly

purchased two shipments of inexpensive Indian corn (maize) directly from America to be distributed to the Irish.

• But problems arose as soon as the maize arrived in Ireland.• It needed to be ground into digestible corn meal and there weren't enough

mills available amid a nation of potato farmers. • Mills that did process the maize discovered the pebble-like grain had to be

ground twice.• To distribute the corn meal, a practical, business-like plan was developed in

which the Relief Commission sold the meal at cost to local relief committees which in turn sold it at cost to the Irish at just one penny per pound.

• But peasants soon ran out of money and most landowners failed to contribute any money to maintain the relief effort.

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Aid• The corn meal itself also caused problems. Normally, the Irish ate enormous

meals of boiled potatoes three times a day.• A working man might eat up to fourteen pounds each day. • They found Indian corn to be an unsatisfying substitute. • Peasants nicknamed the bright yellow substance 'Peel's brimstone.' • It was difficult to cook, hard to digest and caused diarrhea. • Most of all, it lacked the belly-filling bulk of the potato.• It also lacked Vitamin C and resulted in scurvy, a condition previously

unknown in Ireland due to the normal consumption of potatoes rich in Vitamin C.

• Out of necessity, the Irish grew accustomed to the corn meal.• But by June 1846 supplies were exhausted. • The Relief Commission estimated that four million Irish would need to be fed

during the spring and summer of 1846, since nearly £3 million worth of potatoes had been lost in the first year of the Famine.

• But Peel had imported only about £100,000 worth of Indian corn from America and Trevelyan made no effort to replenish the limited supply.

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Responses to the Great Famine

Scenario 5

The Labour Act was passed in 1846 which further worked on landlords to provide work, punishing them if they did not by forcing them to pay a ‘labour rate’. However, by the spring of 1847 the situation was worsening.

If you were Russell (PM after Peel) would you…

a) Begin freely distributing food through soup kitchens, like the Quakers had done?

b) Double the ‘labour rate’ – find work for the poor or go bankrupt?

c) Do nothing. You have already done enough?

Scenario 6

From late 1847 the Poor Relief system (allowing the poorest people to go to workhouses to be looked after) was failing. c.200,000 people were sheltered in workhouses, double the number they should have held. Conditions were appalling and the unions which ran them were bankrupt.

Should Russell…

a) Build more workhouses to cope with the problem?

b) Begin giving relief to the poor still living at home – outdoor relief?

c) Expand the public works schemes?

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Scenario 6

From late 1847 the Poor Relief system (allowing the poorest people to go to workhouses to be looked after) was failing. c.200,000 people were sheltered in workhouses, double the number they should have held. Conditions were appalling and the unions which ran them were bankrupt.

Should Russell…

a) Build more workhouses to cope with the problem?

b) Begin giving relief to the poor still living at home – outdoor relief?

c) Expand the public works schemes?

Scenario 6

Correct Answer

a) Begin giving relief to the poor still living at home – outdoor relief.

Around 800,000 people were given aid in their home. Building workhouses would have been too much involvement and public work schemes were dropped in 1847.

Scenario 5

The Labour Act was passed in 1846 which further worked on landlords to provide work, punishing them if they did not by forcing them to pay a ‘labour rate’. However, by the spring of 1847 the situation was worsening.

If you were Russell (PM after Peel) would you…

a) Begin freely distributing food through soup kitchens, like the Quakers had done?

b) Double the ‘labour rate’ – find work for the poor or go bankrupt?

c) Do nothing. You have already done enough?

Scenario 5

Correct Answer

a) Begin freely distributing food through soup kitchens, like the Quakers had done.

Volunteer and religious groups like the Quakers had already begun distributing food in this way. Once again, the scheme was chosen because of the laissez-faire approach - it was paid for through local rates. By August, 3 million + were fed this way. Scheme ended in September 1847.

Responses to the Great Famine

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• ‘SOUP KITCHENS ‘ RUN BY QUAKERS, WERE SET UP TO FEED THE STARVING PEOPLE.THE POTATO CROP WAS GOOD IN 1847, BUT ONLY A SMALL CROP HAD BEEN PLANTED. PEOPLE WERE EITHER TOO WEAK TO SOW THE PLANTS OR HAD EATEN THE SEED POTATOES.

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Laissez-Faire and Aid• On June 29, 1846, the resignation of British Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel

was announced. • Peel's Conservative government had fallen over political fallout from repeal

of the Corn Laws which he had forced through Parliament. • His departure paved the way for Charles Trevelyan to take full control of

Famine policy under the new Liberal government. • The Liberals, known as Whigs in those days, were led by Lord John Russell,

and were big believers in the principle of laissez-faire. • Once he had firmly taken control, Trevelyan ordered the closing of the food

depots in Ireland that had been selling Peel's Indian corn. • He also rejected another boatload of Indian corn already headed for Ireland.• His reasoning, as he explained in a letter, was to prevent the Irish from

becoming "habitually dependent" on the British government. • His openly stated desire was to make "Irish property support Irish poverty.“

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Laissez-Faire and Aid• As a devout advocate of laissez-faire, Trevelyan also claimed that aiding

the Irish brought "the risk of paralyzing all private enterprise." • Thus he ruled out providing any more government food, despite early

reports the potato blight had already been spotted amid the next harvest in the west of Ireland.

• Trevelyan believed Peel's policy of providing cheap Indian corn meal to the Irish had been a mistake because it undercut market prices and had discouraged private food dealers from importing the needed food.

• This year, the British government would do nothing. • The food depots would be closed on schedule and the Irish fed via the

free market, reducing their dependence on the government while at the same time maintaining the rights of private enterprise.

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Laissez-Faire and Aid• Trevelyan's free market relief plan depended on private merchants supplying food to peasants who were

earning wages through public works employment financed mainly by the Irish themselves through local taxes.

• But the problems with this plan were numerous. • Tax revues were insufficient. • Wages had been set too low. • Paydays were irregular and those who did get work could not afford to both pay their rent and buy food. • Ireland also lacked adequate transportation for efficient food distribution. • There were only 70 miles of railroad track in the whole country and no usable commercial shipping docks

in the western districts. • Meanwhile, the Irish watched with increasing anger as boatloads of home-grown oats and

grain departed on schedule from their shores for shipment to England. • Food riots erupted in ports such as Youghal near Cork where peasants tried unsuccessfully

to confiscate a boatload of oats. • At Dungarvan in County Waterford, British troops were pelted with stones and fired 26

shots into the crowd, killing two peasants and wounding several others. • British naval escorts were then provided for the riverboats as they passed before the

starving eyes of peasants watching on shore. • As the Famine worsened, the British continually sent in more troops. "Would to God the

Government would send us food instead of soldiers," a starving inhabitant of County Mayo lamented.

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The Famine (Roisin Hambly)In the Spring of ’45I planted my potato crop,But when I dug them up in WinterThey were black and brown from rot.

There were seven in my family,Four children under five,I had to find some food for them,To keep them all alive.

It wasn’t too bad to start with,But by Autumn ’47,Two members of my familyHad died and gone to Heaven.

That Winter it was long and coldAnd every thing was bare,Then when my lovely wife passed onI thought it so unfair.

My family were now so thin,Their faces were so hollowThey decided to emigrateBut foolishly I didn’t follow.

I saw a soldier selling corn,No one was around,I took this opportunityTo knock him to the ground.

I robbed him of his food and moneyAnd quickly ran away,But sadly I was caught and killedAnd left there to decay.

How does it make you feel?

How does the narrator feel?

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“My hand trembles while I write. The scenes of human misery and degradation we witnessed still haunt my imagination, with the vividness and power of some horrid and tyrannous delusion, rather than the features of a sober reality. We entered a cabin.

Stretched in one dark corner, scarcely visible, from the smoke and rags that covered them, were three children huddled together, lying there because they were too weak to rise, pale and ghastly, their little limbs-on removing a portion of the filthy covering - perfectly emaciated, eyes sunk, voice gone, and evidently in the last stage of actual starvation. Crouched over the turf embers was another form, wild and all but naked, scarcely human in appearance. It stirred not, nor noticed us.”

Narrative of a Recent Journey of Six Weeks in Ireland. William Bennett 1847

Narrative of a Recent Journey of Six Weeks in Ireland. William Bennett 1847

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“On some straw, soddened upon the ground, moaning piteously, was a shriveled old woman, imploring us to give her something, - baring her limbs partly, to show how the skin hung loose from the bones, as soon as she attracted our attention. Above her, on something like a ledge, was a young woman, with sunken cheeks, - a mother I have no doubt,-who scarcely raised her eyes in answer to our enquiries, but pressed her hand upon her forehead, with a look of unutterable anguish and despair.”

Eye Witness AccountEye Witness Account

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Some people were dead as long as 11 days before they were buried.

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“There wasn’t enough wood to make coffins. Undertakers developed coffins with sliding bottoms so they could be reused after people were buried in mass graves. Later, the Sliding Cross Memorial was made from one of those temporary boxes.

Mothers who had no food to give their children gave them seaweed.”

The famine grew worse. The famine grew worse.

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Black 47• Nicholas Cummins, the magistrate of Cork, visited the hard-hit

coastal district of Skibbereen. • "I entered some of the hovels," he wrote, "and the scenes which

presented themselves were such as no tongue or pen can convey the slightest idea of. In the first, six famished and ghastly skeletons, to all appearances dead, were huddled in a corner on some filthy straw, their sole covering what seemed a ragged horsecloth, their wretched legs hanging about, naked above the knees. I approached with horror, and found by a low moaning they were alive -- they were in fever, four children, a woman and what had once been a man. It is impossible to go through the detail. Suffice it to say, that in a few minutes I was surrounded by at least 200 such phantoms, such frightful spectres as no words can describe, [suffering] either from famine or from fever. Their demoniac yells are still ringing in my ears, and their horrible images are fixed upon my brain."

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Black 47• The dead were buried without coffins just a few inches below the soil, to be gnawed at

by rats and dogs.

• In some cabins, the dead remained for days or weeks among the living who were too weak to move the bodies outside.

• In other places, unmarked hillside graves came into use as big trenches were dug and bodies dumped in, then covered with quicklime.

• Most died not from hunger but from associated diseases such as typhus, dysentery, relapsing fever, and famine dropsy, in an era when doctors were unable to provide any cure.

• Highly contagious 'Black Fever,' as typhus was nicknamed since it blackened the skin, is spread by body lice and was carried from town to town by beggars and homeless paupers.

• Numerous doctors, priests, nuns, and kind-hearted persons who attended to the sick in their lice-infested dwellings also succumbed.

• Rural Irish, known for their hospitality and kindness to strangers, never refused to let a beggar or homeless family spend the night and often unknowingly contracted typhus.

• At times, entire homeless families, ravaged by fever, simply laid down along the roadside and died, succumbing to 'Road Fever.'

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"In a neighboring union a shipwrecked human body was cast on shore; a starving man extracted the heart and liver, and that was the maddening feast on which he regaled himself and his perishing family!”

"What, in the name of Heaven, is to become of us? What are we to do? The country is gone!"

Dublin, IrelandMay 23, 1849

Accounts of the famine appeared in the London Times.

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83

The Potato Famine in Ireland• By 1847, the potato famine had reached full strength and much of

the population of Ireland was malnourished and weak. • This is an account written by a visitor to Ireland who notes much of

the misery he witnessed.

“We have just returned from a visit to Ireland, whither we had gone in order to ascertain with our own eyes the truth of the reports daily publishing of the misery existing there. We have found everything but too true; the accounts are not exaggerated--they cannot be exaggerated-- nothing more frightful can be conceived. The scenes we have witnessed during our short stay at Skibbereen, equal any thing that has been recorded by history, or could be conceived by the imagination. Famine, typhus fever, dysentery, and a disease hitherto unknown, are sweeping away the whole population. The poor are not the only sufferers: fever is spreading to every class, and even the rich are becoming involved in the same destruction.”

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84The Great Migration•During that same time, nearly three million Irish would flee Ireland in hopes of finding a better life.

•250,000 would migrate to England and nearly 2,000,000 would flee to North America and Australia.

•In 1847 alone 100,000 immigrants sailed to the United States.

•The Irish journeyed to America in search of work.

• Many, for example, hoped to gain employment working in the growing factories of the northeast.

•Immigrants were packed into “coffin” ships bound for ports in English speaking countries.

• Many thousands died in the long journey across the Atlantic succumbing to disease and starvation only to have their bodies thrown overboard.

•The Irish arrived in America all at once it seemed.

•Port cities like Boston, New York and New Orleans were flooded with strange people, many of whom were near death.

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85

The Exodus Begins• By the middle of the 19th

Century, thousands of Irish immigrants were arriving in the U.S. in an effort to escape the devastating famine in Ireland.

• The excerpt here deals with the initial stages of the Irish flight.

• “The splendid emigrant ships that ply between Liverpool and New York, and which have sufficed in previous years to carry to the shores of America an Irish emigration, amounting on the average to 250,000 souls per annum, have, during the present spring, been found insufficient to transport to the States the increasing swarms of Irish who have resolved to try in the New World to gain the independence which has been denied them in the old.”

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• DURING THE FAMINE YEARS ABOUT 2 MILLION PEOPLE EMIGRATED TO ENGLAND, AMERICA,CANADA AND AUSTRALIA.CONDITIONS ON BOARD THE SHIPS WERE DREADFUL, WITH VERY LITTLE FOOD. THE 8 WEEK LONG VOYAGES TO CANADA AND AMERICA WERE THE WORSE.DISEASE WAS WIDESPREAD AND THOUSANDS DIED.THE SHIPS WERE KNOWN AS ‘COFFIN SHIPS’

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EmigrationEmigration

One of the most obvious effects of the famine was emigration. Although the famine itself probably resulted in about one million deaths, the resultant emigration caused the population to drop by a further three million. About one million of these are estimated to have emigrated in the immediate famine period, with the depression that followed continuing the decline until the second half of the 20th century. These immigrants largely ended up in North America, with some in Australia and in Britain.

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Emigration

• 1815-45 – 1.5 million emigrated.

• 1845-50 – 1.5 million people emigrated.

• 1850-1910 – 4.5-5 million emigrated.

• ¼ went to England and Scotland; majority went to America.

• Before the famine, it was mainly single, landless men who emigrated.

• Early years of the Famine – mainly cottiers and labourers, plus some richer people emigrated.

• After 1850 it was only smallholders and labourers. Whole families now went too.

• Emigration was hard.

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The Great MigrationWave of New Americans Begins

• In hopes of a better future a number of Irish immigrated to the U.S. between

1820 and 1830 and nearly 2 million during the decade of the 1840s.

• Altogether, almost 3.5 million Irish people entered the United States between

1820 and 1880.• Most of the migration was due to the Irish Potato Famine

between 1845 and 1852.

Forms such as this were used to document the arrival of immigrants to the U.S.

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With many of the emigrants suffering from fever, coupled with the cramped and unsanitary conditions on board what became known as the "coffin ships", disease was rampant.

Coffin ShipsCoffin Ships

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Although they were regulated, many of the ships were privately owned, and some captains grossly overcrowded them in order to get more fares. Only the slave ships of the previous century would have had worse conditions.

Coffin ShipsCoffin Ships

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Coffin Ships

• During the trans-Atlantic voyage, British ships were only required to supply 7 lbs. of food per week per passenger.

• Most passengers, it was assumed, would bring along their own food for the journey.

• But most of the poor Irish boarded ships with no food, depending entirely on the pound-a-day handout which amounted to starvation rations.

• Food on board was also haphazardly cooked in makeshift brick fireplaces and was often undercooked, causing upset stomachs and diarrhea.

• Many of the passengers were already ill with typhus as they boarded the ships. • Before boarding, they had been given the once-over by doctors on shore who

usually rejected no one for the trip, even those seemingly on the verge of death.• British ships were not required to carry doctors. • Anyone that died during the sea voyage was simply dumped overboard, without any

religious rites.

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Coffin Ships• Below decks, hundreds of men, women and children huddled together in the

dark on bare wooden floors with no ventilation, breathing a stench of vomit and the effects of diarrhea amid no sanitary facilities.

• On ships that actually had sleeping berths, there were no mattresses and the berths were never cleaned.

• Many sick persons remained in bare wooden bunks lying in their own filth for the entire voyage, too ill to get up.

• Another big problem was the lack of good drinking water. • Sometimes the water was stored in leaky old wooden casks, or in casks that

previously stored wine, vinegar or chemicals which contaminated the water and caused dysentery.

• Many ships ran out of water long before reaching North America, making life especially miserable for fevered passengers suffering from burning thirsts.

• Some unscrupulous captains profited by selling large amounts of alcohol to the passengers, resulting in "totally depraved and corrupted" behavior among them.

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It is estimated that perhaps as many as 40% of steerage passengers died either en-route or immediately after arrival.

Coffin ShipsCoffin Ships

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Coffin Ships• The first coffin ships headed for Quebec, Canada. • The three thousand mile journey, depending on winds and the captain's skill, could

take from 40 days to three months. • Upon arrival in the Saint Lawrence River, the ships were supposed to be inspected

for disease and any sick passengers removed to quarantine facilities on Grosse Isle, a small island thirty miles downstream from Quebec City.

• But in the spring of 1847, shipload after shipload of fevered Irish arrived, quickly overwhelming the small medical inspection facility, which only had 150 beds.

• By June, 40 vessels containing 14,000 Irish immigrants waited in a line extending two miles down the St. Lawrence.

• It took up to five days to see a doctor, many of whom were becoming ill from contact with the typhus-infected passengers.

• By the summer, the line of ships had grown several miles long. • A fifteen-day general quarantine was then imposed for all of the waiting ships. • Many healthy Irish thus succumbed to typhus as they were forced to remain in

their lice-infested holds. • With so many dead on board the waiting ships, hundreds of bodies were simply

dumped overboard into the St. Lawrence.

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Coffin Ships• Others, half-alive, were placed in small boats and then deposited on the beach at Grosse

Isle, left to crawl to the hospital on their hands and knees if they could manage. • Thousands of Irish, ill with typhus and dysentery, eventually wound up in hastily

constructed wooden fever sheds. • These makeshift hospitals, badly understaffed and unsanitary, simply became places to

die, with corpses piled "like cordwood" in nearby mass graves. • Those who couldn't get into the hospital died along the roadsides. In one case, an

orphaned Irish boy walking along the road with other boys sat down for a moment under a tree to rest and promptly died on the spot.

• The quarantine efforts were soon abandoned and the Irish were sent on to their next destination without any medical inspection or treatment.

• From Grosse Isle, the Irish were given free passage up the St. Lawrence to Montreal and cities such as Kingston and Toronto.

• The crowded open-aired river barges used to transport them exposed the fair-skinned Irish to all-day-long summer sun causing many bad sunburns.

• At night, they laid down close to each other to ward off the chilly air, spreading more lice and fever

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Coffin Ships• Many pauper families had been told by their landlords that once they arrived in

Canada, an agent would meet them and pay out between two and five pounds depending on the size of the family.

• But no agents were ever found. • Promises of money, food and clothing had been utterly false. • Landlords knew that once the paupers arrived in Canada there was virtually no way

for them to ever return to Ireland and make a claim. • Thus they had promised them anything just to get them out of the country. • Montreal received the biggest influx of Irish during this time. • Many of those arriving were quite ill from typhus and long-term malnutrition. • Montreal's limited medical facilities at Point St. Charles were quickly overwhelmed.• Homeless Irish wandered the countryside begging for help as temperatures dropped

and the frosty Canadian winter set in.• But they were shunned everywhere by Canadians afraid of contracting fever. • Of the 100,000 Irish that sailed to British North America in 1847, an estimated one

out of five died from disease and malnutrition, including over five thousand at Grosse Isle.

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Even as the boat was docking, these immigrants to America learned that life in America was going to be a battle for survival.

Almshouses were filled with these Irish immigrants. They begged on every street.

Coming to AmericaComing to America

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First Immigrant to Enter U.S. through Ellis Island

Irish Girl First Immigrant to Arrive at Ellis Island

A young Irish girl by the name of Annie Moore was the first immigrant to ever enter the U.S. through Ellis Island.

Since then, more than 17 million people have entered the United States through Ellis Island.

Today, in addition to the Cobh County Cork statue, on the left, there is also a bronze statue on display at Ellis Island depicting her arrival.

Statue at Cobh, Co. Cork, of Annie Moore and her two brothers leaving for America.

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• Quarantine centers were set up for diseased emigrants.

• Some settled in new territories in the West.

• Most stayed in cities on East Coast where they took poorest jobs.

• Emigration continued for almost a century.

• Emigrants brought with them a deep hatred of England, which they blamed for the famine and their suffering.Click movie to see Irish emigrants on Ellis Island.

Coming to AmericaComing to America

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All major cities had their "Irish Town" or "Shanty Town" where the Irish clung together. Ads for employment often were followed by "NO IRISH NEED APPLY."

Coming to AmericaComing to America

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Immigrants

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The emigrants were forced to live in cellars and shanties, partly because of poverty but also because they were considered bad for the neighborhood...they were unfamiliar with plumbing and running water.

These living conditions bred sickness and early death. It was estimated that 80% of all infants born to Irish immigrants in New York City died. Their brogue and dress provoked ridicule; their poverty and illiteracy provoked scorn.

Coming to AmericaComing to America

Irish crosses

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106

Nativist Response to Irish Immigration

• The influx of large numbers of Irish Catholics during the 19th century disturbed many conservative Americans who viewed the ethnic shift in American society as a potentially damaging phenomenon.

• Many publications argued that the Irish would place their loyalty to the Catholic Church above their loyalty to the U.S.

• Also, the 1856 platform of the briefly influential "Know-Nothing" party stressed the need for native born Americans to take charge.

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This political cartoon from Harper's Weekly, by W. A. Rogers, ran with the caption, "The balance of trade with Great Britain seems to be still against us. 630 paupers arrived at Boston in the steamship Nestoria, April 15th, from Galway, Ireland shipped by the British Government."

How does this cartoon portray Irish immigrants?

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108

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Coming to AmericaComing to America

America meant more hardship for many Irish immigrants. Most were Catholics - and Catholics weren’t always welcomed into American cities at the time. Anti-immigrant sentiment existed in 19th century America.

“Irish need not apply.”“Irish need not apply.”

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Irish immigrants in the United States had to contend with racist attitudes.

What is the message in this political cartoon which appeared in Harpers Weekly?

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The Chicago Post wrote, "The Irish fill our prisons, our poor houses...Scratch a convict or a pauper, and the chances are that you tickle the skin of an Irish Catholic. Putting them on a boat and sending them home would end crime in this country."

Not only the men worked, but the women too. They became chamber maids, cooks, and the caretakers of children. Early Americans disdained this type of work, fit only for servants, the common sentiment being, "Let Negroes be servants, and if not Negroes, let Irishmen fill their place..."

The Blacks hated the Irish and it appeared to be a mutual feeling. They were the first to call the Irish "white nigger."

Coming to AmericaComing to America

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City life for Immigrants• The “New” group usually congregates together and

forms an almost isolated community and institutions in the giant and growing cities of America.

• The Irish came together in great neighborhoods and sections of all Eastern Cities.

• They formed their own political groups and parties.• They used their large numbers to build powerful

political groups that dominated some large Cities and industries in those cities.

• Example: Police and Firemen in New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia.

• They set up: Churches, Hospitals, Welfare Organizations, Schools, Social Clubs, Political Organizations, Jobs, and Security

• They helped each other in exchange for loyalty during the voting season.

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A statue of a mother and her children can be found in Ellis Island, New York, which represents not only the honor of her being the first emigrant to pass through Ellis Island but also stands as a symbol of the many Irish who have embarked on that very same journey.

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New York State's Irish Hunger Memorial -- an extraordinary new memorial devoted to raising public awareness of the events that led to the "Great Irish Famine and Migration" of 1845-1852.

America RemembersAmerica Remembers

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• THE POPULATION

HAD DROPPED BY AT LEAST 2 AND A HALF MILLION.

• EMIGRATION NOW PLAYED A LARGE PART IN IRISH LIFE.

• EMIGRANTS SENT HOME MILLIONS OF POUNDS.

• EDUCATION WAS SEEN AS A MEANS OF ESCAPING POVERTY

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Population

• c.1 million men, women and children died between 1845-50.

• Irish population declined from c.8 million in 1841 to c.6m in 1851.

• By 1900 the Irish population was ½ the size it was in 1845.

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Land

• Cottiers (small land owners) were destroyed and their population fell dramatically.

• c.200,000 smaller farms were lost.

• 10% of the old landlord class went bankrupt.

• Encumbered Estates Act was passed in 1849 to speed up the sale of land.

• 1850s – c.3,000 estates sold.

• But – most were brought by speculators or existing members of the landlord class.

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Farming and Living Standards• There was less

concentration on potato farming and more concentration on dairy and exporting cattle.

• Living standards improved because wages increased.

• Housing standards improved as did literacy – due to urbanisation.

• The m-c farmer became the centre of Irish countryside – there was a 77% increase in farmers’ income and many farmers got the vote in 1850.

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By the time the most damaging effects of the Great Hunger were over, Ireland’s population had dropped from about 8 million (at its highest-ever level in 1845) to about 5 million. It has never recovered from that mass exodus.

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DARK ROSALEENBy Sister Anne Therese Dillen

I thirst beside the heather-laden bogs –no samaritan for me;no one here to seethat I shall die amidst theplenty, in the field –and that its yieldwill sail to shores beyond the sea. How can it bethat flocks of sheep can find their fillwhile I lie empty and in pain?or is it vainto beg attention to my plight? How can I fightwhen I am listless, drained alone,shrunken to the bonewhile others eat what I havegrown in toil? Woman of the soil –I fade against a wall of human greedand - sower of the seed –I languish as it grows...

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Fortunately, the people of Ireland and England are working out their longstanding differences. They have a lengthy history of enmity.

The famine in Ireland caused further animosity between England and Ireland. The Irish people blamed England for not doing enough to lessen the effects of the famine.

Hatred of EnglandHatred of England

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Background

• In 1800, Ireland became part of the United Kingdom (England)

• In the late 1800s, local Irish Catholics sought limited self-government known as Home Rule

• Hostilities continued and were so bad that Britain lost control of the southern part of Ireland

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Catholic Emancipation Actand Daniel O’Connor

• Daniel O'Connell, known as "the Liberator," was born on 6 August 1775 near Cahirciveen in County Kerry and was educated in France because as a Roman Catholic he was unable to go to University in Britain.

• He returned to Ireland, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in Dublin in 1798. • He built up a highly successful practise as a lawyer and dealt with many cases of Irish

tenants against English landlords. • During the next two decades he was active in the movement to repeal British laws that

penalized Roman Catholics because of their religion.• Catholics were barred from Parliament but O'Connell became the leader of the battle to

win political rights for Irish Roman Catholics. • In 1823 he organised the Catholic Association, which played an important role in the

passage of the Catholic Emancipation Act in 1829. O'Connell was elected to the House of Commons for County Clare in 1829 in what Peel called "an avalanche" but — although he was by law allowed to stand as a candidate — he was prevented from taking his seat because of the anti-Catholic legislation which was in force.

• He stood successfully for re-election in 1830 and remained an MP for various constituencies until his death.

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Daniel O’Connor and Young Ireland• In the 1832 General Election O'Connell became MP for Dublin and also

nominated about half of the candidates who were returned, including three of his sons and two of his sons-in-law.

• Of the 105 Irish MPs, some forty-five were declared Repealers: that is, they were committed to the repeal of the Act of Union. O'Connell fought fiercely against Grey's Coercion Act of 1833.

• O'Connell often allied himself with the Whigs in Parliament and was party to the Lichfield House Compact in 1834-35 along with Lord John Russell in a successful effort to cause the fall of Peel's first ministry.

• He became lord mayor of Dublin in 1841.• As head of the Catholic Association he received a large annual income from

voluntary contributions by the Irish people (the Catholic Rent of 1d a month) who supported him in a series of demonstrations in favour of Irish Home Rule.

• He was forced by Feargus O'Connor and other extremist Irish MPs to introduce the idea of Home Rule into parliament prematurely.

• In 1840 O'Connell founded the Repeal Association which was not nearly so successful as the Catholic Association until "Young Ireland" began to publish The Nation.

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Daniel O’ Connor and Young Ireland

• After the demonstration at Clontarf in 1843 O'Connell was arrested and early in 1844 was convicted of seditious conspiracy.

• The conviction was subsequently reversed by the House of Lords on 4 September 1844 and O'Connell resumed his career. Among other things, he opposed Peel's establishment of the "godless colleges" in Belfast, Dublin, and Cork

• In 1845 the famine struck Ireland and the "Young Ireland" members of O'Connell's party began to advocate revolutionary doctrines that he had always opposed.

• Their arguments in favour of violent opposition to British rule led to an open split in Irish ranks in 1846. O'Connell was distressed by this disaffection among the Irish.

• Although suffering from ill health, he set off for Rome in January 1847 but died in Genoa on 15 May 1847.

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What is next?

Reform?

‘I could try to ensure that I work within parliament to push for reforms for Ireland which could lead to greater justice and fairness and equality of legislation in Ireland’.

Repeal?

‘Or I could campaign in Ireland for a movement to push for the repeal of the Act of Union. I am, after all being paid the O’Connell tribute in recognition of my services to Irish Catholics’.

In the end O’Connell’s long-term aim of repeal was replaced with a short-term desire for reform. However, O’Connell was prepared to re-ignite the repeal campaign if the Union failed and equality was not achieved. But why did he take this stance?

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My first object is to get Ireland for the Irish…Old Ireland and liberty! That is what I am struggling for…What numberless advantages would not the Irish enjoy if they possessed their own country? A domestic parliament would encourage Irish manufactures…Irish commerce and protect Irish agriculture. The labourer, the artisan, and the shopkeeper would all be benefited by the repeal of the union…They say we want separation from England, but what I want is to prevent separation taking place…what motive could we have to separate if we obtain all these blessings?...I want you to do nothing that is not open and legal, but if the people unite with me and follow my advice it is impossible not to get the Repeal…there was no pursuit of Roman Catholic interests as opposed to Protestant…the object in view was the benefit of the whole nation.

Daniel O’Connell, 14th May 1843

What exactly does O’Connell want?Lessons 6 & 7

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Stage 1 – Repeal (1840+)

Support?

Catholic Church

Parish Priests Some bishops

Archbishop MacHale

Young Ireland

X = Middle-classes?Lessons 6 & 7

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Mass Meetings

Repeal Rent

Increased support?

Methods of the Repeal Association

Lessons 6 & 7

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Aims•To examine the success of O’Connell’s leadership.

Source 1 - O. MacDonagh, The Emancipist - Daniel O’Connell 1830-1847, 1989.

It was his earlier pressure which had forced Peel and his Cabinet, at last, onto the path of concession in Ireland; and, once committed to that path, they saw the breaking of O’Connell’s power as the necessary preliminary to a course of Irish reform. The fact that it was a Tory and not a Whig administration which intended to yield ground should not blind us...to the essential fact that it was a British government which would yield, in the face of Irish agitation. O’Connell himself had repeatedly, if partly rhetorically, begged to be put out of business - the business of Repeal - by being outbid by ‘Justice for Ireland’. Up to a point, this was precisely Peel’s intention - to undercut O’Connell’s movement by concessions. Lesson 8

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Aims•To examine the success of O’Connell’s leadership.

Source 2 - Harriet Martineau, History of the Thirty Years Peace 1816-1846, 1848.

The untruthfulness of O’Connell must be regarded as a constitutional attribute in O’Connell two sets of characteristics were united...He was genuinely impetuous, ardent, open-hearted, patriotic, ad devoted; and then again, he was genuinely cautious and astute; calculating, sly, untruthful; grasping. selfish, and hypocritical. He was profuse, and he was sordid; he was rash, and he was unfathomably politic; now he was flowing out, and now he was circumventing. Among all his charges, however, he never was brave, he never was reliable or accurate; and he never kept his eye off the money boxes which supplied his annual income from the scrapings of the earnings of the poor.

Lesson 8

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Aims•To examine the success of O’Connell’s leadership.

Source 3 - O. MacDonagh in A New History of Ireland, volume 5, edited by W.E. Vaughan, 1989.

His part in the later campaigns for Catholic emancipation had both promoted him to a sort of national leadership and cleared away what was, in many ways, a great cross-issue obstructing the path of reform. His entry into parliament in 1830 transformed his situation and both enabled and induced him to develop an entirely new grammar of pressure politics...Well before he shifted his focus from Westminster again, he had established his domination in Catholic Ireland by persuading or compelling his political rivals, the trade unions, the priests, the Catholic bourgeoisie, and the rural masses to support him...throughout his parliamentary manoeuvres. In short, he had turned Catholic Ireland into something like a gigantic political party, which, of course, the leader had to tend and listen to, but which in the last resort he could count on to back him, even blindly.

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Aims•To examine the success of O’Connell’s leadership.

Source 4 - John Mitchell, Jail Journal.

He led them, as I believe, all wrong for forty years. He was a lawyer; and never could come to the point of denying and defying British law. He was a Catholic, sincere and devout; and would not see that the Church had ever been the enemy of Irish Freedom. He was an aristocrat, by position and by taste; and the name of a Republic was odious to him.

Lesson 8

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Aims•To examine the success of O’Connell’s leadership.

Source 5 - A. MacIntyre, The Liberator - Daniel O’Connell ad the Irish Party 1830-47, 1965.

The age of O’Connell witnessed a series of important reforms in Ireland, undertaken by Government partly in obedience to current ideas about economics and society but also, in a more tangible and immediate fashion, in response to the presence and activity of the O’Connellite party in Parliament.

Whatever the final judgement on O’Connell’s party, there can be no doubt of its success as a political pressure group. From the conclusion in 1832 of the struggle for Parliamentary Reform until the effective rise of Chartism and the Anti-Corn Law League in the early 1840s, the Irish question formed a central theme of British politics.

Lesson 8

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The Irish QuestionThe Irish never accepted English rule:• They resented English settlers, especially absentee landlords.• Many Irish peasants lived in poverty while paying high rents to landlords living in England• The Irish, most of whom were Catholic, were forced to pay tithes to the Church of England.

Irish nationalists campaigned for freedom and justice.

In 1845, a disease destroyed the potato crop, causing a terrible famine called the “Great Hunger.” At least one million Irish died while the British continued to ship healthy crops outside Ireland. The Great Hunger left a legacy of Irish bitterness that still exists today.

The Irish struggled for years to achieve home rule, or local self-government. However, Parliament did not pass a home rule bill until 1914. It then delayed putting the new law into effect until after World War I.

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Exports

• Ireland continued to export food through famine years

• Shipments left Irish ports for England under heavy guard by British soldiers

• British officials believed interfering with trade would harm British economy

Self-Government

• Parliament debated several bills to grant home rule to Ireland, 1800s

• None of them passed

• Ireland did not receive limited self-government until 1920

Resentful of British Rule

• Famine left many Irish more resentful of British rule than ever

• 1860s, many Irish began to fight for change

• Some wanted independence, others home rule within United Kingdom

Ireland

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Fenian Movement

• In 1865, the British suppressed the Fenian Rebellion in Ireland.

• The Fenians, a secret revolutionary organization, was established in 1858 by Irish-Americans.

• Its purpose was to achieve Ireland’s independence.

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William Gladstone (1809-1898)

* An active legislator and reformer.

* Known for his populist speeches.

* Could be preachy.* Queen Victoria

couldn’t stand him.* Tried to deal with

the “Irish Question.”* Supported a “Little

England” foreign policy.

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Gladstone’s 1st Ministry Accomplishments:

1868: Army reform peacetime flogging was illegal.

1869: Disestablishment Act Irish Catholics did not have to pay taxes to support the Anglican Church in Ireland.

1870: Education Act elementary education made available to Welsh & English children between 5-13 years.

1870: Irish Land Act curtailed absentee Protestant landowners from evicting their Irish Catholic tenants without compensation.

1871: University Test Act non-Anglicans could attend Br. universities.

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Aims•To examine briefly Gladstone’s motives.•To examine his initial measures.•To assess the success of his early measures.

‘Ireland, Ireland! That cloud in the west, that coming storm, the minister of God’s retribution upon cruel...injustice. Ireland forces upon these great social and great religious questions.’

Gladstone, in a letter to his sister, 1845.

Lesson 13

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Gladstone’s Last Ministries

3rd Ministry: 1886 First introduced an Irish Home Rule Bill.

This issue split the Liberal Party. Gladstone lost his position in a few months.

4th Ministry: 1892-1894 1893: Reintroduced a Home Rule Bill.

Provided for an Irish Parliament. Did NOT offer Ireland independence! Passed by the Commons, but rejected in the House of

Lords.

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Home Rule for Ireland??

Gladstone debates Home Rule in Commons.

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Home Rule

• Act of Union – gave Ireland voice in the British Parliament

• Home Rule – legislative drive for independence– Second parliament for Ireland free from direction

British control– Ireland would remain part of United Kingdom– Citizens would swear allegiance to British monarchy– Exercise autonomy through their own prime minister

and legislative body

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Edward CARSONEdward CARSONLeader of Ulster Unionist CouncilLeader of Ulster Unionist Council

UNIONISTUNIONIST Arthur GRIFFITHArthur GRIFFITHFounder of Sinn FeinFounder of Sinn Fein

REPUBLICANREPUBLICAN

Patrick PEARSEPatrick PEARSEIRB member and leader ofIRB member and leader of

Easter RisingEaster RisingREPUBLICANREPUBLICAN

James CONNOLLYJames CONNOLLYFounder of Irish Citizens ArmyFounder of Irish Citizens Army

SOCIALISTSOCIALIST

David LLOYD GEORGEDavid LLOYD GEORGEBritish Prime Minister 1916 - 1922British Prime Minister 1916 - 1922

Michael COLLINSMichael COLLINSLeader of IRA forces and IRBLeader of IRA forces and IRB

REPUBLICANREPUBLICAN

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Eammon DE VALERAEammon DE VALERALeader of Sinn FeinLeader of Sinn Fein

REPUBLICANREPUBLICAN

John REDMONDJohn REDMONDLeader of Irish Nationalist PartyLeader of Irish Nationalist Party

NATIONALISTNATIONALIST

Eoin MAC NEILLEoin MAC NEILLLeader of Irish Volunteer ForceLeader of Irish Volunteer Force

NATIONALISTNATIONALIST

Roger CASEMENTRoger CASEMENTMember of IRBMember of IRBREPUBLICANREPUBLICAN

James CRAIGJames CRAIGDeputy Leader of Ulster Unionist PartyDeputy Leader of Ulster Unionist Party

UNIONISTUNIONIST

Herbert ASQUITHHerbert ASQUITHBritish Prime MinisterBritish Prime Minister

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Home Rule: Unionists

• Protestants in the north were not in favor of Home Rule– Afraid of Catholics in the south– Felt they would lose status– Wanted to remain united with the British– Outnumbered Catholics– Irish Protestant Unionists began to militarize

their Orange organizations

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Home Rule: Republicans

• Southern Catholics and Protestants favored Home Rule– Republicans wanted complete autonomy– Feared Unionists – Formed a number of movements

• Irish Revolutionary Brotherhood

– Attacked military targets, British police, and Irish Unionists in the north

– Violence expanded to Britain

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Home Rule

• Beginning of the campaign for Home Rule in 1871.

• The southern Irish were determined to secure Home

Rule.

• While the six counties of northern Ireland, known as

Ulster, were predominantly Protestant, and desired

to maintain the union with Great Britain

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Unionists and Republicans

• 19th century Unionists and Republicans were fully Irish– Irish Unionists

• Primarily Protestant• Dominated the North

– Irish Republicans • Primarily Catholic• Controlled the South

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Aims•To examine what the Home Rule Bills wanted.•To analyse the impact of their failure.

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Lesson 19

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In this Punch cartoon, Harry Furniss shows William Gladstone trying to persuade his Cabinet to support his proposed Home Rule Bill in 1893.

Lesson 19

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Irish Nationalism• Sinn Féin (“Ourselves”) founded by Arthur

Griffith in 1905.

• Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) founded 1848.

• New generation takes over in the 20th c. Thomas Clarke and Sean MacDermott. Founded the Irish Volunteers, a paramilitary group, in 1913.

• Gaelic League (cultural)

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Dublin Lockout 1913

• James Larkin—founded Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union in 1908.

• Led the union against Dublin United Tramway Company, owned by William Martin Murphy. He ran Dublin’s biggest newspaper, department store, and hotel.

• Employees strike and then face lockout. • Violent protests, but after six months, it’s clear

they will lose.• Larkin leaves for the US, and James Connolly

takes his place.

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The Irish Citizen Army.

• The Irish Citizen Army was formed in November 1913 by James Connolly.

• After the outbreak of World War 1 the Irish Citizen Army and the Irish Volunteers joined together to start planning the rising

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Irish Citizen Army

• Founded in 1913 to help locked out men defend themselves.

• Connolly starts to train and drill them.

• Counter to the Ulster Volunteer Force, which had organized and trained in the north.

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James Connolly and the ICA• Leader of the ICA

– ICA set up to protect workers from police brutality

– Considered using it to attack British rule in Ireland

– Too small to act alone• Told the IRB he would join them in a rebellion

– Grew impatient & wanted to fight the British alone

– IRB made an alliance with him in Jan 1916

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Cartoon from The Bystander, 1914:‘The change in Ireland’

Aims•To learn how successive British governments tried to deal with the Irish situation.•To assess the reaction of the main strands of nationalism to these events.

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Ireland

• Independence v. home rule• Britain didn’t grant home rule until 1914

(one month before WWI so home rule was put on hold)

• 1916 – Easter Uprising---a group of people lead a rebellion against the British. Ultimately they were executed. This sparked a nationalist movement.

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Easter Rising

• The Easter Rising was a rebellion to get Ireland out of British rule.

• It was staged in Dublin Easter week 1916

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Preparing the Rising

• IRB organizers: Thomas Clarke, Sean MacDermott, Patrick Pearse, Eamonn Ceannt, Joseph Plunkett, James Connolly, and Thomas MacDonagh

• James Connolly brings in the Irish Citizen Army• Eoin MacNeill and the Irish Volunteer Force. • He caught on to what was being planned and

ordered his men not to take part in it.• Hope for German support

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The planning of the Rising

• IRB began planning for the rising.• Patrick Pearse, Eamonn Ceannt,

Joseph Plunkett , Thomas Clarke , Sean Mac Dermott , James Connolly and Thomas Mac Donagh secretly drew up the plans for the rising.

• They set the date for the rising on Easter Sunday 1916.

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Key Personality: Patrick Pearse

• Had been a member of the Gaelic League– Committed to the revival of the Irish language– Devoted his time to teaching & writing Irish

• 1903, became editor of An Claideamh Soluis

• 1908, established St. Enda’s school– Almost bankrupt him

• Conflict between Unionists & Nationalists turned him into a republican separatist

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“An Ireland not free merely but Gaelic as well; not Gaelic merely

but free as well”

• Two issues linked:– Reviving Irish – Achieving complete independence

• Became one of the foundations of the Irish state after 1922

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The Irish Volunteers.

In November 1913 the Irish Volunteers were formed. In July and August 1914 two ships landed in Howth and Kilcoole, full of guns and arms. When World War 1 started the Volunteers split up into two groups. John Redmond led the National Volunteers, who went to the trenches to fight with Britain to help Belgium, while Eoin MacNeill stayed with the Irish Volunteers in Ireland.

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Eoin Mac Neill & the Irish Volunteers

• IRB depended on the Irish Volunteers

• Mac Neill against the idea of a rising– He argued that the Irish people did not want

one– But stated that they would fight if the British

introduced conscription, tried to disarm them or failed to deliver on HR

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Who?

• Largely organized by the Irish Republican Brotherhood

• The Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army also joined

• The three groups together formed the Irish Republic

• Led by Patrick Pearse, James Connolly and others

• The Irish Republic was rising against the British

Picture found:http://irelandsown.net/connolly5.html

Picture found:http://www.archontology.org/nations/eire/eire_rep1/pearse.php

Pearse

Connolly

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Planning the RisingThe I.R.B began to plan for the Rising. Joseph Plunkett, Patrick Pearse

and Eamonn Ceannt, who were later joined by Seán Mac Dermott, Thomas Clarke, Thomas Mac Donagh and James Connolly secretly wrote the plans for the rising.

These men were to sign the proclamation. Easter Sunday 1916 was the date they set for the rising.

The Irish Volunteers had disagreements.

Eoin MacNeill did not want a rebellion unless they would win.

Roger Casement went to Germany to get guns and bombs.

The ship, the Aud arrived off the coast of Kerry on Holy Thursday but the British stopped the ship and the guns were sunk with the ship.

When Eoin MacNeill heard of the plans for the rising he cancelled all plans.

However the rising was still to go ahead on Monday.

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What was the Easter Rising??

The Easter Rising in 1916 was a very big event in history. When the Act of Union started in 1801, the British had complete control over Ireland. They took the Parliament that was in Ireland and put it in England.

All the Irish M.Ps had to travel across to London.

The Irish wanted their Parliament back.

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What Happened?

• 1,500 Volunteers took part

• A number of women as well– Acted as messengers, nurses or couriers– Countess Markievicz the most prominent

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Cumann na mBan: The Women’s Association

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When?

• Began to develop in September of 1914, after the outbreak of WWI

• Easter Week, 1916• Lasted from April 24-April 30• Most significant uprising in Ireland

since the rebellion of 1798

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Why?

• The Irish people were looking for political freedom and the establishment of an Irish republic

• The difference in ways of life between the Irish and the British was becoming too much for the Irish to handle

Picture found:

http://users.bigpond.com/kirwilli/1916/html

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Where?

• Dublin, Ireland• Headquarters for the Irish Republic

was the General Post Office on Sackville Street (now O’Connell)

• The Dublin Castle, Boland’s Flour Mill, the South Dublin Union, the Four Courts, and several railroad stations in Dublin were all sites of action

Dublin city center & O'Connell Street bridge. Picture found:http://www.irelandposters.com/

irish_movies

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The buildings they took over.

• The rebels took over:• The GPO• The Four Courts• Boland's Mill• South Dublin Union• Jacobs Factory• The Royal College of Surgeons• St. Stephens Green

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Lesson 28

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The Rising

• Easter Monday 1916

• Little attention paid at first

• Took up positions around the city– HQ in the GPO

• Pearse reads out the Proclamation of the Irish Republic

• Little other action outside Dublin

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Monday 24th April• The Irish Volunteers, The

Irish Citizen Army and Cumann na mBan gathered together at Liberty Hall.

• They took over several buildings.

• Pearse read the Proclamation on the GPO steps.

• A green, white and orange flag was raised above the GPO.

• Only 1,600 people turned up due to the confusion.

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Flag

• The flag colours were made to represent the different parts of Ireland.

• Green republic of Ireland

• White peace in all Ireland

• Orange northern Ireland

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Easter Monday 1916•The rebels, led by James Connolly of the Irish Citizen’s Army Patrick Pearse of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, have based their headquarters at the General Post Office in Sackville Street. •Pearse has just announced the creation of the Republic of Ireland from the Post Office. •Also based at the Post Office is Michael Collins. •The rebels have carefully chosen the buildings and areas to capture.•The South Dublin Union •The Four Courts •St. Stephen’s Green •Boland’s Flour Mill •The latter building is especially important as it covers the docks at which any troops sent to Dublin will land.

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•The rebels have cut telephone lines which have cut off Dublin Castle. •The British seem to have got over the initial shock of what the rebels have done and have started to organise themselves.• Troops stationed near to Dublin have been brought in. Dublin Castle have informed the most senior British army officer based in London, Lord French, what is going on. •French is an Irishman but also a strong Unionist. It is reported that French has ordered four army divisions to be sent to Dublin.

French

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Tuesday 25th April

• The country was put under martial law which means the British could shoot whoever they needed to.

• The GPO was surrounded so that no supplies reached the rebels!

• The British took over the Shelbourne Hotel and Trinity College so they could shoot the rebels in St. Stephens Green!

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•The rebels are busying themselves with reinforcing their bases. •The British army have surrounded the affected area of Dublin. •They have brought in artillery based in Trinity College. •It would seem that the plan is to split the rebels in two by driving a wedge between them. Martial law has been declared by the British.•There is looting in the streets of the city and innocent people have been shot by the British army. •The rebels based at Boland’s Flour Mill, led by Eamon de Valera, cannot stop British reinforcements landing at Dublin’s docks.

Tuesday April 25th

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Wednesday 26th April

• Today there were hardly any rebels left!

• A boat called the ‘Helga’ was sent up the Liffey to bomb Liberty Hall

• The British’s headquarters was Dublin Castle and the rebels could not gain control of it so that weakened their position

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•British army start their attack on the rebels.

•A gunboat, the ‘Helga’ has been brought in to assist this action.

•Civilian casualties are high.

•The British flatten any building in their attempt to destroy the rebels.

•It is clear that they will stop at nothing to deal with the rebellion.

Wednesday 26th April

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Arrival of the Helga

• Sails up the Liffey and begins shelling the GPO

• Volunteers evacuate the GPO– Withdraw to Moore St.

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Thursday 27th April

• England’s General Maxwell came to Ireland and took command

• O’Connell was mostly on fire and everyone had to leave it

• In Middle Abbey Street James Connolly had to be helped back to the GPO because he got shot in the foot

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•General Sir John Maxwell has arrived. The British Prime Minister, had given him one simple instruction – put down the rebellion as quickly as was possible.• No restraints have been put on his methods.•British soldiers in Dublin have made the assumption that anyone seen in the city not in a British army uniform is a rebel.• The use of artillery has also led to the city burning and the fire service cannot operate properly in such circumstances.

Thursday 27th April

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Friday 28th April• The GPO went on fire and

the rebels had to get out quickly.

• The Imperial Hotel and Clery’s, two of the most major buildings in Dublin collapsed.

• People heard the rebels singing The Soldier’s Song and it later became our national anthem.

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• The Soldier's Song• (Peadar Kearney)• We'll sing a song, a soldier's song

With cheering rousing chorusAs round our blazing fires we throngThe starry heavens o'er usImpatient for the coming fightAnd as we wait the morning's lightHere in the silence of the nightWe'll chant a soldier's song

Soldiers are wewhose lives are pledged to IrelandSome have comefrom a land beyond the waveSworn to be freeNo more our ancient sire landShall shelter the despot or the slaveTonight we man the gap of dangerIn Erin's cause, come woe or weal'Mid cannons' roar and rifles pealWe'll chant a soldier's song

• In valley green, on towering cragOur fathers fought before usAnd conquered 'neath the same old flagThat's proudly floating o'er usWe're children of a fighting raceThat never yet has known disgraceAnd as we march, the foe to faceWe'll chant a soldier's song

Soldiers are wewhose lives are pledged to IrelandSome have comefrom a land beyond the waveSworn to be freeNo more our ancient sire landShall shelter the despot or the slaveTonight we man the gap of dangerIn Erin's cause, come woe or weal'Mid cannons' roar and rifles pealWe'll chant a soldier's song

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• Sons of the Gael! Men of the Pale!The long watched day is breakingThe serried ranks of InisfailShall set the Tyrant quakingOur camp fires now are burning lowSee in the east a silv'ry glowOut yonder waits the Saxon foeSo chant a soldier's song

Soldiers are wewhose lives are pledged to IrelandSome have comefrom a land beyond the waveSworn to be freeNo more our ancient sire landShall shelter the despot or the slaveTonight we man the gap of dangerIn Erin's cause, come woe or weal'Mid cannons' roar and rifles pealWe'll chant a soldier's song

• The Soldier's Song was written in 1907 by Peadar Kearney, an uncle of Brendan Behan, but was not widely known until it was sung both at the GPO during the Easter Rising of 1916 and later at various camps where republicans were interned. Soon after, it was adopted as the national anthem, replacing God Save Ireland. The first edition of the song was published only in 1916.

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•The General Post Office is in a state of collapse and the rebels based there have escaped to a nearby building.

• A last stand is being made in King’s Street but up against 5,000 troops, the remaining rebels seem to have little chance.

•It is reported that it is near King’s Street that attacks against civilians hiding for their own safety are being carried out by members of the army.

Friday 28th April

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Saturday 29th April• Elizabeth Farrell, a female

Volunteer walked through O’Connell street holding a white flag. They were surrendering!

• The reason for this was because they did not have the GPO anymore and Pearse wanted to stop any more deaths

• 2,000 people were injured • The city was in ruins

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Surrender

• Pearse witnesses a family being shot dead in the crossfire

• Decides to surrender on Saturday

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The rebels have surrendered. Connolly

had been seriously wounded and it was Patrick Pearse that

formally surrendered to the British.

Saturday 29th April

PearseConnolly

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Pearse’s Surrender Note

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•The rebels are marched across Dublin to prison.

•They are jeered by Dubliners who have just seen part of their city wrecked.

• Damage to central Dublin is estimated at £2.5 million

•–About 500 British soldiers have been killed and over 1000 civilians.

Sunday 30th April

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•The leaders of the rebellion were shown no mercy.

•They were tried in secret by a military court and sentenced to death.

• Their deaths were only publicly announced after their executions.

• It was now that public opinion in Ireland turned towards the rebels.

•There was an overwhelming belief that the executions had been unfair and that the men involved, at the very least, deserved a public trial.

•When it became known that Connolly had been tied to a chair and shot as he was so badly wounded, there was nothing short of public revulsion in parts of Ireland.

Executions

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Executions

• More than 3,000 people were arrested and 90 people were sentenced to death. 15 were killed by the firing squad.

• James Connolly had to be strapped to a chair before getting killed because he couldn’t stand up.

• Countess Markievicz was supposed to be killed but since she was not

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Executions

• Ninety of those people were sentenced to death.

• The 15 people who signed the Proclamation were also sentenced to death.

• The would be killed by firing squad.

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Executions• British saw the Rising as a ‘stab in the back’• Put General Maxwell in charge of what to do

– They arrest about 3,000 people• 88 sentenced to death• Markievicz & De Valera escape execution• The leaders are all shot in Kilmainham Jail

– Take place over a week– Connolly so badly wounded that he was shot tied to a

chair• Nationalist opinion begins to support the rebels• Asquith travels to Dublin & orders an end to

executions

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Kilmainham Jail

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The Newspapers!

• The Irish times: The Rising was ‘a criminal adventure’!

• The Freeman’s Journal: ‘Such a reckless and barren waste of life, courage, property and the historic beauty of a capital city’

• The Irish Independent: The Rising was ‘Insane and criminal’. The leaders ‘deserve little compassion’.

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The peoples opinions!

• The peoples opinions on the seven signatories quickly changed.

• When the signatories were alive they were thought of as criminals.

• After they were executed the Irish people thought they were heroes.

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Early Irish Republican Army (IRA)– Began with campaign of violence by Irish

Republican Brotherhood (IRB) in late 1800s– Bombings and assassinations 1870-1916– IRB activities frightened Irish citizens– IRB leadership dominated by men who

believed each generation produced warriors who would fight for independence

– Provided basis for resurgence of Irish culture

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The History of the IRA• The first signs of the IRA

were evident during the early 1860.

• Between 1919 and 1921 they fought against British troops during the Irish revolution.

• In December 1920 the British government passed the Government of Ireland Act, which established six of the nine counties as the province of Northern Ireland.

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Michael Collins• In 1916, Collins returned to Ireland to take part in the Uprising in Dublin.• He fought alongside others in the General Post Office. He played a relatively

minor part and was not one of the leaders who was court-martialed. • Collins was sent to Richmond Barracks and then to Frongoch internment camp in

Wales. • He was released in December 1916 and immediately went back to Ireland. • His goal now was to revitalise the campaign to get independence for Ireland. • Collins was elected to the executive committee of Sinn Fein and he led a violent

campaign against anything that represented British authority in Ireland - primarily the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) and the Army.

• The murder of RIC officers brought a tit-for-tat policy from the British. • Ireland, post-World War One, was a dangerous country to be in. • The more killings that were carried out by Collins and the men he led in the

newly formed Irish Republican Army (IRA), the more the British responded with like.

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Lesson 33

Michael Collins, 1921 Poster for film Michael Collins,

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Irish History and the Growth of Modern Terrorism

• Modern terrorism came to Ireland in 1919– Michael Collins took command of IRA and waged

fierce campaign against British– Collins studied tactics of Russian revolutionaries, and

his followers used bombs, murder, ambushes, and other terrorist tactics to fight Protestant police force and British army. Ireland gained independence in 1921 but British held the north of Ireland

– Collins was killed in 1922 by former revolutionaries opposing peace with the British. After his death, IRA outlawed by Republic of Ireland.

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Michael Collins continued…• The notorious Black and Tans and the 'Auxies' were used by the British Army to

spread fear throughout Ireland (though primarily in the south and west). • Violence led to more violence on both sides. • On November 21st, 1920, the IRA killed 14 British officers in the Secret Service.• In reprisal, the British Army sent armoured vehicles onto the pitch at Croke

Park where people were watching a football match, and opened fire on them. • Twelve people were killed. In May 1921, the IRA set fire to the Custom House

in Dublin - one of the symbols of Britain's authority in Ireland. • However, many of those in the Dublin IRA were captured as a result of this

action.• The British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, was given some blunt advice

by his military commanders in Ireland. "Go all out or get out" - meaning that the army should be allowed to do as it wished to resolve the problem, or if this was not acceptable at a political level, the British should pull out of Ireland as the army was in an un-winnable position as matters stood then.

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Irish History and the Growth of Modern Terrorism

• Role of British army in rebirth of IRA– As violence grew in Northern Ireland after

failed Catholic civil rights movement, British sent army to stop rioting

– Young soldiers sided with loyalists against Republicans and brutally repressed Catholics

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A state of war exists and

murder and violence against

the English are not crimes until

the alien invaders have left the

country.

An t-Óglach (IRA newspaper), 31 January 1919

Dan Breen was one of the men behind the Soloheadbeg ambush in Co. Tipperary, 21 January 1919, in which

two Irish constables of the RIC were killed.

It marked the start of the Anglo-Irish war.

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IRA: Tipperary Flying Column

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IRA: Mayo Flying ColumnThese men ‘defied six hundred British troops at Tourmakeady’ according to An t-Óglach.

They lost one man and six shotguns in this famous battle.

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IRA: Mid-

ClareBrigade

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Irish Republican Army Order, 30 March 1920, five days after the arrival of the first English recruits to the Royal Irish Constabulary.

1. Whereas the spies and traitors known as the Royal Irish Constabulary are holding this country for the enemy, and whereas said spies and bloodhounds are conspiring with the enemy to bomb and bayonet and otherwise outrage a peaceful, law-abiding, and liberty-loving people;

2. Wherefore do we hereby solemnly proclaim and suppress said spies and traitors and do hereby solemnly warn prospective recruits that they join the R.I.C. at their own peril. All nations are agreed as to the fate of traitors. It has the sanction of God and man.

By order of the G.O.C. Irish Republican Army

DROGHEDA BEWARE If in the vicinity a policeman is shot, five of the leading Sinn Feiners will be shot. It is not coercion - - it is an eye for an eye. We are not drink-maddened savages as we have been described in the Dublin rags. We are not out for loot. We are inoffensive to women. We are as humane as other Christians, but we have restrained ourselves too long. Are we to lie down while our comrades are being shot down in cold blood by the corner boys and ragamuffins of Ireland? We say ‘Never’, and all the inquiries will not stop our desire for revenge. Stop the shooting of the police or we will lay low every house that smells of Sinn Fein. Remember Balbriggan.

(By Order) Black and Tans

Black & Tans notice, September 1920

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British administration under siege, winter 1920.Barricade and barbed wire entanglements made Dublin Castle almost a beleaguered fortress.

Officials were unable to stir abroad without an armed escort.

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‘Bloody Sunday’, 21 November 1920.

The ‘Cairo Gang’, so called because of their Middle Eastern experience, some of them were among the 12 British intelligence officers assassinated by Michael Collins’s ‘squad’ on the morning of 21 November 1921.

The numbers refer to the names on the back, where Nos 1, 2 and 3 are marked as being Irish.

Neil Jordan’s depiction in the film Michael Collins of British armoured cars bursting through the main gate of Croke

Park and firing their machine guns on the crowdwas criticised as pure invention.

In fact, armoured cars were involved but outside the ground and, according to the official enquiry the one at the

St James’s Avenue exit fired fifty rounds.

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Five hundred arrests were made within forty-eight hours of the murders of ‘Bloody Sunday’. Here an Auxiliary cadet has picked up a couple of suspects in the Ministry of Labour offices in

the Rotunda, Dublin, and marches them through the streets at pistol point.

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‘Behind the wire’.Nearly 5,000 republicans were incarcerated in internment camps by the early summer of 1921.

‘Conditions were not severe. Many were glad to be out of the struggle.’

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The end of the affair?The Irish Free State Army takes over Dublin Castle. A Free State officer makes arrangements with a British officer, while

some of the first recruits for the Free State Army wait and look round them with a wild surmise.

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Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921• Eamonn de Valera, considered to be the leading republican politician in Ireland,

sent Collins to London in October 1921 to negotiate a treaty. • It was generally recognised by both sides that the situation as it stood in Ireland

could not be allowed to continue. • The difficult negotiations took three months before the treaty was signed by

Collins and Arthur Griffiths. • In December 1921, it was agreed that Ireland should have dominion status within

the British Empire; i.e. that Ireland could govern itself but remain within the British Empire.

• The six northern counties were allowed to contract out of the treaty and remain part of the United Kingdom.

• To Collins, the treaty was simply the start of a process that, in his eyes, would lead to full independence for what was now the Irish Free State.

• Collins is said to have commented when he signed the treaty that:• "I tell you, I have signed my death warrant"

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Arguments for & against the TreatyNorthern Ireland and Its Neighbours

since 1920 by S. Gillespie & G. Jones, Hodder & Stoughton,, 034062034X, p. 23

We have got peace which is what the peoplewant.

We are able to set up our own governmentand rule ourselves.

An oath of loyalty to the King hasno meaning.

This is a step towards independence. We willtake other steps and become fully independent.

We are not in a position to start another warwith Britain.

You may have peace but where is theRepublic we have fought for from 1916?

Your powers are limited while you stayin the Empire and have the King as head of

state.

We swore an oath of loyalty to the Republicand we will not swear an oath to the King.

Britain will continue to interfere in Ireland'saffairs unless you remove her power completely.

We will still have British troopsIn our country.

Lesson 32 – OHT 3

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Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921• There were many in the south who believed that Collins had betrayed the

republican movement. • These people, including de Valera, wanted an independent and united Ireland. • Some believed that Collins had sold out to the British government. • Few seemed to realise that Collins was not a politician and that he had been put

into a situation in which he had no experience of what to do.• He was up against British politicians who were experienced in delicate

negotiations.• Some have argued that de Valera deliberately put Collins in this situation

knowing that if he came back with an unacceptable treaty, it would seriously damage the reputation of Collins and weaken whatever political kudos he had in Ireland - therefore removing any potential threat he may have been to de Valera at a political level.

• It is known that Collins did not feel that he had the necessary knowledge and experience to get what was wanted and he asked de Valera to send others instead of him.

• Some, such as Countess Markievicz, openly called Collins a traitor to the cause.

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Anglo-Irish Treaty• The Dáil accepted the treaty by just seven votes. • This, in itself, seemed a justification of what Collins had set out to achieve. • Arthur Griffiths replaced De Valera as president of the Dáil and Collins was appointed chairman

of the provisional government which would take over Ireland once the British had left. • Those who did not support the treaty fell back on violence and a civil war took place in Ireland

from April 1922 to May 1923. • The IRA split into the 'Regulars' (those who supported the treaty) and the 'Irregulars' (those who

did not). • On August 22nd, 1922, Collins journeyed to County Cork. • He was due to meet troops of the new Irish Army. • His car was ambushed at a place called Beal na mBlath and Collins was shot dead.• To this day, no-one is completely sure what happened or who killed him. • No-one else was killed in the ambush. • Collins' body lay in state in Dublin for three days and thousands paid their respects.• Thousands also lined the streets for his funeral procession. •

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Anglo-Irish Treaty 1921

• Security and Defence – Britain was to have 3 naval bases in Ireland.

• Ulster– Would be able to opt out of the Treaty – so could end up being

partitioned permanently.– A Boundary Commission would be set up to examine the

boundaries of Ulster and make recommendations.

• The powers of the new Irish state– Southern Ireland would have dominion status – granted Ireland

the same powers as Canada and other Dominions within the Empire. This was not independence. This meant full control of domestic affairs, membership of the Empire and the Irish would have to swear allegiance to the Crown.

– Oath of allegiance was watered down.

Lesson 32 – OHT 2

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2020thth CENTURY CENTURY

• 1921 : Ireland divided into two separate parts• Based on majority religion of each part• Northern part PROTESTANTPROTESTANT became known as

NORTHERN IRELANDNORTHERN IRELAND – remained part of UK• Southern part CATHOLICCATHOLIC became known as

IRISH FREE STATEIRISH FREE STATE• Both had own Parliaments• But continued to recognise English monarchy

and laws regarding foreign affairs• 1949 : Irish Free State cut ties with Britain• Became the REPUBLIC OF IRELANDREPUBLIC OF IRELAND

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Background

• In 1921, Ireland was divided into 2 separate parts, based on majority religion– Northern Ireland (which was predominantly

Protestant)– Southern Ireland (Irish Free State)

• Had their own parliament but consulted the English monarchy regarding foreign affairs

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Why is Northern Ireland not part of Ireland?

• In 1921, after some fighting, the British tried to make everyone happy by creating an Irish Free State and Northern Ireland, which would remain part of the United Kingdom.

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Creation of Irish Free State / Northern Ireland

• In 1921, the island of Ireland was partitioned by the British government.

• The 26 southern counties gaining independence from Britain, while the 6 northeastern countries remained part of the United Kingdom

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66% Protestant

33% Catholic

10% Protestant

90% Catholic

ULSTER

(Six counties - Northern Ireland)

Stayed part of UK

66% Protestant

33% Catholic

The Catholics felt cheated by the treaty.

They wanted to be a part of a united Ireland. They

felt abandoned in the new Ulster dominated by

Protestants. From the start they felt no loyalty to the ‘Orange State’.

IRISH FREE STATE

(becoming the Republic of Ireland in

1949)

Given Home Rule, the right to have its own government and make its own decisions.

BUT….

•The Free State stayed in the British Empire.

•Irish politicians had to swear an oath of loyalty to the King of Britain.

•Ireland had to accept the loss of Ulster.

Lesson 35

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Ireland Continued

• Post WWI – the Nationalists protested Parliament and declared themselves independent.

• The Irish Republican Army (IRA) fought for Irish independence

• 1921 – Britain divided Ireland: the south was named a dominion but declared itself a republic in 1949

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Background to the “Troubles”

• Following Partition in 1921 the Protestants took steps to ensure they had control

• ‘Gerrymandering’ was used to keep control of town and city councils

• This meant they could control the allocation of new housing and many different jobs

• Catholics were second class citizens

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What did this mean for Northern Ireland?

• They would have some self-government, but still be part of the U.K.

• The Catholics were now the minority.

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Northern Ireland

• At the time, the 6 northeastern counties had a built-in Protestant majority (65/35)

• Ethnic bias in the distribution of housing and welfare services lead to more turmoil between the two sides