Prelude to the Irish Famine: The Potato (2024)

FAQs

Prelude to the Irish Famine: The Potato? ›

By 1840, a Connaught farmer would have eaten three potato meals a day, containing a total of around 5 to 6kg (12 to 14lb) of potatoes. In conclusion, on the eve of the famine around a third of Irish people, concentrated in Munster and Connaught, depended on the potato almost exclusively.

The proximate cause of the famine was the infection of potato crops by blight (Phytophthora infestans) throughout Europe during the 1840s. Blight infection caused 100,000 deaths outside Ireland and influenced much of the unrest that culminated in European Revolutions of 1848.

The late renowned Irish Poet Eavon Boland's chilling Famine Poem “Quarantine” comes to mind in such landscapes.

It decimated Ireland's population, which stood at about 8.5 million on the eve of the Famine. It is estimated that the Famine caused about 1 million deaths between 1845 and 1851 either from starvation or hunger-related disease. A further 1 million Irish people emigrated.

More than the crop failed, however; so did the entire system by which England gov- erned Ireland. John Mitchel, a witness to the period that the Irish remember as “The Great Hunger,” wrote, “The Almighty, indeed, sent the potato blight, the English created the famine.” The Irish were a conquered people.

The question is often asked, why didn't the Irish eat more fish during the Famine? A lot of energy is required to work as a fisherman. Because people were starving they did not have the energy that would be required to go fishing, haul up nets and drag the boats ashore.

The Irish potato famine was not simply a natural disaster. It was a product of social causes. Under British rule, Irish Catholics were prohibited from entering the professions or even purchasing land. Instead, many rented small plots of land from absentee British Protestant landlords.

Pope Pius IX issued the encyclical Praedecessores Nostros in 1847 urging the faithful both to pray for an end to the Famine and the suffering of the Irish people, and to donate money to ease their plight. Considerable sums were subsequently collected for Irish famine relief throughout the Catholic world.

By 1849, the forcible displacement of poor Irish cottiers, under the guise of relief legislation, became the major channel through which the Irish economy was remade. Thus, the British Government deliberately facilitated Irish deaths during the Great Famine, and therefore committed genocide against the Irish people.

The great Irish potato famine of the late 1840s and early 1850s was a massive social catastrophe which resulted in the death of about one million people – a scale of mortality which, taking into account the scale of Ireland's population in 1845, places this disaster among the worst in modern world history.

What stopped the Irish famine? ›

With a population significant reduced by 2 to 3 million, and increased food imports after 1850, the Irish Potato Famine eventually ended around 1852.

The donors included the rich and the famous—President Polk, of the United States, Queen Victoria, Pope Pius IX—while people in Italy, Antigua, France, Venezuela, Hong Kong and Barbados were among those who sent contributions.

Mass evictions, the near-famines of 1861-1864 and 1879-82, and the hardships of subsistence farming meant emigration to North America continued to be seen as an opportunity to support and improve life.

Assuming by “the British,” you mean the British government, then the answer is yes. However, the government's response was inadequate when compared to the unprecedented scope of the disaster. Over one million people died of starvation and disease in Ireland and another million fled the country because of lack of food.

Why were potatoes so important to Ireland? The potato plant was hardy, nutritious, calorie-dense, and easy to grow in Irish soil. By the time of the famine, nearly half of Ireland's population relied almost exclusively on potatoes for their diet, and the other half ate potatoes frequently.

As the people became too weak to labour, British and Anglo-Irish landlords evicted them from their miserable dwellings, leaving them at the mercy of the elements. One and a half million Irish people starved to death, while massive quantities of food were being exported from their country to Britain.

Great Famine, famine that occurred in Ireland in 1845–49 when the potato crop failed in successive years. The crop failures were caused by late blight, a disease that destroys both the leaves and the edible roots, or tubers, of the potato plant.

Although the Irish potato blight receded in 1850, the effects of the famine continued to spur Irish emigration into the 20th century. Still facing poverty and disease, the Irish set out for America where they reunited with relatives who had fled at the height of the famine.

The Quakers collected mostly American food, flour, rice, biscuits and Indian meal, along with clothes and bedding. They set up soup kitchens, purchased seed, and provided funds for local employment. During 1846–47, the Quakers gave approximately £200,000 for relief in Ireland.

Photographs of the Great Famine in Ireland (1845 – 1852) and famine victims are scarce because photography was a relatively new invention at the time. The equipment needed to produce photographs was expensive and thus only the wealthy classes had access to it.