Fleeing the Famine The Great Hunger, Cecil Woodham-Smith, Harper & Row, New York, 1962, (pp.270-271)

Irish emigration across the Atlantic has gripped the imagination of the world, but there was another emigration, more numerous though less celebrated, in which the Irish in overwhelming masses crossed the Irish Channel to land at ports in England, Scotland and South Wales. This was the flight of the very poor, those who could not 'make out the money' even for a passage to Quebec: a deck passage to England in a steamer could be had for a few shillings. For instance, to go from Drogheda to Liverpool in the well-known steamer Faugh a Ballagh cost five shillings; in small sailing-ships engaged in coastal trade the crossing could be made for half a crown, while a large export of coal from Cardiff to Cork enabled vessels to bring passengers back not merely at a very low rate but for nothing at all. Mr. Evan David, chairman of the Board of Guardians of Cardiff Union, stated that a vast influx of Irish from Cork and Waterford were 'brought over as ballast without any payment for their passage ... Captains find it cheaper to ship and unship this living ballast than one of lime or shingle' and until recent years the memory of emaciated, ragged men, women and children, staggering from the holds, more than half dead, lingered in the ports of South Wales. Crossing to Great Britain was a familiar experience for thousands of Irish; they regularly went to work in the harvest, and had done so for centuries; cattle-dealers crossed two or three times a year; labourers, from the beginning of the industrial revolution, had gone over from Ireland in masses, to dig docks and canals, to work on railways and in factories and mills. With luck the sea voyage took only a few hours, and there were regular services of steamers of 300 to 800 tons, daily to Liverpool from Dublin, and weekly, or twice-weekly, to Liverpool from Drogheda, Youghal, Sligo, Cork, Waterford and Belfast; from Belfast and Derry there was also a regular service to Glasgow. There was an irresistible attraction in England--the starving were given food. Under the English Poor Law, outdoor relief was permitted in most districts, and the destitute Irish cottier knew that, once he got himself across the Channel, he would not be allowed to die of hunger. In addition, from the end of 1846 the flight of the very poor received an extra impetus from the consequences of a new method of clearing penniless tenantry from estates. Landlords were applying not for an eviction order but for a judgment against the tenant who owed rent; he was put in prison and his wife and children were left to fend for themselves. The prospect spread terror. Separation is the worst of evil to an Irish family, and the people did not wait to be proceeded against; they fled. 'An application of this kind is known throughout a barony as soon as it takes place,' wrote the Head Constable of Liverpool on February 16, 1847,'and when known the cottier and his family without hesitation put everything portable on their backs and make their way towards Dublin or some other seaport, determined to reach England, where they all understand they will not be allowed to starve. . . .' If they were sent to the workhouse, it was preferable because the dietary was better. In an English workhouse. inmates received certain quantities of sugar, meat, butter and tea, in contrast to stirabout twice a day in an Irish workhouse, with no 'animal food' of any kind. 'They have a great dread of the workhouse in Ireland,' stated a relieving officer in South Wales. The Chief Constable of Liverpool decided to make inquiries into the flood of poor arriving from Ireland. He sent over two experienced detective constables who travelled through Kildare, King's County, Westmeath, Roscommon, Galway, Mayo and Sligo. It was better, wrote the Chief Constable, after receiving their reports, not to mention names, but certain landlords were pressing very hard on their tenants, and in one instance notices to appear in court had been served on 1400 tenants, of whom 900 fled. 'During the progress of the constables . . . they encountered thousands of men, women and children upon the high roads, moving towards the sea side for the purpose of embarking for England, most of them begging their way and all apparently in a stare of great destitution.' In the west, at one quarter sessions, held at Ballinrobe, County Mayo, no fewer than 6,000 applications had been made for judgments for rent, and Jonathan Pim, a secretary of the Relief Committee of the Society of Friends, wrote that a general movement of the people from west to east was in progress; they were leaving their cabins apd spreading over the eastern counties, all begging. Their physical condition put work out of the question, nor were they looking towards the future and hoping to establish themselves in Britain; they wanted only one thing--to be fed: and in search of food an army of paupers descended on Britain.   (page 279) No other town was struck by such an invasion [as Liverpool], but Glasgow, the second point of entry for destitute Irish, repeated events in Liverpool on a smaller scale. In December, 1846, the city became overrun with Irish beggars, '. . . the influx of paupers from the other side of the channel was never so great ... as it is at present,' and statements taken from destitute persons proved they had been sent off by landlords and their agents--'they are coaxed or driven out of the sister kingdom by those who should succour them.' Glasgow resorted earlier to deporting the destitute; 130 paupers were sent back to Ireland by the Glasgow and Ardrossan steamers during January, 1847, and nearly four hundred given passages to Ireland by the Glasgow Town's hospital. Nevertheless, in June the streets of Glasgow were 'literally swarming' with Irish beggars, and between June 15 and August 17, 26,335 persons, mainly destitute, arrived in Glasgow, many 'absolutely without means of procuring lodging even of the meanest description'. As in Liverpool, they crept into such shelter as they could find; an old disused barn in the Gorbals was occupied by more than fifty people, and a cellar at No. 95 Bridegate, measuring ten feet by ten, held eight adults and no fewer than seventeen children. Three times in June the City Parochial Board petitioned that steamers from Ireland should be quarantined, but because quarantine meant a loss to shipowners inspection of passengers on arrival was substituted, with the result that a fever epidemic broke out in Glasgow: 9,290 cases were recorded, of whom 5,316 were Irish. However, a large number in very poor districts undoubtedly remained unknown. The Royal Infirmary put up a fever shed, holding 140 patients, on the green outside the Infirmary, and the Barony Hospital a similar shed for 250.

	Updated on Saturday, 01-Jul-2000 18:10:16 MDT