The Great Irish Potato FamineThe History Press, 2002 M11 1 - 160 pages In the century before the great famine of the late 1840s, the Irish people, and the poor especially, became increasingly dependent on the potato for their food. So when potato blight struck, causing the tubers to rot in the ground, they suffered a grievous loss. Thus began a catastrophe in which approximately one million people lost their lives and many more left Ireland for North America, changing the country forever. During and after this terrible human crisis, the British government was bitterly accused of not averting the disaster or offering enough aid. Some even believed that the Whig government's policies were tantamount to genocide against the Irish population. James Donnelly's account looks closely at the political and social consequences of the great Irish potato famine and explores the way that natural disasters and government responses to them can alter the destiny of nations. |
Contents
Famine and Government Response 18456 | |
Production Prices and Exports 184651 | |
Soup Kitchens and Amending the Poor | |
The Amended Poor Law and Mass Death 184751 | |
Landlords and Tenants | |
Excess Mortality and Emigration | |
A Famine in Irish Politics | |
Constructing the Memory of the Famine 18501900 | |
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Common terms and phrases
A.J.P. Taylor ablebodied acres agents agricultural amended poor law BennWalsh Black 47 blight Board Bourke Britain British government Catholic cent Clare clearances coffin ships committees Confederate Connacht Cork corn cottiers counties Davitt declared destitute disease dispossessed distress Dublin early ejectment emigration English estates excess mortality exports families farmers Galway genocide government’s grain Grosse Île guardians historians Illustrated London impotent poor Irish famine Irish Folklore Commission Irish landlords Irish poor Irish poor law Jail journal July June Kennedy Kerry Kilrush union labourers landowners Last conquest late less Lord mass evictions Mayo million Mokyr nationalist O’Connell O’Connell’s O’Neill outdoor relief paupers Peel’s political poor law commissioners poor rates population prefamine proprietors quoted ibid quoted in Correspondence relief commissioners rent repeal Repeal Association responsibility revisionist Rossa Routh Skibbereen smallholders Smith O’Brien soup kitchen starvation starving Sullivan tenants Trevelyan Vandeleur wages Whig workhouse Young Irelanders