The Irish in the nineteenth-century empire
1600-present: 10,000,000 Irish abroad; population of Ireland today: 5,000,000
I. Migration and the empire
Estimates of Irish migration, 1815-1910
Bielenberg, The Irish Diaspora, 224.
Destination No. of emigrants % 4,765,000 61.7 1,468,000 19.0 1,057,000 13.7 361,000 4.7 35,000 0.5 34,000 0.4 7,720,000 100
II. An Irish empire?
A. British and Indian Army
British Army vs. East India Company Army
Second Anglo-Sikh War, 1848 [map]
Kipling, Kim
enlisted men
Akenson, The Irish Diaspora
Year Irish pop (% total UK pop) Irish-born % of British Army 1831 32.3 42.2 1841 30.6 37.2 1861 20.0 28.4 1871 17.5 24.5 1881 14.8 20.9 1891 12.5 18.4 Indian Army
1813-57 50% of all recruits 1850s 50% of 14,000 Indian Army soldiers 40% of 26,000 British Army regulars in India Anglo-Irish officers
1850s-1900 17% of officers in the British Army (30% in the Indian Army)
"rishti"
B. colonial professionals and administrators
India
1817: 20% of the British population in India was Irish
colonial administration
Indian Civil Service Exam (1855)
Trinity College (1855-1863: 24% of recruits)
c. 1000 Irishmen in ICS during the 1880s
governor-general/viceroys: Lord Canning, Lord Mayo, Lord Dufferin, Lord Lansdowne
South Africa
1/3 of all colonial governors, judges, and mid-level bureaucrats
arrival of Governor Lowry Cole
18,000 Irish in SA in 1904
police
NSW: 67% in 1865
Victoria: 82% in 1872
C. religious personnel
Catholic clergy
Protestant missionaries
Amy Carmichael and the temple children
