Nassau Senior (English political economist), Ireland:  Journals and Correspondence (1835).
        Take away these elements of prosperity--cut up Yorkshire into holdings of from six to twelve acres--let its population, instead of being collected in towns, be spread over the country, deprive them of diligence and of skill, let neither property nor life be secure--and then see whether the landlord can make them comfortable.  A few instances have occurred in which men of large means, and with great courage and energy, by making it the business of their lives, have raised a Connaught or a Munster population, not indeed to the average English standard, but to a state which, when compared with that of their neighbours, was one of prosperity.  but to produce this prosperity, and to maintain it, they must eject and consolidate.
        ...The people of England and of Ireland--meaning here, by Ireland, the provinces of Munster, Connaught, some parts of Leinster, and the whole county of Donegal--are among the most dissimilar nations in Europe.  One is chiefly Protestant, the other is chiefly Roman Catholic; one is principally manufacturing and commercial, the other almost wholly agricultural; one lives chiefly in towns, the other in the country.  The population of the one is laborious, but prodigal; no fatigue repels them--no amusement diverts them from the business of providing the means of subsistence and enjoyment; but they consume almost as quickly as they acquire.  That of the other is indolent and idle, but parsimonious.... They leave their potato-grounds foul, merely to save the labour of weeding them; their cottages let in the rain, because they will not take the trouble to thatch them; a wake, or a fair, or a funeral, attracts from its occupations the inhabitants of a whole village.  They can work for a master, and while his eye is upon them, but are negligent taskmasters to themselves.  The one country possesses a large middle-class, the other is divided between landlords and peasants:  in the one the proprietors of the soil are connected by origin, by interest, and by feeling, with those who occupy it; in the other, they are, in many cases, strangers, and, in almost as many, enemies.  In the one, public sympathy is with the law; in the other, it is with those that break it.  In England crime is infamous; in Ireland it is popular....
        With equal impropriety we have transferred our English notions into Ireland.  There are there also persons called landlords, farmers, and labourers, but they resemble their English types in little but name.  In Ireland the landlord has been accustomed to erect no buildings, and make no improvements whatever.  He is, in general, a mere receiver of rent; his only relation to his tenant is that of a creditor.  They look to him for no help, and, on the other hand, he can exercise over them little control.  It is very seldom that he prescribes to them any system of husbandry, or, if he do so, that he can safely enforce it.  He cannot remove them, if dissatisfied with their treatment of the land; still less can he do so for the purpose of throwing farms together, and introducing the processes which require large capitals and large holdings.  Even at the expiration of a lease, the landlord who displaces the existing occupier is bold; the tenant who takes his place is rash.  With the labourers the landlord has scarcely any relation whatever....
        Again, the Irish farmer is not, like the Englishman, a capitalist, employing, on a tract of perhaps three hundred acres, a capital of £3000, maintaining thirteen or fourteen labouring families, and paying £9 or £10 a week in wages.  The Irish farmer occupies from six to twenty acres, the average extent of a substantial farm being perhaps twelve acres.  The farm-buildings consist of hovels for the family, the horse, the cow, and the pigs....
        The labourer, again, is not, like the English labourer, a mere cottager working on another man's land and for another man's benefit, and dependent for subsistence on his wages when in employment, and on his parish when unemployed.  He is, in general, the occupier of a patch of land, from one to four roods in extent, manured for him by the farmer, on which he raises the potatoes that are to feed his family.  For this, and for the site of his cabin, which he has probably built himself, he pays a rent worked out in labour.  Thus, if the rent for the rood of potato-ground be £2 a year, and that of the cabin £1 and his labour be estimated at 6d. a day, he works for the farmer 120 days.  The rest of his time he gives to his own potato-ground, or to fairs or wakes, or to cowering over the fire; or, if he is active and enterprising, he comes over the assist in getting in the English harvest, leaving his wife and children to beg during his absence.  And if these resources are insufficient, he turns beggar himself.

Father Theobold Mathew to Sir Charles Trevelyan (18 June 1846).  [Trevelyan was secretary to the Treasury, & was put in charge of Irish famine measures.  Mathew was a well-known temperance advocate.]
        Cork.  It will gratify you to be assured that the wise and generous measure adopted by government has been attended with complete success.  A frightful famine has been warded off, and the inhuman speculations of corn, flour, potato etc. dealers have been confounded.  Our people are becoming fond of maize flour, and I am confident it will ever continue to be used in Ireland as a necessary of life.  The mode of preparation best suited to the condition of the people, and what is generally adopted, is what in Italy is generally called polenta....
 

Sir Randolph Routh, Commissary General, to Trevelyan (31 July 1846). [He had received instructions in Nov 1845 to proceed to Dublin to join a relif commission to inquire into potato scarcity.]
        At an early priod in the autumn of 1845 the general blight in the potato crop throughout the south and west districts, and detached parts of the north and east, excited so much alarm that though it did not exaggerate the fact, the apprehension was so great that it antedated the period when the supply would fail.  The crop was unusually large, and early in December a very severe frost set in, and appeared partially to arrest the progress of the disease under certain circumstances.... There was also a marked capriciousness in the disease itself, leaving particular fields untouched and healthy, whilst others in their immediate vicinity were almost a mass of corruption.  None of the remedies suggested for the preservation of the crop were successful, but that which most assisted this object was the plan adopted by the peasantry themselves, of leaving the potatoes in the ground until they were required for use.
        I have not been able to obtain any satisfactory explanation of this calamity, which has spread simultaneously over the greater part of Europe and America, and in every diversity of climate, and it is as difficult to decide whether the fungus is the cause or effect of the disease.... As soon as the rains set in towards the end of January and until March, the partial suspension of the disease gave way, and reappeared with greater virulence, not only amongst the potatoes already tainted, but manifesting itself amongst the sound pits in districts which hitherto had resisted it....
        It will be unnecessary for me to detail the arrangements entered into by Her Majesty's government for the introduction of a new food from the United States, which by its cheapness and nutritious qualities was calculated to replace advantageously the loss of the potato crop.  The quantity of Indian corn and Indian corn meal imported from America into Cork through the house of Messrs Baring Brothers and Co. somewhat exceeded eight thousand tons.  No individual could have undertaken it, for the duty was a prohibition, and being a new article of food, untried, and of doubtful success, it was altogether out of the sphere of mercantile speculation.... It has [eventually] become so popular, that the oatmeal which we have in store is seldom asked for, though offered at a low price.  The Indian meal is so nutritious, that one meal in the morning supports the labourer throughout the day; and it has been remarked by the peasantry that where it has been used, fever has been less prevalent, or has entirely disappeared.
        The great object which now presented itself was to postpone the assistance of government to the lastest possible period, and to enforce the necessity of self-exertion as a claim to that assistance, for once commenced this aid could not be suspended or withheld without danger to the public peace.... The aid of the government should be only auxiliary to the efforts of the people, and the large amount subscribed, and much of that in small sums from 6d to 10s, afford a gratifying proof of the good feelings of the proprietors....
        The district committees...have had great difficulties to contend with--a large population clamourous for food and employment, and no precise information of the extent of works that might be approved, or the day on which they could be commenced.  I do not know which is the most difficult undertaking, to feed or to employ such vast numbers [except] that the former will brook no delay, nor admit of interruption.... But the principal feature in these operations...are the small comparative expense at which this large quantity of food has been made to supply a whole population, the little disturbance, almost unperceived, that it has occasioned to the ordinary course of trade, and the quiet manner throughout all its channels in which the relief has been distributed....
        A practical relief of this description, distributed to a nation in small issues, to reach the poorest families, is an event of rare occurrence, even in history.  It is a formidable undertaking even to anticipate, and yet, with whtever imperfection, successfully to have accomplished it, may be received as a work of much labour and thought, and not unworthy of your lordships' commendation; and it is a just tribute to pay to the characteristic endurance of the Irish peasantry that no outrage or violence has disturbed the public peace, and in its place a deep feeling of gratitude has risen in return for the paternal care of Her Majesty's government.
 

Letter from Col. Jones to Trevelyan (1 Sept 1846).
Board of Works, Dublin.  The prospects for the ensuing season are melancholy to reflect upon; the potato crop may now be fairly considered as past; either from disease, or from the circumstance of the produce being small, it has been consumed; many families are now living upon food scarcely fit for hogs.  I am apprehensive government will find it necessary to send meal into some of the remote districts in the west, where there is a large population who live upon potatoes in good years; there is scarcely a town, and if there is, there is scarcely any trade with the ports beyond the very few articles or commodities that a very poor population require, therefore it is not to be expected that private dealers will be able or willing to introduce meal in such quantities as will be required.  I am very much afraid the government will not find free trade, with all the employment we can give, a succedaneum for the loss of the potato.... The every day cry is for government to do something for the starving population.  It is really distressing to read the applications for assistance from Skibbereen and that district, where there is abundance of fish close to the shore, lying upon the beach, and no salt to cure them.  There is another point which requires early attention.  What is to be done when bad weather sets in and the people cannot be employed on works; are they to be paid or fed?
 

Report from Parker to Jones, on conditions in Scull & Skibbereen (31 Dec 1846).
        I have just returned from a tour of inspection to the west.... The parish of Scull is very extensive, lying between Roaring Water Bay and Dunmaus, and contains about 18,000 inhabitants; and of these, at least 16,000 are in a state of utter destitution, and most of the remainder will be similarly situated as soon as the little stores they have are consumed....
        A great number of people must inevitably be swept off by starvation, and by diseases arising from starvation, such as bowel complaints, scurvy, dropsy, and fever.  Food is daily becoming scarcer, and much dearer, and where are future supplies to come from?  Hitherto Skibbereen, with its immediate neighbourhood, has been the peculiar object of solicittude [but Scull & the whole area is] equally bad off.... The people now drop off fast, and deaths increase daily.... There is no corn for seed; hitherto potatoes have alone been cultivated, and now no corn can be procured for seed but if seed is not sown, the state of things next winter will be worse than this.
        In the promontory of Kilmore and parish of Scull, no very extensive system of drainage...can be advantageously carried out; a more wretched, rocky, wild country I never saw, yet there is a large population.  I have visited the poor in these parishes, and the scenes I have witnessed are dreadful; death seems stamped on the face of thousands; in many places I could with difficulty move, I was so beset with hundreds imploring assistance.  I am quite positive that unless something be speedily done by throwing in supplies at a moderate price, by affording gratuitous relief, or by affording immediate means of emigration for the most destitute the bulk of the population must be swept off.  The desolation is indeed complete; the people seem harmless and inoffensive; political agitation has hardly reached them, and the inhabitants of these remote south-western parts are fit objects for the especial protection of government.
 

Trevelyan, Treasury circular to heads of Irish departments on famine relief measures (10 Feb 1847).
        The plan at present in operation for the relief of distress in Ireland consists of two separate parts.  The first of these is a system of public works...but although this Act has, to a certain extent, answered its object, and a large part of the population of Ireland has been preserved from famine..., the operation of the Act has been attended with serious evils, and it has become indispensably necessary to have recourse to some other remedy.... The government never relied on the [Public Works] Act...as the only safeguard against the impending scarcity.  It was never contemplated that so large a proportion of the labouring population would have been sent upon the roads and other public works as has proved to be the case, but it was supposed that the pressure of a great public would have led to increased exertions on the part of the upper and middle classes of society, and that employment of destitute labourers being provided in this way, a moderate number only would have been left to be maintained on the relief works....
        Another cause of the partial failure of the Act is the unexpected magnitude of the public calamity.  Although upwards of two millions of persons, either directly or indirectly obtain assistance from the relief works, there are other multitudes who stand equally in need of relief.  The relief works do not always furnish a subsistence even for those who are employed on them.  The wages allowed have been higher than have been usually given for agricultural labour in Ireland, but at the present prices of food, they are insufficient for the support of a family; and instances of starvation daily occur....
        The dependence of the people on the relief works has also led to this formidable result.  A large portion of the soil of Ireland is cultivated by cottier and con-acre tenants, whose subsistence has hitherto been mainly derived from the potatoes grown by themselves.  This numerous class has become destitute by the failure of the potato.... If these people are retained on the works their lands will remain uncultivated.  If they were discharged from the works, without some other provision being made for them, they would starve.
        The other part of the plan at present in operation consists of a system of direct relief by means of the sale and gratuitous distribution of food.  Relief committees have been formed in most parts of Ireland.... The sums so obtained by them are laid out in the purchase of meal and other kinds of food, which are again retailed at cost price to those who have the means of purchasing, and are given gratuitously to those who have not.  More lately the plan of establishing soup-kitchens has been adopted..., and is now being rapidly extended throughout Ireland, it being found by experience that food given in this shape goes further, and is more nourishing and reviving than any other.... Having been found very successful in mitigating the effects of the prevailing calamity, [the soup-kitchen scheme] has been made the foundation of the measures now about to be adopted....
        One point of pressing importance is, that every practicable exertion should be made...to prepare the land for the next crop; [this] must mainly depend upon the influence...over the cultivators...by the resident gentry, the landlords, agents, and other persons interested in the land...[in order] to obtain the largest possible amount of produce at the next harvest....
        Another point on which you will make it your object to secure the cooperation of the upper and middle classes of society is the proper formation, and subsequent revision...of the lists of persons entitled to relief.  If...the members of the relief committee yield to intimidation or fail in the firm and impartial discharge of their duty the whole country will become pauperised....
 

Excerpts from Irish Journals of Elizabeth Smith (1846-1849).
        2Jun46:  John Robinson arrived to collect the rents, having given the people three weeks law on account of some fairs which were postponed.  The tenants paid well; generally no complaints except from the sickness among the cattle some little time ago which was a serious misfortune.  The scarcity of potatoes is little felt by the farmers it being caused principally by the stocks having been kept back from the markets in the expectation of prices rising continually which system pressed heavily on the labouring purchasers in which class the failure of the crop has been the commonest owing to inferior management.  The passing of the Corn Bill has lowered all provisions already.
        26Oct46:  Provisions continuing to pour into England from Ireland and yet the famine said to be pressing there.  I can't believe it, for besides that both food and work seem to be plenty, it could hardly be that if people were hungry they would refuse task work which from the Lord Lieutenant's proclamations they must in many places have done, claiming for daily wages, in order words leave to idle.  They have got it into their heads that being in distress they are to do nothing to get out of it, but to sit comfortably down and open their mouths to be fed.  Like cousin Bartle, I can't but despise a people so meanspirited, so low-minded, so totally without energy, only I attribute it to the want of animal food; there can be no vigour of mind or body without it.
        12Jan47:  Alas! the famine progresses; here it is in frightful reality to be seen in every face.  Idle, improvident, reckless, meanly, dependent on the upper classes whom they so abuse, call the bulk of the Irish what we will, & no name is too hard for them, here they are starving round us, cold, naked, hungry, well nigh houseless.  To rouse them from their natural apathy may be the work of future years.  To feed them must be our business this.
        9Mar47:  Discovered another feature in the overwhelming distress of the times--the relief don't reach down to the very lower classes it was intended principally to succour.  Most of the labourers are in debt to the hucksters as deep as those hucksters would let them go--a week's provisions is the ordinary extent.
        22May47:  The relief now afforded at a great expense is but a mockery--one pound of dry meal a day to adults, half a pound to children without any sort of kitchen; it may keep them alive a few weeks, but in the end a pestilence must ensue; the quantity is not sufficient and the quality is defective.
        8Jan49:  I don't see the misery of the country is at all increasing, it is only spreading.
        28Mar49:  Death and starvation in Ireland at any rate, progressing rapidly.  The roads are crowded with wretched beggars from the south and west, famine too truly depicted on their miserable skeletons, hardly concealed by rags.
 

William S. Trench (1808-72), "Realities of Irish Life" (1868).  [Trench was a land agent, managing the estate of the Marquis of Lansdowne, an "absentee landlord."]
        None of those who witnessed the scenes which took place in Ireland during the 'potato rot' and the 'famine years' are likely ever to forget them.... I went to reside at Cardtown, my place in the Queen's County [now County Laois].  It adjoins an extensive mountain tract of land which I had purchased, and which I had for years previously been engaged in reclaiming..., the mode of reclaiming being chiefly through the means of the potato, as the only green crop which grows luxuriantly in rough ground with previously imperfect tilth, I planted each year larger and larger quantities of that root.  Guano having been at that time (1845) recently brought into use as manure, was found to be particularly suited to the production of the potato; I accordingly applied a liberal quantity to the crop, which was most luxuriant, and well repaid the labor, money, and attention necessarily bestowed upon it.... I planted in the year 1846 about one hundred Irish acres [162 English acres] of mountain land under potatoes, counting, as surely as any farmer can count on reaping any crop, upon a produce worth at least L30 per acre.... My reclamation had succeeded beyond my most sanguine expectations, and in the month of July, 1846, my potato crop, for its extent and luxuriance, was the wonder of every one who saw it; and...I felt certain, humanly speaking, of realizing by their sale at least L3,000....
        On August 1st of that calamitous year, 1846, I was startled by hearing a sudden and strange rumor that all the potato fields in the district were blighted; and that a stench had arisen, emanating from their decaying stalks.  I immediately rode up to visit my crop, and test the truth of this report; but I found it as luxuriant as ever..., without any unpleasant smell whatever.  On coming down from the mountain, I rode into the lowland country, and there I found the report to be but too true.  The leaves of the potatoes on many fields I passed were quite withered, and a strange stench, such as I had never smelt before, but which became a well-known feature in 'the blight' for years after, filled the atmosphere adjoining each field of potatoes.
        The next day I made further inquiries, and I found the disease was fast extending, and on rooting up some of the potato bulbs under the withered stalks, I found that decay had set in, and that the potato was rapidly blackening and melting away.  In fields having a luxuriant crop, the stench was generally the first indication of disease, and the withered leaf followed in a day or two afterwards.  Much alarm now prevailed in the country.... Those, like me, who had staked a large amount of capital on the crop, hitherto almost a certainty, and at least as sure as the crop of wheat or turnips of any other agricultural produce, became extremely uneasy; whilst the poorer farmers looked on helplessly and with feelings of dire dismay at the total disappearance of all they had counted on for food....
        I need not tell how bitterly I was disappointed...by this special calamity, sent by the special hand of God, and the like of which had never appeared in nature before.... But my own losses and disappointments, deeply as I felt them, were soon merged in the general desolation, misery, and starvation which now rapidly affected the poorer classes around me and throughout Ireland.  It is true that in the more cultivated districts of the Queen's County and the midland counties generally, not many deaths occurred from actual starvation.  I mean, that people were not found dead on the roads or in the fields from sudden deprivation of food; but they sank gradually from impure and insufficient diet; and fever, dysentery, the crowding in workhouse, or hardship on the relief works, carried thousands to a premature grave.  The crop of all crops, on which they depended for food, had suddenly melted away, and no adequate arrangements had been made to meet this calamity--the extent of which was so sudden and so terrible that no one had appreciated it in time--and thus thousands perished almost without an effort to save themselves.
         Public relief works were soon set on foot by the Government.  Presentment sessions were held, relief committees organized, and the roads were tortured and cut up; hills were lowered, and hollows filled, and wages were paid for half or quarter work--but still the people died.  Soup kitchens and 'stirabout houses' were resorted to.  Free trade was partially adopted.  Indian meal poured into Ireland; individual exertions and charity abounded to an enormous extent--but still the people died.  Many of the highest and noblest in the land, both men and women, lost their lives, or contracted diseases from which they never afterwards recovered, in their endeavors to stay this fearful calamity--but still the people died.  We did what we could at Cardtown; but, though the distress there was far less than in most other places, yet our efforts seemed a mere drop of oil let fall upon the ocean of misery around us--and still the people died....
        Such was my first practical acquaintance with the fearful 'Potato Rot' of 1846--the effects of which have produced a social revolution in Ireland.  It hurried on the introduction of free trade.  It indirectly brought about the arterial drainage of many of the main rivers of Ireland.  It created the Land Improvement Act [1860].... It drove some millions of people to the other side of the Atlantic, and sent many thousands to an untimely grave.  It broke up, to a great extent, the small farms of Ireland.  It relieved the plethora of the labor market.  It removed the needy country gentlemen, and forced them to sell their estates into the hands of capitalists.  It unlocked millions of capital, since then laid out on the improved cultivation of the land.  It brought over hundreds of Scotchmen and Englishmen, who have farmed on an extended and more scientific system than had before then been the practice in Ireland; and, in short, it has produced a revolution which has lasted ever since....
         It is not my object or intention here to enter into any description of the arrangements which were made by Government to meet this dire calamity.... My present intention is merely to state what occurred under my own observation, or that of my immediate friends.  When first this dreadful cry resounded through the land, the question which occurred to every thinking and practical mind was, 'Why should these things be?'  Ireland was not like any part of India, cut off from extraneous supplies.  It was true that potatoes had rotted, and it was true the people depended on the potato almost alone for food.  But there was abundance of corn [generic word for grain], abundance of flour, and abundance of meal in the country, not to speak of herds of sheep and cattle innumerable; and, in the midst of such plenty, why should the people die?... Such was the position of affairs--the people dying, plenty of food within reach, plenty of money to purchase it, plenty of fish in the sea adjoining--but no one with forethought and arrangement enough to cook the victuals, catch the fish, draw the corn across the mountains, and bring the food and the people together!
        The plan adopted by [some] energetic philanthropists was very plain and simple.  They first sought for funds; and the appeal was immediately and most generously responded to.  They then engaged active earnest men, as temporary agents.... And having selected the places most suitable for their operations, they opened what they then termed 'soup kitchens', but what were really depots of boiled meal, made into a thick nutritious food which in Ireland is called 'stirabout'.  It is perhaps the simplest and most palatable form in which a wholesome well-cooked food can be obtained cheaply in half an hour.  These depots, of which there were nineteen to the district, were placed within two or three miles of each other, sufficiently near to enable all those who wanted food, and who were willing and able to walk a short distance, to obtain at least one good meal each day, the only condition or stipulation being that they should come as clean as their case admitted, to the food depot.
        I will not venture to describe the harrowing scenes which presented themselves.... I will not dilate upon the 'sliding coffin'...nor upon the emaciated forms which crawled for food to the newly-established depots.  Suffice it to say, that in a very brief period [1Apr-10May1847] they distributed, free, to the starving population, 102,129 meals within a district comprising sixty-seven townlands; in other words, they fed with one good meal per diem 2,553 persons for forty consecutive days at the wonderfully moderate cost of 2d. per meal.... I have purposely avoided giving any details of individual suffering in the harrowing forms in which they presented themselves.... A book could be written on this subject; but of what avail would it be now?  It is generally admitted that about 200,000 persons died of the famine in Ireland;  and my object is to show that if proper precautions had been taken in time--by energetic men capable of undertaking the task--to feed those who were unable to work, the famine would have been stayed, and most of the people saved.
 

Oral Tradition, Irish Folklore Commission (Collected 1945).  [Original in Gaelic, west coast.]
        (South Kerry)  There were famines in Ireland before the Black Famine and the worst of them was in 1822.... The cause of every famine in this country as blight on the stems of the potatoes.... People had no remedy for the blight in 1822, in 1845-52 or in 1879, which was a very wet year.  They had hardly half a crop that year.  They didn't know of the blue-stone cure until 1900.
        The disease was not too bad in 1845, but it was worsening steadily up to 1848.  The poor people had been getting weaker since 1845 until, in 1847 and 1848, they were finally smitten. (These were known as the black years.) Most of them had not potato seed, but even if they had some, they had scarcely enough strength to plant it.  The richest farmers had wheat, barley, oats, rye, and corn.  They had plenty of cereal to eat.  The Corn Laws were in force at the time and the farmers had to sell the cereal crops to pay the rent.  Even though the British government knew very well how things were, they didn't stop the export of corn, and the landlords had no conscience.  They used to throw the poor people out on the roads to die from famine and plague.  They died at home, in the field, beside the ditch and at the side of the road.  There was a story of a child found still on its mother's breast, as though drinking her milk, and both of them dead!... O'Connell asked the English parliament to stop the Famine, for, if they didn't, half a million people would die in Ireland.  And, alas, he was right, for it happened just as he said.  The government listened to him and distributed the meal.  Yet the people died when the food had gone and the London Times announced with joy 'that the Celt had gone with a vengeance'.  It's a wonder they didn't say thank God!  There were coffins with bottoms that could easily open and close; they were full of corpses and they were regularly going to the graveyards for burial.  This stopped the plague.... They started making roads, draining, building bridges.... The landlords were given money to erect high walls so that the poor people would not see them [landlords] at all--and the walls are still to be seen.
        Lord Lansdowne, the 4th Marquess, sent thousands of people from his estate in south Kerry to New York, USA in 1848.... Some of them died of disease on the ship and got a watery grave.  The others reached New York.  The fever-ridden and the diseased were hospitalized in the 'Lansdowne Ward' and many of them died there.  After that they were buried on the banks of the river Hudson to fertilize the land!!!
 

John Mitchel, Jail Journal (1854).  [Originally published in Mitchel's New York newspaper, The Citizen.]
        ...In 1846 came the Famine, and the 'Relief Acts' advancing money from the Treasury, to be repaid by local assessment; and of course there was an aggravated and intolerable Poor-rate to meet this claim.  Of which Relief Acts, only one fact needs to be recorded here--that the Public Works done under them were strictly ordered to be of an unproductive sort--that is, such as would create no fund to repay their own expenses.  Accordingly, many hundreds of thousands of feeble and starving men were kept digging holes, and breaking up roads--doing not only no service, but much harm.  Well, then, to meet these Parliamentary advances there was nothing but rates [local taxes]; and therefore, there was the higher premium to landlords on the extermination, that is the slaughter, of their tenantry.  If the clearing business had been active before, now there was a rage and passion for it....
        At the end of six years, I can set down these things calmly; but to see them might have driven a wise man mad.  There is no need to recount how the Assistant Barristers and Sheriffs, aided by the Police, tore down the roof-trees and ploughed up the hearths of village after village..., how the farmers and their wives and little ones in wild dismay, trooped along the highways--now in some hamlets by the seaside, most of the inhabitants being already dead, an adventurous traveller would come upon some family eating a famished ass--how maniac mothers stowed away their dead children to be devoured at midnight...--how husband and wife fought like wolves for the last morsel of food in the house; how families, when all was eaten and no hope left, took their last look at the Sun, built up their cottage doors, that none might see them die nor hear their groans, and were found weeks afterwards, skeletons on their own hearth; how the 'law' was vindicated all this while;... how overworked coroners declared they would hold no more inquests; how Americans sent corn, and the very Turks, yea, negro slaves, sent money for alms;... and how, in every one of these years, '46, '47, and '48, Ireland was exporting to England, food to the value of fifteen million pounds sterling, and had on her own soil at each harvest, good and ample provision for double her own population, notwithstanding the potato blight.
        To this condition had forty years of 'moral and peaceful agitation' brought Ireland.  The high aspirations after a national Senate and a national flag had sunk to a mere craving for food.  And for food Ireland craved in vain.  She was to be taught that the Nation which parts with her nationhood, or suffers it to be wrested or swindled from her, thereby loses all....
        Every week was deepening the desolation and despair throughout the country; until at last the French Revolution of February, '48, burst upon Europe.  Ireland, it is true, did not then possess the physical resources or the high spirit which had 'threatened the integrity of the Empire' in '43; but even as she was, depopulated, starved, cowed and corrupted, it seemed better that she should attempt resistance, however heavy the odds against success, than lie prostrate and moaning as she was.  Better that men should perish by the bayonets of the enemy than by their laws.
 

Fenian Oath (1859).
 I, A.B., in the presence of Almighty God, do solemnly swear allegiance to the Irish Republic, now virtually established, and that I will do my utmost, at every risk, while life lasts, to defend its independence and integrity, and finally, that I will yield implicit obedience in all things, not contrary to the laws of God, to the commands of my superior officers.  So help be God!  Amen.
 

John Mitchel, The Last Conquest of Ireland (Perhaps) (1861).
        ...So it is; and so it was, even before Famine, with almost the whole of that [west] coast region.  The landlords were all absentees.  All the grain and cattle the people could raise were never enough to make up the rent; it all went away, of course; it was all consumed in England.... Of course there were no improvements--because they would have only raised the rent; and in ordinary years many thousands of these poor people lived mainly on seaweed some months of every year.  But this was trespass and robbery; for the seaweed belonged to the lord of the manor, who frequently made examples of the depredators.
        Can you picture in your mind a race of white men reduced to this condition?  White men!  Yes of the highest and purest blood and breed of men.   The very region I have described to you was once--before British civilization overtook us--the abode of the strongest and richest clans in Ireland....
        After a struggle of six or seven centuries, after many bloody wars and sweeping confiscations, English 'civilization' prevailed--and had brought the clans to the condition I have related.  The ultimate idea of English civilization being that 'the sole nexus between man and man is cash payment--and the 'Union' having finally determined the course and current of that payment, out of Ireland into England--it had come to pass that the chiefs were exchanged for landlords, and the clansmen had sunk into able-bodied paupers....