The Famine

 In 1845 Ireland depended on potatoes. The potatoes caught a disease called blight. The Irish were so poor that they had to rent houses from English absentee landlords. The famine lasted for six years. Back then the population was 8 million. About one million people died and about one million people emigrated. People rented houses from absentee landlords. They had to sleep in straw. They even had to stay in the same room as their animals. There was no point of building on to the  houses because the absentee landlords could just say “Get out of here!” and that would be a lot of work gone down the drain.

In the 1840s the potatoes caught blight. The disease of blight was carried by a fog. In about 1847 the English finally decided to give us some food. They gave us some Indian corn. One problem was that the corn gave people diarrhoea or people could die from it. After a while the English increased the price of the corn, so that people could not afford it.

 People tried to avoid workhouses so that they didn’t split up their family. If people got caught they would have to go to the workhouses. Men would have to cut stones, women would have to knit children would have to go to a school in the workhouses but sometimes children had to work. The only time families could see each other was at services on Sunday. Parents would normally run away because they thought their children would get fed more food.

And that’s what I know about the Famine.