The Hunger

[Taytocrisps]

Did anyone watch this two-parter about the famine? I recorded it but I'd put off watching it because I knew it was going to be a grim and difficult watch. Anyway, I watched the two episodes last night. It was interesting because it took an international approach. I'd forgotten that the potato blight started in South America and spread across the world. Other European countries were also affected such as France, Belgium, parts of Germany (Prussia) etc. They compared the relief measures some of those countries took with the relief measures adopted by the British government. As you'd expect, the British government's efforts fell far short of what was needed. If you haven't watched it already, I'd recommend it - with the caveat that it's very harrowing in places.

I'm going to try and watch on RTÉ player if it's on there - I'm in the UK.

@bellinisurge it's on RTE Player but I'm not sure if you can access it in the UK.

I checked. I can only get Episode 2 for the next 5 days. I knew about it and was preparing myself to watch it. Obviously I didn't get to episode 1 quickly enough.
I'm currently reading History of Ireland in 250 episodes and it has reached The Famine . My late Mum rarely discussed it with me although obviously I knew a bit about it. But I figured that getting my DD's Foreign Birth Register entry sorted and passports for us all deserved me working a bit harder to learn the things I wasn't told enough about.

Hi, I have it recorded but haven't watched it yet.

According to my mother, my great-grandmother used to ask her family to not put her in the workhouse as she neared the end of her life. She lived with them until her death. I tried to look her up in the 1901 census when she would have been a child but didn't find her. It makes me wonder if she had a difficult start in life and if she had been in a workhouse. Her family were labourers in Co. Kerry.

@bellinisurge it's a pity you missed the first episode. The two episodes together give a very comprehensive account of the events of that decade and how certain key decisions made by the British government at various stages (such as declaring the famine over prematurely and insisting that the cost of famine relief come from within Ireland) exacerbated the problems. Maybe the BBC will show it at some stage.

@IsFuzzyBeagMise yes, lots of older people were terrified of the workhouses.

I often wonder who my ancestors were during the famine and how they survived it. My grandmother was born in the late 19th century so she was only (at a guess) two generations removed from it. I don't think she spoke about it much. She didn't live through it herself obviously but I wonder if her parents or grandparents discussed it, or told stories about it. If things had been different and my ancestors had perished, I wouldn't be here. Or my ancestors might have emigrated and I might be living in a different part of the world - the UK, the US, Canada or Australia.

I had the same thought @Taytocrisps and I said it to my son. I don't know who my ancestors were. They probably lived very ordinary lives, but the fact that they survived that time is remarkable.

My mum was born in the early 1930s in Co Cork. I suspect they never spoke about it at home. She spoke very little to me about the Civil War although it was "fresh" for her as a child. I got the impression they were a "we don't want to talk about it" family.

@bellinisurge

My mum was born in the early 1930s in Co Cork. I suspect they never spoke about it at home. She spoke very little to me about the Civil War although it was "fresh" for her as a child. I got the impression they were a "we don't want to talk about it" family.

Cork, west Cork in particular, was so riven by the civil war that I think absolutely there was a 'whatever you say, say nothing' blanket silence subsequently -- not just your family!

My mother was born in the early 40s, and is very resistant to hearing anything about family involvement -- she knew her widowed mother lived on her husband's IRA pension for decades, but when I found his application letters which detailed what ambushes etc he'd actually been involved in, she absolutely didn't want to know, and in fact the letters quietly disappeared from a place where only she or her two siblings could have had access to them, though no one will admit to taking them.

The Famine is still very much written on the landscape locally -- the ground in the graveyard my grandparents are buried in is a good eight feet higher than surrounding land, and there are lots of Famine roads built as public works during the bad years. Most of the ghost stories my mother grew up hearing from older people involved Famine deaths.

My father who was born in 1937 used to quote a sign in a local barbershop; 'no discussion about religion or politics'. His own father was involved in some way with the local branch of the IRA, but we don't know to what extent. This was Cork City.
My maternal grandfather was born in September 1921 at the height of the civil war and the burning of Cork.

I think there was a kind of shame in talking about the famine and poverty. My mother has a vague story her mother had about her mother's or grandmother's family seeing men stealing what crops (oats that were sown maybe? - I'll have to ask her again) were growing in the field, and running off when they were seen. Walter Macken's middle book of the historical trilogy is an easy fiction read. Name is escaping me.

The whole thing is so depressing I'm not surprised people didn't want to talk about it.

My brother likes to believe it was equally hard for people all over Europe, nothing spesh about Ireland.

I must look up that book, Apileofballyhoo.

There are three, fuzzy, and they're easy to read, well I think so anyway. I've remembered since that the famine one is called The Silent People I think. The Cromwell one is Seek the Fair Land and the War of Independence/ Civil War is The Scorching Wind. The Wind that Shakes the Barley or whatever that film is called is either based on the last one or ripped off the last one a bit, whichever.

I've read all of those books @Apileofballyhoo but it was years ago. I'm due a re-read - maybe over the Christmas break.

Thanks @Apileofballyhoo. I'll definitely look them up.

I think The Wind That Shakes the Barley also has a lot from Ernie O'Malley's civil war book. (Not On Another Man's Wound. Is it The Singing Flame?) I was thinking about him because TG4 had a documentary about him last night. He's such an interesting figure -- IRA commander, then hanging out in New Mexico with DH Lawrence, Georgia O'Keefe and co and writing.

Thank you for suggested reads.

No worries. Roddy Doyle's A Star Called Henry is another WoI/Civil War one. RTÉ did a mini series years and years ago called The Treaty with Brendan Gleeson playing Michael Collins. It was very good but I don't know where you'd get your hands on it now.

I find Irish history terribly sad. I honestly don't know how we ever managed to achieve the Free State. Well I know what happened but everything prior to that is such a litany of disaster, and I suppose the Civil War was just another one. Maybe it had to happen.

It all makes me very sad.

If podcasts are your thing there’s an excellent episode of the BBC In Our Time: History series on the famine (episode 4 April 2019). Well worth a listen.

The Great Irish Famine

Thanks Blogdog, I'll check it out.

The Irish History Podcast did a massive series on the Famine.

I thought The Hunger was really well done. My Granny's tiny village was mentioned. I did a sharp intake of breath, I'm probably related to the people they were talking about.

Apparently there was a famine in the west of Ireland in 1924.
The new independent Irish government played it down.
There was an article in The Journal about it a few years ago.
I know my grandparents spoke of the hungry 30's.
I wish I asked them more questions when they were alive.