School: Drom an Mhadaidh
- Location:
- Drumavaddy, Co. Cavan
- Teacher: S. Ó Murchadha
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0990, Page 040
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD.
See copyright details.
DownloadOpen data
Available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- XML School: Drom an Mhadaidh
- XML Page 040
- XML “Famine Times”
Note: We will soon deprecate our XML Application Programming Interface and a new, comprehensive JSON API will be made available. Keep an eye on our website for further details.
On this page
- Though the Great Famine must have effected the district to a considerable extent still very little information can be gleaned as to its ravages. The old people who remembered it or who came in direct contact with the sufferers have long since passed on and the amount of tradition to be had is scant.
The population in this district at that time was very large. Houses that now serve as byres and stables are pointed out as being the homes of large families. While in many cases nothing remains but a mere outline of the foundation walls. In other cases, where once large families were raised a bush or bank of yellow clay marks the spot where the dwelling place stood. On Ardhill mountain immediately overlooking this school there were several houses. Scarcely a vestige of one of them is to be seen now.
The "blight" seems to have struck the potato crop very suddenly. One man, on going to his field in the morning saw the crop that the previous evening was growing splendidly, a withered mass. In derision [?] he ran to his neighbour's field where a like picture presented itself. The green stocks[?](continues on next page)
