School: Gort an Ghainimh (roll number 16127)

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1. The Famine Times

   

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   The famine years of 1846 and 1847 were very severe years on the people. The potato crop failed and the people were depending on the potatoes. The district was very thickly populated before this. Hundreds of people died by the roadside with starvation. They went through the fields gathering wild weeds. They used to boil them with salt and they used to live on them without a potato to eat with them. Raw turnips were eaten in the district, too. They used to sell a few hens every day and buy some meal. They used to make gruel out of the meal and have it for the meals. The potatoes rottened in the ground and they had no seed for the next year. Little buds grew on the ridge and they gathered those for seed for the next year. They sowed the buds but they did not grow. Potatoes were their last and holy hope. The poor people were starving with hunger as they had neither food or money to buy it.

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   Topics

   1. time
      1. historical periods by name (~25)
         1. the great famine (~4,013)

   Language

   English

   Collector

   Kitty Mulrennan

   Gender

   Female

   Address

   Cloonagh, Co. Roscommon

   Informant

   Mrs Mulrennan

   Gender

   Female

   Address

   Cloonagh, Co. Roscommon