Impact of the famine
- Created by: Lott1lover
- Created on: 30-11-16 12:07
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- Why did the famine have such a devastating impact on the populace
- Absentee landords and middlemen
- By 1841, more than 2/3 of the population were dependent on agriculture
- Land in Ireland was owned by absentee landlords who did not live on their estate
- employed managers to run them on their behalf.
- These managers let their land in large parcels to local individuals
- became known as middlemen
- They took out fixed price long leases on great quantities of land.
- This would then make the middlemen landlords themselves by making money of subdividing land.
- To maximize his income, the middleman would deliberately create small plots of land to get more tenants
- Landholdings
- With more people seeking land, plots became even smaller, and land previously considered unusable was now being adopted.
- land previously considered unusable was now being adopted.
- A census taken in 1841 found that only 7% of landholdings were more than 30 acres
- Those Irish renting less than 30 were named cottiers
- Existence entirely based on sustenance as it was believed a family only needed 1 acre to survive.
- In the 1840s, there were 300,000 cottiers, representing the poorest in Ireland.
- With more people seeking land, plots became even smaller, and land previously considered unusable was now being adopted.
- Mono culture and Blight
- Due to land size they engaged in monoculture
- The practice of only growing one crop at any time.
- The varitey of potato grown amongst the poorer farmers was the lumper potato.
- Became the staple diet with 10/15 pounds being consumed a day.
- In July 1845, Ireland had poor whether but there were no fears on the crop.
- However, in august there was news of Englands crops being attacked by a disease known as the potato blight.
- 1/3 harvest in 1845 was destroyed and the next 3 successive harvests were similarly poor.
- Due to land size they engaged in monoculture
- Impact of famine on the populace
- In 1846, Ireland had its first recorded deaths from starvation.
- These deaths hit over 1 million by 1851, also relating to typhus and relapsing fever.
- In the winter of 1847, there became an epidemic as the weather combined with lack of food weakened the population.
- 250,000 died from starvation and fever in 1847, named 'black 47'
- The famine was mostly in rural areas due to the large number of small farms.
- A census in 1841, showed that more than 64% of land holdings were less than 5 acres.
- The worst affected were cottiers for whom the potato was their only sustenance.
- This decline removed one of the country's biggest social groups.
- As well as destroying the cottier class and reducing the size of the population, the famine also stimulated emigration abroad.
- In 1846, Ireland had its first recorded deaths from starvation.
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