Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (96): early draft (2)?

Continuing from the previous post.

I now have a clearer idea of where these recently found scraps of paper came from; they date from the 1980s, as my interest in this particular area of research became more serious. Yet there’s no mention of my taking the subject out of the academy, and appealing to family historians for help.

Some of the scraps relate to my doubts about venturing into women’s history. I was obviously concerned about doing so. Brave? Stupid? Naive? Obstinate? This all seems apparent from what I jotted down.

 Here is a random selection of my jottings.

 ‘Women’s participation in the flight from Ireland in the 19^th century has not always been appreciated, or given the attention it deserves‘.

‘It may seem reasonable to assume that destitute young Irish females, victims of the Great Famine, inmates of Victorian workhouses, were among the wretched and oppressed of the earth. But it would be wrong to lump them all together indiscriminately as powerless and passive victims of patriarchal society’. From an early date, I was determined not to deny the famine orphans any agency.

‘Don’t start from an ‘a priori’ position, either forcing or distorting evidence to suit one’s ends, or failing to apply the canons of rigorous self-criticism’.

‘What was the structure of their oppression? Were they passive victims of government instrumentalities—selected, inspected, packed and freighted, indentured and apprenticed, and protected, by a succession of remarkably paternalistic bureaucrats’?

‘Patriarchal values formed part of their cultural background and instinctively some women reacted to the subjugation which these implied. Rebellious or so-called refractory behaviour in a workhouse, or on-board ship to Australia might be interpreted in such a light. Perhaps, too, the decision to emigrate’.

‘Yet however plausible the argument that disaffection with the patriarchal society in which they lived encouraged women to emigrate, there still remains the difficult distance between plausibility, and establishing that this was in fact so’.

‘19^th century Irish newspapers cast females in the classic Madonna-Whore mould. Female convicts sent to Van Diemen’s Land were ‘pariahs of their sex, condemned of the law and outcasts of the world’. Female orphans were idealized innocents, ‘rosy-cheeked’, ‘smiling’ and laying claim ‘to that unparalleled beauty for which the daughters of Erin are so characteristic’. But on board ship these rosy-cheeked innocents became ‘the sport and prey of brutalized mariners’, and were led down the road to perdition.

‘But what do stereotypical and patronising attitudes shown towards women in newspapers tell us about the regard with which women were held in society at large anyway? Arguably, not a great deal’.

Do you, dear reader, ever use writing as a way of clarifying your thinking? I imagine that was what I was doing here.

If you have a glance at either of the Cambridge University repository links below, you’ll see how far away from https://earlgreysfamineorphans.wordpress.com the subject of my doctoral thesis was. (Not that i was a total newcomer to Irish history).

I am extremely pleased that so much good material is available on ‘open access’ nowadays. Combat misinformation however and whenever you can…even if my own interest in ‘Jacques Rohault and the history of natural philosophy’ might be a sure fire cure for your insomnia.

https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/items/c6f88cf8-14be-48ed-8d42-04599888238f

https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.11460

I’ve come across a few more typed pages that date from around the same time as these scraps of paper. They deal with the question why so many Irish women left Ireland in the 19th century. I’ll share them with you in the next post. My experience with http://www.tintean.org.au has shown me that posts can, and should sometimes, be short.

…and could hear her saying, yet again, and very clearly, and so late in the day, that she’d changed her mind ...

(from Claire Keegan, So Late in the Day, Faber and Faber, 2023.)

P.S. A landmark commemoration of the Famine orphans will take place in Williamstown 19 November commencing at 2pm.

Disclaimer. ChatGPT is responsible for the description of this post.

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine orphans (95): early draft?

I’ve come across a few typed pages of stuff i seem to have written around the time of the first volume of Barefoot…? That is, the late 1980s or early 1990s. This particular one was on the back of a list of medicines. I’m intrigued. I cannot remember it. When did i write it? Is it an early draft of the Preface and Introduction to Barefoot 1? or was I preparing a lecture, a conference paper, or even an article for an Irish history journal? Readers will recognise some sentences. Some claims and issues are dated by now. (Pace my comments about twentieth century historians). I’ll keep searching for more pages. Or should I not? Maybe they will be of interest…i hope.

Here’s my first discovery. Historiographical? Was i trying to put the immigration of Irish females into some kind of context? I’ll suppress the temptation to revise it.

“They were condemned out of hand as prostitutes, ill-suited for work in the colonies, and undisciplined and promiscuous during the voyage here. Even more surprising is the fact that the criticisms of contemporaries should be so readily and uncritically adopted by twentieth-century historians. Fortunately, the good sense and meticulous scholarship of some, A. J. Hammerton for example, has shown how ill-founded condemnation of these young women was. Too often the exceptional case has been taken as typical, an isolated complaint “representative of every woman on every ship” (my italics). All of them were tarred with the same brush.

As far as the Irish foundlings were concerned, not one of the boats carrying young women from charitable institutions in Dublin and Cork was reported on unfavorably at the time of their arrival. (Check) Yet recently an Irish historian could still write, “…on the long voyage to Australia the sailors and girls consorted promiscuously. When they reached Sydney, they became prostitutes…”. Such blanket condemnation and blind following of the undiscriminating opinions of contemporaries has too often been characteristic of historical writing on the subject.

The weaknesses of historians aside, it remains true that single female migrants were generally looked down upon by religious leaders, and members of of the upper and middle-class public in Britain and Australia for most of the nineteenth century. It was as if the language learnt from Masters and Surgeons, uncomfortable if not openly hostile to the women convicts and female paupers in their charge became the only acceptable way of saying things. Such language was repeated unquestionly by a succession of commentators as a means of attracting attention, and gaining publicity for themselves. The hostility of the early days was to forge images and condition attitudes towards later female migrants, not least the female orphans from Irish workhouses in…”

And after that she wove a garland for her hair. She pleated it. She plaited it. Of meadowgrass and riverflags, the bulrush and waterweed, and fallen griefs of weeping willow.

James Joyce, Finnegans Wake.

Postscript

I hesitated ever so briefly about adding this bit. But it is too important not to. It’s a brief and simple explanation of why i am writing “YES” in the upcoming referendum. It’s from my FB page.

‘I suppose i have to ask myself why? Where did that come from? EQ. Emotional intelligence. I know deep down it is the right thing to do. From…? Life experience, not all of it in Australia. My training as a would-be historian, try to know and understand, try putting yourself in the other person’s shoes. Use empathy. I’d hope descendants of the Irish orphan ‘girls’ would have that.‘

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (87); Using the search box

Recently someone asked me how to find which workhouse their orphan came from. I provided some suggestions, basically how to do the research themselves. Would you like to have a go? Here are some links you will find helpful. https://earlgreysfamineorphans.wordpress.com/2015/07/24/earl-greys-irish-famine-orphans-20/ Trying to sort out the difficuties that have arisen from the next par below.

The first is to the contents of the blog. It is incomplete but it contains what you need for this exercise. Try clicking on the Contents title below, and then on post number 20, at the HTTP link; it’s the one that begins ‘British Parliamentary Papers’, a fair way down the page. It should tell you the names of workhouses that sent orphans for each ship, the early ships anyway.

And with thanks to Donna Winterton https://www.dippam.ac.uk/eppi/documents/12556/pages/314758?fbclid=IwAR19evZ4zFXEH1b78hv_eoEWDs5M8ZGFxx-HkF8SPYy8Lb0tzxsqZ1f8bYM

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans(56): Contents of the Blog

A more direct but still quite complex method would be to go to the search box that appears at the end of each post, just after the comments.

Here’s a screenshot. Type what you are looking for into the search box; i typed the words, ‘which workhouse’, and up came a number of places where these two words appear in my blog, posts 62, 64 and 66, for example

Here’s another screenshot showing part of what came up. You need to click on those different links and search for what you are after.

In this case, post 62, scroll down past “Literacy” and “Sydney Legend” and follow my suggestions. Take your time and work through at your own pace. If you you encounter difficulties, I’m sure there is someone at home, or in your orphan Facebook group who will be willing to help. At some stage you will also need ‘Google maps’ and Peter Higginbotham’s great workhouse website. But let’s go slowly.

What you are doing is identifying the workhouses that sent orphans on your orphan’s ship (blog post 20). Then with information about your particular orphan’s native place (see shipping lists, the https://irishfaminememorial.org/ website, or my Barefoot ) go to Peter Higginbotham’s www.workhouses.org and see if you can find the workhouse your orphan most likely came from. Which was closest to her native place? The method is not foolproof. But it is a good start. [You may need to use the search box again to see how to use Peter’s workhouse site].

Best of luck with your quest. Technology can tie us in knots,especially if we aren’t used to it.

I’d be interested in hearing about your experience. Please tell me, and other people by adding a comment at the end of this post.

May i ask if you found any information about your particular orphan when you typed her name into the search box?

What specific words did you use in the search box that directed you to information that was both helpful and interesting? Have you any tips for other searchers? Have you any queries?

Given how close we are to June 16th, it seems appropriate to finish with a quotation from this work,

The gravediggers took up their spades and flung heavy clods of clay in on the coffin. Mr Bloom turned his face. And if he was alive all the time? Whew! By Jingo, that would be awful!

James Joyce, Ulysses.

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (86): Ann Trainer per Derwent

Peter has kindly allowed me to share this version of his orphan ancestor’s story. (see Blogpost 84) Ann was another Port Phillip arrival.

Ann Trainer or Traynor per Derwent

Born c 1833 Ireland. Died 1874 New Zealand

Her story

by great great grandson Peter James Hansen, February 2022.

Ann Trainer, my great great grandmother, was unknown to my family until the early 1990s. My discovery of her was a huge surprise as my parents prided themselves as having no benighted Irish or Roman Catholics in their ancestry. I found an Irish Roman Catholic ancestor on both sides of our family. Both were Irish female famine orphans, each with sad stories to uncover.

This story is about Ann Trainer on my mother’s side.

Born out of wedlock, institutionalised, living much of her youth in a workhouse. Shipped to Australia under a British Govt scheme to provide domestic servants & wives. The Victorian gold rush in Australia from 1851-late 1860s.  Marriage to a sea captain, three children, prostitution, drunkenness & finally an early death in a rip-roaring frontier gold rush town on New Zealand’s wild West Coast.

According to the Magherafelt Workhouse records, Ann Trainer’s mother was Catherine Cassidy b c 1797, single spinster Roman Catholic who had three illegitimate children, Samuel Cassidy b c 1830, Ann Traynor b c 1833 & Patrick Henry b c 1839.

Sam’s father is unknown but Ann & Pat both had surnames acknowledging the putative fathers, Traynor/Trainer & Henry.

The Magherafelt Workhouse records usually name Ann as Ann Traynor but occasionally as Ann Cassidy.

The Magherafelt Workhouse opened in March 1842.

 A few weeks later Catherine Cassidy aged 45 single spinster Roman Catholic, clean, from the Electoral Division of Tobermore townland of Drumreany was admitted 26 March 1842 with two bastard children. Ann Traynor aged 9 & Patrick Henry aged 3. They were discharged on 5 August 1842.

Further transcriptions of the Magherafelt Workhouse records reveal the following

Entering the workhouse 23 August 1842, leaving 16 Sept 1842. Catherine with two children. Ann’s age was recorded as 10.

In 16 Dec 1842 & out 3 April 1843 when Catherine 46 is described as single, a spinner, Roman Catholic woman with 3 bastard children. Ann described as being 9.

In 25 Sept & out 14 Oct 1843. Catherine Cassidy aged 48, single, with children all very wretched. Samuel Cassidy 12, Ann Traynor 10 Pat Henry 4.

In 4 Feb 1845 out 24 March 1845. Catherine Cassidy single mendicant, clean of Tobermore with two children. Ann Traynor 10 & Pat’k Henry 5.

In 12 July 1845 out 28 July 1845. Catherine Cassidy 49 single mendicant having one child clean & healthy of Tobermore. Patrick Henry 7.

(Where were Ann Traynor & Samuel Cassidy?)

Autumn of 1845 saw the first failure of the potato crop.

In 2 Dec 1845 out 26 Jan 1846. Catherine Cassidy 40! Single with 2 children. Clean, of Tobermore.  Samuel Cassidy 15 occupation out of service escaped over wall 25 Jan 1846.  Ann Traynor 12 out of service.

In 15 May 1846 out 24 Aug 1846. Catherine Cassidy labourer,49, unable to support herself and her children. Tobermore townland of Ballinderry, clean. Ann Cassidy (Traynor) 12 & Pat Casidy (Henry) 8.

Autumn of 1846 saw the second failure of the potato crop.

In 26 Sept 1846 out 6 Aug 1847. Catherine Cassidy 48 single labourer unable to support herself and children, clean from Tobermore. Samuel Cassidy 15 escaped over the wall 2 Oct 1846 (for the second time). Ann aged 12.

The winter of 1846/47 was severe and fever was rife.

Patrick Henry aged 8 died 21 April 1847 in the Magherafelt Workhouse.

In 24 Dec 1847 out 7 July 1848. Catherine Cassidy 52, single no means of support mendicant with one child healthy.  Ann bastard child healthy.

In 4 January 1849 out 30 Oct 1849. Anne Cassidy listed on her own aged 16 single destitute. (Where was her mother?)

Nothing more is known of Catherine Cassidy. Had she died by Jan 1849?

What happened to Samuel Cassidy after his second escape over the workhouse wall 2 Oct 1846?

Ann Trainer was selected from the Magherafelt Workhouse to be part of the ‘Earl Grey scheme’.

On 9th Nov 1849 she and 135 other female orphans from northern Ireland left Plymouth in the 365 ton barque ‘Derwent’ for Port Phillip. There was the usual problem of the crew fraternising with these young girls on the long voyage. There is no record of Ann being involved in any incidents on the 78-day trip.

The ‘Derwent’ arrived at Port Phillip Bay on 25 February 1850.

The Derwent’s manifesto names Ann,

No 121 Trainer, Ann, House Servant, age 16, Native Place and County – Maherfelt, Derry, Roman Catholic, Read & Write – both. (Ann only signed with an ‘X’ on her marriage registration)

 On the Disposal list she appears as ‘Trainer, Ann, 16, RC, House Servt., Employer – Andrew Doyle, Carpenter, Collins St. at the rate of £8 per annum for 6 months.

There is no further record of Ann until her marriage in January 1854.

In the meantime, the Victorian goldrushes commenced in 1851 and literally hordes of mostly males seeking their fortunes arrived at Melbourne from the world over and dispersed throughout the diggings in Victoria. Melbourne became deserted as goldrush mania affected many. Crews deserted their ships including that of Ann’s future son-in-law William McKechnie from Dundee, Scotland. It was probably there that he first met Captain Whitford, Ann’s husband and also Richard Seddon, future Prime Minister of New Zealand. They were all ‘mates’.

On 18 January 1854, St James Church Melbourne Ann married George Whitford. The marriage certificate describes George as,

George Whitford, Bachelor, born At Sea, Master Mariner, age 23, residence Russell Street, parents John Whitford, deceased, Master Mariner, Mary Whitford maiden name unknown.

And Ann as, Ann Trainer, spinster, born Belfast, Ireland, occupation ‘Independant’, age 21, residence Russell Street, parents James Trainer, Schoolmaster, Catherine Kessedy maiden name.

They married in the Cathedral Church of St James according to the Rites of the Church of England.

Signed-George Whitford & Ann ‘X’ Trainer

George Whitford was master of the lighter “Allegro” which traded around Port Phillip Bay. Ann went to live with him on the ship and their three children were born on board at nearby Hobsons Bay.

Their first child George Arthur Whitford was born in Hobsons Bay 20 August 1854.

Their second child was born on the lighter ‘Legro’ (the “Allegro”) Hobsons Bay 23 May 1856. She was registered on 24 July 1856 by Ann as Winefred Elizabeth Whitford. Father, George Richard Whitford, 25, Master Mariner, born at sea Malabar Coast (India), mother Ann Whitford formerly Trainer, 22 born Belfast Ireland. Informant-The X mark of Ann Whitford, mother, Hobson’s Bay.

No trace of Winefred Elizabeth exists after this. However, on 15 October 1856 a baptism took place in St James’ Cathedral of a Mary Jane Whitford with the same birth date 23 May 1856, same parents & their abode is given as Yarra Yarra (Melbourne wharves). Baptismal names take precedence over registered names. Mary Jane is my great grandmother.

Their third child James Richard Whitford was born on the ‘Allegro’ 5th May 1858. Ann again signed X Her mark. 

George Whitford then went on to be master of the paddle steamer ‘Lioness’ for seven years. It seems that the Whitford family then moved into a cottage at Port Sandridge near Melbourne.

In Oct 1865 at Hokitika, Westland, New Zealand, Capt George Whitford met his former ship ps ‘Lioness’ to take up duties as a tug master towing sailing ships over the dangerous Hokitika river bar. Hokitika and Greymouth became the centres of a goldrush. There are numerous recorded accounts of Capt Whitford and his superb seamanship.

Ann and the three children followed at a later date & lived in a house Capt Whitford owned near Gibsons Quay in the town.

In 1869 Capt Whitford was appointed as Pilot for the Ports of Westland. However soon afterwards he disappeared. A George Whitford seaman died in a Melbourne infirmary in 1879.

George Whitford, Master Mariner, Ann’s husband.

Family tradition is that Ann and her children were left unsupported and destitute. However, the children appear to have received an education.

Shortly before she died in 1874 Ann featured in a sordid court case held in the Magistrates & then Supreme Court. March & September 1874. It was reported in salacious detail in the West Coast Times.  A sad finale to her life. Ann was acquitted of charges but was a witness to a theft in a brothel where she was staying.  She’s described as being very drunk.

Finally, in the West Coast Times 8 Sept 1874

“In the case of Annie Haines tried yesterday for larceny, a most material witness, a woman named Whitford, was unable to attend, being ill in Hospital……”

Annie Cassidy/Trainer/Whitford died on 8th October 1874, Hokitika Hospital aged 36 (sic) years, actually c 41) married, of Phthsis (Tuberculosis), informant NR Goodrich, Carpenter, Hokitika.

Annie Whitford was interred in Hokitika Cemetery 13 October 1874. The plot in the Roman Catholic section was purchased by her husband’s friend William McKechnie.

Annie’s grave set apart from the row of nuns nearby.

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (83): Amanda’s Guide

Amanda Midlam has kindly allowed me to share this with you. I hope you will find it useful. I have made some very minor changes to titles, and the spelling of names, and added a couple of website links.

DEDICATED TO THE REMARKABLE YOUNG WOMEN WHO CHANGED THEIR LIVES FOREVER – AND SOME OF OURS – BY EMIGRATING FROM IRELAND WHILE STILL IN THEIR TEENS IN 1848 – 1859.

HOW TO RESEARCH AND WRITE THE LIFE STORIES OF IRISH FAMINE ORPHANS

By Amanda Midlam

HOW TO USE THIS GUIDE

This guide came out of a research project I undertook as part of my studies for a Master of Research, Macquarie University, under the supervision of Associate Professor Tanya Evans.   For this project I researched and wrote the stories of Mary Rattigan and Brigid Callery and this guide came out of what I learned along the way.

First of all, I suggest you give this guide a quick read through then keep it as a reference as you research and write your own famine girl stories. 

There is currently more information available about conducting research and where to find records than there is about writing up your research, so I have included writing information. 

I have a Masters in Creative Writing and love passing on writing skills.  The reality is that the research is only half the task.  It is what you do with your research that brings the Irish Famine Orphans to life for other people.   Best of luck.  There are great stories to be found and told.

HOW TO RESEARCH AND WRITE THE LIFE STORIES OF IRISH FAMINE ORPHANS

ACCURACY.  Aim at accuracy but keep in mind that telling the story is more important than nailing down a single fact, a feat which sometimes turns out to be impossible.  Keep an eye on the big picture instead. 

ADDENDUM OR APPENDIX.  This is where you can put information that has some relevance or context but is not part of the story, or else slows the story down.   Not everything you find has to make it into the story.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.  Many people will help you track and trace your famine girl and it is a good idea to keep a list of their names right from the start.  You might want to write an acknowledgement page thanking the people who helped and from courtesy you should send each person a copy of your work when it is completed.  When people hear about these teenage girls travelling to Australia, usually on their own but sometimes with a sister, they almost always become engaged.  Convict ancestors inspire interest, these young female free settlers inspire sympathy and empathy along with interest.

ANCESTRY.COM.  Some people find this a great resource and others doubt the accuracy of family research found on this site.   See Resources – Primary and Secondary.

ARE THERE RIGHT AND WRONG WAYS OF TELLING THE STORY?

No.  There is a format that works – born, workhouse, migrated to Australia, worked, married, had children, died – but which parts you focus on and how you ultimately tell the story is up to you.  The way you tell the story does not matter but try to develop the skill to tell it as best you can.

ATTRIBUTIONS.  This is a way of acknowledging, in your writing, the work or ideas of others.  There can be copyright or ethical reasons for this and, I would argue, literary reasons because attributions can make for a better story.   Mary Rattigan’s story was enriched, in my view, by naming contemporary family members and quoting them as this provided a strong link between past and present. 

AUDIENCE.  Think about who are you writing for.  The answer to that will affect the tone of your writing.  For a start, are you telling the story for children or adults?   It can be helpful to imagine a reader while you are writing. This imagined reader may be a partner, a relative, a friend or a version of yourself.  Thinking about your audience will guide you in such things as tone, choices of vocabulary, sentence and paragraph length, and focus of the story.

BAPTISMS and BIRTH CERTIFICATES.  Baptism certificates are more likely to have accurate birth dates than birth certificates as there was a fine for late registrations of births.

BAREFOOT AND PREGNANT?  IRISH FAMINE ORPHANS IN AUSTRALIA, VOLS 1 and 2, by Trevor McClaughlin, are the definitive books about the subject. 

BEGETTING. Avoid begetting, a word no-one seems to use any more.  What I mean is the long list of names that purports to explain who someone is by listing all the ancestors.  Solomon begat Isaiah who begat Shania who begat Kylie…   If you want to list the family line, attach it as an addendum.  A list of names is not part of telling a story. 

BEGINNING.  Where do you begin the research?  You start with what information you have.   The Irish Famine Memorial database gives you barebones information and that is a great start. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY.  It is important to create a bibliography because it acknowledges the work of others, helps you keep track of the information you have read, and is a guide for future researchers.  Generally the bibliography is in alphabetical order but I found it more convenient to divide it into types such as personal contacts, electronic sources and books.  I have included the bibliography for Mary Rattigan as a sample in the addendum.  Some of the sources listed here will be general to all Irish famine girls while others are specific, but you can substitute my local sources for your own local one, for example historical societies.

BLOG.  Trevor McClaughlin’s blog, “Trevo’s Irish Famine Orphans”, at https://earlgreysfamineorphans.wordpress.com/author/trevo1/ is a great resource.  You may find other blogs that are helpful too. Do a search using a key word and the word “blog”.

BOOKS.  In my attached bibliography I have listed many books and you will find more relating to life in Ireland, migration at the time, Australian history and related subjects. 

CHRONOLOGY.  It is best to keep your research in chronological order.  The Earl Grey Scheme ran from 1848 to 1850, so the information you gather falls before or after that.  With the writing you might want to start the story at a dramatic point then backtrack and that is fine.  Keep in mind, if you have doubts about how to tell the story, a chronological telling works and is understood by everyone. 

COPYRIGHT.  Information itself is not subject to copyright but the way it is expressed is. The copyright lies in the words and the ordering of them.  You might find information in a book or on a website that you want to use.  If you copy and paste without permission that is a breach of copyright.  In that case you can either ask for permission to use the material or rewrite the information in your own words.   Sometimes the writing of the material is so beautiful it is worth asking permission to use it.

CREATIVE NONFICTION.  If you want to improve your writing skills look up creative nonfiction.  Life writing – whether it is your life or someone else’s – falls into the category of creative nonfiction and is beyond plain journalism which purports to be objective (although often it isn’t).  Creative nonfiction is writing that is factual but it also has narrative elements.  Think of the true story you are writing as having a setting, a central character and a plot.  Unlike plain journalism you can use descriptive language and metaphors if you like and you can express emotion.

DEATHS.  Death is the end of someone’s life but not necessarily the end of their story.  You might want to end the story with a description of a famine girl’s legacy whether that is descendants, the Irish Famine Memorial, or a reflection on her life.

DATES.  Dates can be rubbery.  One source will give one date and second source gives another.   Accurate dates can help you find specific documents in your research but in story terms what happened is often more important than the exact date, so don’t get too hung up.  Keep working on the story.

DEADLINE. Set a deadline, otherwise you will never finish.  There will always be one more piece of information you are chasing.  Set a date to have a finished version of the story that stands alone.     

DELIVERY. You may want to set a date when you will deliver the goods, whether it is a printed story or a bog post.  This will reinforce the deadline and help you to progress.  Don’t make the delivery date Christmas.  Even if family members are looking forward to reading what you found, Christmas is too busy for everyone, including you.  Maybe make it the date your Irish famine orphan arrived in Australia.  The dates are on the database.

DISTRIBUTION.  Give copies to people and organisations who helped as a thank you and also because it can add to their information base.  Give copies to family networks.  Also send a copy to the Irish Famine Memorial.   You can publish your work as a blog or in print.

ENDING.  While you are researching and writing, keep an eye out for a satisfying end to the story.  It may be information you come across, or it may be original writing that sums it up. Once you have an ending it can be easier to build towards it, to know what should be included and what is extraneous, and the tone to take in telling the tale. 

FACEBOOK.  I found the descendent of one orphan within a day by posting on a community page relevant to the locality where the orphan had lived.  That is how I learned family members still lived there.  I also found Irish community pages on Facebook to be informative and full of insights into the famine and local conditions at the time.  It is a simple matter to look up the name of the county on Facebook and look for local pages then ask to join. There is also an Irish Famine Girl Facebook page for descendants in Australia.

FACT OR NOT FACT?  Sometimes it can be hard to tell if information you find is a fact or untrue.  If you want to include it, you can deal with this by using words “maybe” or “possibly” or “the family believe that…”. That does not confirm nor disprove but leaves it open.

FAMILY LORE.  This can be fertile ground for finding gold.  One woman told me there is a story in her family that when Grannie, with her tribe of kids, arrived in the remote bush setting where she was to live, she sat on a log and cried.  This is a telling detail.  She didn’t just sit down and cry.  She sat on a log and that tells us there was nothing but bush.  Ask family members for any stories they may remember.

FAMILY MEMBERS. Keep a list of family members who help and send them a copy of your finished story.  Keep their names in both your Acknowledgements list and your Bibliography and you have twice the chance of not forgetting anyone.

FAMILY HISTORY.  Previously researched family history may contain furphies.  Or maybe whoever wrote it had access to records that no longer exist.  It can be hard to tell.  All you can do is try the best you can and remember you can write about anything questionable in a way that makes it clear it is a possibility and not rock solid fact.   

FINISHING.  You will never finish, there will always be more information.  You need to reach a point, or points, when you produce a written story that feels complete in the sense of being a satisfying read.

FREEMAN’S JOURNAL. This is a Catholic newspaper published in Sydney from 1850 and is found on Trove. https://trove.nla.gov.au/

FRIENDSHIPS.  One of the frustrating things is that we cannot find much information about friends.  They don’t leave certificates like marriages and births do and they don’t make themselves known in census records.  You can look out for the same names popping up in different records and explore further.  This is one reason why it is good to go back through the records and documents with a fresh eye looking for different information.

GENEALOGICAL SOCIETIES.  Whether you are looking for family members who came before your famine girl or after, genealogical societies have a lot of information and expertise.

HISTORICAL SOCIETIES.  These, and the people who run them, are often worth their weight in gold.  Historical societies may or may not have a presence on the internet.  The nearest library to the locality where your Irish immigrant lived, should be able to direct you to local historical societies.

HOLES.  There will be holes in your story – big gaps and leaps of years you can’t account for.  If you can’t fill these holes, move on.  No-one expects you to find information about every phase of someone’s life. You will find enough information about some phases to tell a great story.

INDIGENOUS PEOPLE. Too many pioneer stories ignore indigenous people.  During my current research, I was dismayed to find settler history and Indigenous history to be largely separate instead of shared – even though in the years 1848 to 1850 people of a variety of cultures shared the same spaces, perhaps not fairly but it would be wrong to assume the traditional inhabitants have nothing to do with your immigrant’s story.  Check with the local cultural centre and/or land’s council for information and gain an insight into what the locality was like from an Indigenous perspective at the relevant time.    

IRISH FAMINE MEMORIAL DATABASE. https://irishfaminememorial.org/orphans/database/ This is a great resource that has some information on over 4000 Irish famine girls.  From the data base you can see first name,

surname, native place, age on arrival, names of parents, religion and ship name.  If you

 click on the surname of the girl more details come up. 

IMMIGRATION CORRESPONDENCE.  The details on the Irish Famine girls data base may refer to “im cor” followed by numbers. This refers to Immigration Correspondence which is held on microfiche at the NSW State Library.

INTERPRETATION.  All history is interpreted.  The past happened – and that doesn’t change – but any story we tell about the past is not an exact replica of that past. It is an interpretation.  

INTERVIEWING.  You may need to interview people who have important information.  If the word “interview” is daunting use expressions like “talk to” or “have a chat”. Know what it is you are after and have specific questions ready, so you don’t waste the person’s time while you try to figure out what to ask next.  Two questions I ask that sometimes provide new insights and telling details are, “What interests you most about the famine girls/ the locality at that time/ the treatment of the Irish…”.  And a similar question that sometimes yields surprising and valuable results is, “What surprised you the most about…” 

LIBRARIES – LARGE.  The NSW State Library has lots of information of use to family historians and you can ask librarians for assistance in finding what you want.   You can apply for a library card online or in person.  The National library also has great family history resources and again you can apply for a library card which allows you to access online resources.

LIBRARIES – LOCAL.  You might not be able to join the local library where your famine girl lived if you live out of the area but it is worth visiting.  Let them know you are coming and make an appointment.  Tell them you would like to look at their historical collection and give them information about your particular interest. Your own local library can arrange interlibrary loans if there is material held in other libraries that you’d like to borrow.   Unfortunately this often does not apply to historical collections as often there are materials that are fragile and irreplaceable.

LIFE WRITING.  Life writing means writing from life.  It does not mean writing a whole life.   Do not think you need to show all phases of a famine girl’s life in the same amount of detail and length.  If one phase really fascinates you, you might want to write just about that.

MAPS.  Try to find old maps of where your famine girl came from and where she settled.  There are plenty of maps on line.  It helps to visualise places and gives insights for example on how isolated she may have been.

MUSEUMS.  There are many museums that can help with your research.  Before visiting larger museums do some research to know what it is you want to see in their collections.  Go looking for smaller museums too.  These are varied but can give insights into lives and times.  Some of these museums may be in localities you are interested in but others may be elsewhere but have themes of use such as pioneering.

NEUTRAL TONE.  There is no need to adopt a neutral tone.  Your interests will show up anyway.  You are an individual.  The famine orphan you are writing about was an individual.  If everyone wrote their stories in the same neutral tone, there would be a sameness to their stories and what we want is richness and that comes from a variety of voices.  So be yourself.   

NOTEBOOK.  I am old fashioned and keep a notebook just for this project and I jot down everything from research ideas to contact details.  I like paper and pen and can carry the notebook around with me.  Others may prefer to keep everything on their computer.  

ORGANISING INFORMATION.  Keep your research in chronological order.  It will help you find it and you can see where everything fits in.  With the writing chronological order may not be imaginative but it works and it does not confuse readers.   If you have a better way of organising the material and it works, go ahead, if you don’t stick to chronological order.

PERMISSIONS.  You may need permissions to use items such as photographs.  It is best to ask as you go and keep a record.

PHYSICAL RESEARCH. It is useful to walk in a famine girl’s footsteps.  On a site visit to the Kiah River I discovered how quiet it was.  There was nothing to hear except birdsong and the breeze in the trees.   Mary Rattigan had come from the Parramatta hospital which would have been busy and noisy.  Before that she was on the Digby with 200 other girls.  Before that in an overcrowded workhouse.  Before that in a small community where land holdings were tiny and neighbours were close.  I doubt she had previously ever experienced such quiet.

QUOTES.  Quotes enliven writing.  As you research make notes of great quotes you come across that you would like to use.  A couple of Irish people I found on Facebook gave great quotes about conditions during the Famine in the localities where my famine girls came from.  I asked for and was granted permission to use them.  These quotes were far more colourful and deadly than any description of the Famine that I could have written myself.

RACISM.  The English in Australia looked down upon the Irish and Catholics.  If this aspect interests you will find a lot of information.

READ ALOUD.  It is very important to read your written work aloud before you show it to someone else.  You catch many typos and clumsily expressed phrases this way.  It is far more effective than reading silently.  I rely on the Read Aloud function on Word which is found under the Review tab.

REFERENCING. Do you have to use references?  It depends on the audience for your written work.  Certainly keep up with referencing during the research.  Later on you will want to check something and it is really frustrating when you can’t figure out where you got certain information from.  The easiest way to keep information and details of where you found it together is to put the details in brackets immediately after the info. 

REFLECTIVE WRITING.  Writing about your experience of researching can be revealing.  You can reflect on your thoughts and feelings and it can help you to clarify and focus.  It is up to you if you use reflective writing as a tool or include it, or some of it, in the story you are writing.  See Voice.

RESOURCES – PRIMARY AND SECONDARY.  Primary sources are documents like birth, wedding and death certificates, shipping and census records, and any other records from the time of the life you are writing about.  I would include Trevor McLaughlin’s books and blog as primary resources too.  Secondary sources are what other people have put together from primary sources.  Blogs, family history websites and previously compiled family histories are secondary resources.  If you have a primary and secondary resource with conflicting information, rely on the primary. 

REVIEWING and RE-READING. Along with researching and writing, reviewing is an important task.  Don’t store your records away from sight assuming you know what’s in the documents and images.  You may think you’ve got the information you wanted from a baptism certificate, but it is extraordinary how many details hide that later pop out.   I had that happen when family members and I wondered what help, if any, Mary Rattigan had when giving birth. I looked again at the birth certificate of her son and spotted a squiggle next to the witness’s name.  A magnifying glass showed the squiggle said “Nurse”. 

SCHOLARLY WRITING – Unless you are a scholar or aiming at a scholarly publication, don’t try it.   Scholarly writing is written for scholars, not general readers.  It is tedious and avoids surprises.  The surprising twists and turns of someone’s life are going to be a feature of the story you write and does not suit scholarly writing.

SHIPPING LISTS.  The Irish Famine Site database has information about which ship each girl arrived on.

SKIMMING.  Develop skimming skills for looking through masses of information.  You develop these skills by doing it. For electronic sources you can use the search function but many old records are not digitised.  It was by skimming that I learned the ships surgeons the girls travelled with were not employed by the ship but were hired to look after their health. They were not answerable to the captain. 

SOCIAL MEDIA.  If you have social media skills, use them.  Social media is a great way to network.  I found it helpful to use Facebook to make contact with people living in the Irish communities Mary Rattigan and Brigid Callery came from.  For these people in Ireland, the past and the Famine was still fresh in memory and they gave me insights.  

SOUND LIKE YOURSELF.  Your writing will be stronger if you sound like yourself.  Try not to write the story in the way you imagine a family historian should write.   You want the story to be engaging and fluent.  You don’t have to sound authoritative; sounding interested or passionate about your subject is fine.

SPECULATION.  It is fine to speculate but make it clear that is what you are doing.  To say your orphan was heartbroken at leaving Ireland may make a strong impact but, if you don’t have any evidence for this, you have strayed into fiction.  Some girls actually lied about their age and even their marital status in their eagerness (or maybe desperation) to be accepted in the Earl Grey scheme.  Use words like “maybe”.   “Maybe she was heartbroken, or maybe she was relieved that she was escaping starvation and a hopeless future…”.  In Mary Rattigan’s story, I quote a descendent saying she liked to think Mary had a friend because she could not bear to think of her all alone.  She and I speculated about who such a friend could have been, a couple of possibilities having turned up in the research.   This does not mislead anyone but the speculation raises the important issues of loneliness and friendships. 

STARTING POINT. Start the research with whatever information you have.  The database on the Irish Famine Memorial was the start for my research.  I suggest you start the writing sooner, rather than later.  There are three reasons for this.  The more you write, the more writing skill you develop.  Secondly, as you find more information you can fit it in into the framework of the writing you have already done.  Thirdly, writing is a form of thinking.  Writing forces you to find the words and make sense of what you are learning.

STICKING POINTS.  There will be times when you get stuck either in the research or the writing.  The solution is to work on what you can.  You move on to something else. Later on you can come back to the sticking point and decide what to do with it.  No story is going to contain all details of all phases of someone’s life

STRUCTURE.  Structure in writing is equal to architecture in building.  It is going to work better if you have a plan, even if that plan needs to be re-worked.  Stories have a beginning, a middle and an end.  Readers expect this.  The difference between a list of events and a story is structure.  Develop an idea as soon as you can of where your story begins, where the middle is, and where it ends.  Also look for turning points, places where the story changes direction, for example a move to a new location.   

STORY. Try to have an idea of the story as soon as you can.  That is, not just a list of dates and names and places, but some idea of how her life, or part of it, was shaped.  Remember always that a story has a beginning, a middle and an end.  Look for those beginnings and ends.  

VOICE.  Most stories are written in the first person voice, using pronouns such as “I”, or third person, using pronouns such as “she” and “her”.  The big difference is that in third person, the person telling the story is invisible.  It is up to you if you want to be part of the story, a path that allows you to reflect and explain how you found an important piece of research, or if you prefer to write in third person, in which case you don’t appear in the story at all.  Some people will instinctively know which voice is right for them, other people might like to experiment and write a sample of each to decide.

VOLUNTEERS. Usually historical and genealogical societies are run by volunteers and often they are older people who may be frazzled by technology.   They are incredible sources of information about particular and general research.   Treasure these resources.

WRITE WHAT YOU KNOW – If you are a farmer and your Irish famine orphan was a farm servant, research farming methods at the time.  What did they grow?  How did they sell their produce?  If you love the sea, maybe focus on the voyage.   You don’t have to write what you know but it can be an interesting angle and add breadth. 

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?  If you are a fan of this show or others like it, keep watching.  If you are not, try viewing some episodes.  They are really good examples of what information is found and where it is found.  Importantly they also use experts to interpret the material.  You can follow this idea by asking historians (from the library or historical society) and genealogists (from a genealogical society) to interpret documents and explain context.  These programs build a strong story about some information, rather than trying to find every single detail.  Also, importantly, they look at the relevance, how what they have found has importance and impact today.

WONDER.  It was wonder that got you interested in the first place and it is wonder that can drive you forward and give you direction to tell a unique story.  You can revive your wonder by writing a list of questions that begin with “I wonder…” Here are some examples.   “I wonder how her diet changed from Ireland to Australia” – you could research this.  “I wonder if she was religious” – church records may provide an answer.  “I wonder if she left siblings behind in Ireland and if so what happened to them” – you could search for the answers. 

Best of luck with finding and telling stories.

All the best,

Amanda

Amanda Midlam is a freelance writer of Irish descent who has Roscommon ancestors on both her mother and father’s sides.  She is proud to be a member of the same family as John Hubert Plunkett who prosecuted the perpetrators of the Myall Creek massacre.  She has not found any Irish famine orphans in her ancestry.  

---

 

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (59): Miss D. Meanors

Misdemeanors

This is a brief codicil or supplement to an earlier post called “Skibbereen and Beyond” https://wp.me/p4SlVj-1Aq

If you remember I’d asked a couple of questions,

had an orphan’s Famine experience damaged her, and made her especially vulnerable in Australia?

What were the circumstances and experiences in Australia that contributed to her difficulties, thrusting her into a life of petty crime, or alcoholism, or to the doors of a Benevolent Asylum or Mental Hospital?

In that particular post i suggested some things we could  examine, for example,

• the vulnerability of a lonely female immigrant who lacked a support network from ‘home’
• sexual and domestic abuse
• criminal misdemeanours
• alcoholism
• mental illness, and other maladies
• poverty and hardship
• desertion, illness and death of her husband

and said a few words about those who suffered sexual and domestic abuse, sought refuge in a Benevolent Asylum especially in old age, or became a patient in a mental hospital.

In this post I’d like to add a little about ‘criminal misdemeanors’. But first a couple of caveats. The ‘crimes’ I’ll be talking about are mostly public order crimes, drunkenness, obscene language, causing a nuisance, vagrancy, prostitution and the like, many of them no longer on the statute book. Imagine if today you could be thrown into gaol for swearing or being drunk in a public place.

As Dr Kildea informed us in his oration at Hyde Park Barracks in August 2017 public intoxication was only decriminalised in New South Wales in 1979. He suggested “in mid-Victorian New South Wales with its colonial imitation of Dickensian England, the law was used as a blunt instrument to defeat anti-social behaviour, with punishment rather than intervention the preferred antidote“. Still, these petty offences were ‘crimes’ in mid nineteenth century Australia, and if you did the crime, you did the time, or paid the fine.

The other thing I’d like to stress is that I’ve separated poverty and destitution from alcoholism and abuse and mental illness and the others as a means of examining each in turn. But clearly they should not be separated. The orphan who became a casualty in Australia would experience a mixture of these different things in different measure and in different intensity at different times in her life. One would have to look at each individual case on merit.

South Australia

Let me start with South Australia. Many of our South Australian orphans are still elusive. South Australian State Records may now have a different numbering system from the one I’ve given below. These cases are taken from the Adelaide Police Court Minute Books, SRSA GRG 65/1/1 +. Those who were Earl Grey female orphans were often but not always described as such. They are from research notes I made in the dim and distant past. I had a limited time available to me.

Mary Murray per Roman Emperor September 3 1849 Prostitute behaving indecently in Hindley Street 2 September, 14 days hard labour P.C. Dyke No 266. See the AJCP (Australian Joint copying Project) for Colonial Office (CO) 13/70 Return of Adelaide Prostitutes 30 September 1850. The microfilm will be in your State Library. I’ll put CO 13/70 beside the names of those who appear in this Government Report.

Mary appeared regularly in the Adelaide Police Court, 12 December 1849 violent behaviour at Police Station, 11 March 1850 along with Margaret Kenny another female orphan and Ellen Nugent, common prostitutes behaving in a riotous manner in Hindley Street, 19 July 1850, 6 February 1851 obscene language in Light Square, fined 40 shillings and 10 shillings costs, 7 November 1851 drunk on the racecourse discharged with a caution. I wonder is this the Mary Clark nee Murray per Roman Emperor who entered Dunwich Benevolent Asylum in Queensland in  1897. Given what we know about the geographic mobility of some orphans that is not beyond the bounds of credibility. That Dunwich Mary Murray per Roman Emperor married William Campbell at Armadale (sic) New South Wales when she was 26. Her second husband was John Edward Clark whom she married when she was 34.

Catherine Duffy per Roman Emperor (CO 13/70) 23 March 1850. charged along with  Susannah Griffiths with ‘feloniously receiving’ two rings stolen by Joseph Cooper. The prisoners were committed for trial on the 26th and allowed bail 2 sureties each of £25. ‘Bail was procured by Cooper and Griffiths, but no one coming forward to answer for the appearance of Duffy, she was taken to gaol’. See South Australian, 29 March 1850, p.3, col. 2. https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/71625931/6252341

Young Catherine was to have a long criminal career. 6 January 1851 disorderly prostitute in Light Square discharged, 13 February, 1 March 1851 Prostitute disorderly in Hindley St. fined 40 shillings paid, 28 March using obscene language Morpeth St. discharged, 9 May 1851 drunk and disorderly pleads guilty, 10 July drunk,  4 October, drunk and disorderly fined 20 sh., 16 October, 24 October drunk fined 5 sh., 18 November drunk, 19 January 1852 drunk in Currie St., 5 April 1852, drunk, 27 July drunk in Rosina st., 24 August driving on footway in Currie st., fined 5 sh. 15 November drunk in Hindley st. fined 10sh. 1 March 1854 Drunk in Hindley st. But there is no sign of her in the first six months of 1857. I wonder what became of her.

Ann Curran per Inconstant (CO 13/70) Monday 8 April 1850 drunk and using obscene language in Hindley St. fined 10 shillings paid. Ann Curran and June Rogers charged with wilfully breaking eight panes of glass belonging to Catharine Duffy at Light Square, complainant declined to prosecute. 31 July 1851 to answer complaint of Mary Tilly for using obscene language to her near the Theatre, fined 5 sh.

Margaret Kenny per Inconstant (?) There was a Mary Kenny according to the S. A. Register. See Mary Murray above. 15 July 1850 charged with Sarah Hannon, Fanny Clarke and Sarah Cobbe disorderly prostitutes fined 20 sh., 28 august 1850  Margaret Kenny Irish orphan charged with stealing 14 shillings from John Iris at Adelaide imprisoned for three calendar months as a rogue and vagabond. 13 March 1852 obscene language.

Mary Kelly per Inconstant 24 February 1851 indecent behaviour in Light Sq. discharged with a caution, 13 June 1851 Emma Baker and Mary Kelly prostitutes fighting in Gilles Arcade fined 5 sh., 17 June Margaret Kelly drunk and using obscene language, 24 July drunk, 14 August 1852 Margaret Kelly obscene language 10 shillings fine.

Catherine Ryan Irish Orphan per Elgin CO13/70  There was another Catherine Ryan fined for her hog sty nuisance 2 March 1849. Obviously not the one by the Elgin which didn’t arrive until 12 September that year. 17 August 1850 stealing in the dwelling house of August Fischer at Adelaide one gold brooch and one gold locket, remanded,  24 August 1850 remanded last Saturday for stealing a brooch and a locket. Committed for trial. 27 September 1851 theft committed for trial. 9 March 1854 Larceny.

Bridget Cotter per Elgin CO 13/70  23 September 1850 with three others including Catherine McDonald per Elgin CO 13/70 prostitutes with using indecent language in Hindley St. Cotter and two others 40 sh. each plus 20 sh. costs in default one month hard labour. McDonald discharged.

Mary Ann Dorgan per Inconstant CO 13/70 12 October 1850 using obscene language in Currie St. fined 40 sh. plus 20 sh. costs or one month hard labour. A  Margaret Doran per Inconstant appears 10 march 1851, 26 November 1851 and 29 July 1852, possibly the same person(?)

Jane Robinson Irish orphan per Roman Emperor CO 13/70 17 august 1850 using obscene language in Light Square fined 40 sh. and 20 sh. costs paid. 23 September 1851 obscene language discharged. 4 December drunk in Currie St. fined 5 sh. 27 January 1852 theft of one silver watch prosecuted  discharged.

Catherine Reardon Irish orphan per Inconstant CO 13/70 13 August 1850 obscene language in Hindley St. 40 sh. plus 10 sh. costs paid.

Elizabeth Quinlan per Elgin CO 13/70 12 August 1850 drunk and using obscene language in Hindley St. 40 sh. paid.

Mary Maher per Inconstant CO 13/70 4 July 1850 drunk and disorderly in Currie St. fined 20 sh. or 14 days in prison

Sarah Johnston per Roman Emperor CO 13/70 5 August 1850 disorderly and obscene Hindley St. 10 sh. or one month in gaol.

Rose McShane per Roman Emperor CO 13/70  22 January 1851 drunk Rundle St. 5 sh.

Sarah McEwen per Roman Emperor CO13/70 30 June 1851 indecent, 26 November 1851 obscene language discharged, 4 February 1852 abusive language.

Clearly there is a lot more work to be done on this subject. I’m far from satisfied with the hurried nature of my research in the Archives. How do we trace those who changed their name with marriage or by adopting an alias? What are the limitations of the sources available to us? What explanation should we give for the petty criminal behaviour of these particular orphans? Poverty and hardship? A desire to be independent? Alcohol? Lack of extended family support? Domestic abuse? Psychological or other medical problems? Pizzazz? And what of those who fell on hard times later in life? How do we find those? Fortunately this last question is taken up in the next section.

New South Wales

I am indebted to Julie Poulter for the information contained in this next section. The cases below are taken from Julie’s careful research and pursuit of ‘Earl Grey orphans on the streets of Sydney’. It is work she did for her studies at the University of New England. Most of her information has made its way to the database http://www.irishfaminememorial.org/orphans/database/

The first five cases from Julie’s work are Sarah Packham née Arlow, Jane Lansdowne née Kelly, Mary Ann Lankenon née Hanbury, Cecilia Day née  Maguire and Margaret Hanlon née Burke.

OLd Darlinghurst Gaol. Bird’s eye view from Sydney Illustrated News 16 November 1866

These women who fell on hard times and were imprisoned in Darlinghurst Gaol in Sydney led tragic lives. They suffered domestic abuse, desertion, habitual intemperance, grinding poverty and illness. They lived in the dirtiest, most insalubrious parts of the city and sold their bodies for sex, and neglected their children in their desperate struggle for survival.

Julie argues it was not so much  their Famine experience as their experience in New South Wales that tipped them into the quagmire of petty criminality. Unlike the Adelaide cases above, it would be a long time, on average more than fourteen years in the colony, before they committed any crime.

Sarah Arlow from Banbridge, Co. Down per Earl Grey

Sarah was one of the ‘good’ girls on board the notorious Earl Grey, according to the Matron Maria Cooper. Deserted by her husband on the goldfields of Turon River, she and her two children went to the Benevolent Asylum. (On the Asylum see Tanya Evans, Fractured Families, UNSW Press, 2015). Sarah’s first crime was committed eight years after her arrival. In 1862-5 she was sent to gaol for her indecent behaviour, being idle, drunk and disorderly, and as a vagrant. She was found in a laneway in a drunken stupor and died in 1865 aged 36. Here is her database entry.

• Surname : Arlow
• First Name : Sarah
• Age on arrival : 19
• Native Place : Banbridge, Down
• Parents : William & Eliza (both dead)
• Religion : Church of England
• Ship name : Earl Grey (Sydney 6 Oct 1848)
• Workhouse : Down, Banbridge
• Other : shipping: house servant, reads only, no relatives in colony. Empl. Mr O’Brien, Sydney, £10, 1 year; married Alfred Packham in 1850 at St Andrews, Sydney; Aug 1855 Alfred Peckham (alias John Harris) charged with deserting wife & children, ordered to pay 20s a week for 2 years; Sarah & children went to Benevolent Asylum; Sarah drunk and disorderly in 1856 & 1862; Sarah Packham (aka Davis) died at the Infirmary.

Mary Hanbury from Boyle Roscommon per Digby

See Julie’s account of Mary’s life on the database link below. Mary’s first crime was committed seventeen years after her arrival in the colony. Between 1866 and 1872 she had thirteen convictions for  drunkenness, assault and robbery, prostitution and vagrancy.  (see Sydney Morning Herald 23 January 1872, p.3 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/13251153/1455990). She too sought refuge in the Sydney Benevolent Asylum.

• Surname : Hanbury
• First Name : Mary (Mary Ann)
• Age on arrival : 16
• Native Place : Boyle, Roscommon
• Parents : Terry & Kitty (father living in Manchester)
• Religion : Roman Catholic
• Ship name : Digby (Sydney 4 Apr 1849)
• Workhouse : Roscommon, Boyle
• Other : shipping: house servant, reads & writes, no relatives in colony; with her two sisters, Bridget & Catherine; Register No.584 request for her, in Sydney, to be with sister; No.724 30 Jul 1849, request for her & 26 Sep 1849 indentures cancelled; de facto husband, Johannes Lankenon whose illness in 1866 apparently began their life of crime; Nov 1866 Mary admitted 2 children to Benevolent Asylum & Johannes numerous criminal convictions 1866-71; Mary had 12 convictions: drunk & disorderly, assault & robbery and charges of prostitution; 12 months hard labour Parramatta Gaol 1867; dau Charlotte Maria’s birth 1862 confirmed her mother was Mary Ann Hanbury; 3 children died (1863, 1867 & 1868). See attached story
• Read Her Story

http://www.irishfaminememorial.org/media/Hanbury_from_Julie_Poulter.pdf

Jane Kelly from Athlone, Co. Westmeath per Digby

Jane’s first crime was committed fifteen years after her arrival on the Digby. In 1856 whilst she was pregnant her husband assaulted her so severely she needed surgery and a long stay in hospital. She said he tied her to triangles and cut her clothes off. While she was undressed he struck her back with a whip. He accused her of infidelity and associating with prostitutes. (see, Goulburn Herald, 30 December 1857, p.2 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/118246611 and 2 January 1858, p.3 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/118244726/10143494). She fled and found work  with a local Reverend Sowerby. As Julie put it (Jane is one of Julie’s ancestors, her great great great grandmother) ,”she took up with another man {William Garner} who by 1862 had deserted her, and facing starvation Jane endured a 200 kilometre walk during summer, whilst pregnant and with three small children, in order to reach help at the Benevolent Asylum”. By 1863-4 she  was living in Sussex Street and associating with her shipmate Bridget Higney. Both were living in the worst of Sydney slums. She was first jailed for vagrancy, and then, by 1866, three other times for indecent and riotous behaviour. She died of tuberculosis in 1872. From memory, Jane’s story also appears in Tanya Evans’s Fractured Families.

Below is Jane’s database entry.

• Surname : Kelly
• First Name : Jane
• Age on arrival : 19
• Native Place : Athlone, Westmeath
• Parents : Patrick & Isabella (both dead)
• Religion : Church of England
• Ship name : Digby (Sydney 4 Apr 1849)
• Workhouse : Westmeath, Athlone
• Other : shipping: houseservant, reads & writes; Jan 1850 working for James W Chisholm at ‘Kippelaw’, Mummel nr Goulburn, indentures cancelled after absconded; married Thomas Lansdowne (alias Digby) at Yass 4 Nov 1850; 6 chi; marriage broke down, he assaulted her, case in Goulburn Court Dec 1857/Jan 1858, 5 children remain with Thomas; Jane awarded maintenance, began work for William Garner whose wife had died in Nov 1857; 1858-1863 5 children with Garner who deserted her in 1863; she walked to Sydney Benevolent Asylum; Garner charged with desertion & ordered to pay 7s6d weekly; 1864-1866 Jane Lansdowne (alias Digby) gaoled for vagrancy in Sydney, sometimes with friend & fellow Digby shipmate Bridget Higney; two of Jane’s daughters sent to the Randwick Asylum for Destitute Children; 12 Jul 1872 Jane Digby died of tuberculosis in St Vincent’s Hospital, Darlinghurst. No trace of her sister Isabella also arrived on the Digby

Celia Maguire from Castlebar, Co. Mayo per Panama

There isn’t a lot of information about Celia or Cecilia Maguire either on the irishfaminememorial database or on Barbara’s brilliant website http://mayoorphangirls.weebly.com/

Both will be grateful to Julie for her research. Celia’s first crime was committed seven years after her arrival in Sydney. In 1852 she married Edwin Day of the 11th Regiment but in 1856 Edwin struck an officer and was sent to prison, leaving Cecilia to fend for herself and her four year old daughter. She did so by working in a brothel.  In 1857 she was found guilty of larceny and sent to Darlinghurst Gaol for twelve months. Shortly afterwards, in May 1858, a Coronial Inquest found that she died of “disease brought on by intemperance“.  See The Illawara Mercury 6 May 1862, p. 2, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/136441137

Here is the database entry.

• Surname : Maguire
• First Name : Celia
• Age on arrival : 18
• Native Place : Castlebar, Mayo
• Parents : Michael & Sarah (both dead)
• Religion : Roman Catholic
• Ship name : Panama (Sydney 12 Jan 1850)
• Workhouse : Mayo, Castlebar
• Other : shipping: house servant, cannot read or write, no relatives in colony, sister Jane also on Panama; Empl. E Cherry, Fort Street, Sydney, £8, 1 year

Margaret Burke from Portarlington, Co. Laois per Tippoo Saib

Only fourteen when she arrived, it would be thirteen years before Margaret Hanlon née Burke was convicted of any crime. It was the first and only time she was convicted  for theft. She then embarked on a twenty-five year period of petty crime. In the 1870s she was hardly out of gaol. By 1873, Julie tells us, she was well-known to police as a habitual drunkard. See Empire 17 June 1873 p.2. https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/63231600/5662874

In all, she was convicted more than 122 times, mostly for drunkenness and vagrancy but also for assault, riotous conduct, obscene and indecent language, being disorderly, and in 1883, when she was 47, as a prostitute. What set her on this life of crime is unknown. She may even have used the vagrancy laws and the police watch house as a means and source of shelter and food. What became of her is unknown. She disappears from the record after 1886.

Here is the current  database entry.

• Surname : Burke
• First Name : Margaret
• Age on arrival : 14
• Native Place : Port Addington [Portarlington], Queens [Laois]
• Parents : John & Mary (both dead)
• Religion : Roman Catholic
• Ship name : Tippoo Saib (Sydney Jul 1850)
• Workhouse : Queens [Laois], Mountmellick
• Other : shipping: nursemaid, reads & writes, no relatives in colony. Mary also per Tippoo Saib with same parents is probable sister.

Finally, for now anyway, an orphan Julie has begun work on. She has yet to confirm all that she has suggested here. So please take this as work in progress.

Mary O’Brien from Ballina, Co. Mayo, per Inchinnan

What Barbara has on her website would suggest that Julie may be on the right track. See

http://mayoorphangirls.weebly.com/mary-obrien.html

where Mary was threatened with being sent into the interior for breaking her indenture.

Julie suggests this is the same Mary who married John Reily (Riley, Reilly, etc) in Sydney in 1852. Her first (next?) conviction is in 1856 eight years after her arrival. But then she is gaoled 26 times between 1856 and 1871 for being idle and disorderly, using indecent language and found guilty of riotous conduct, prostitution and theft.

Her husband John died in Liverpool Asylum in 1872.  Mary in 1873 then married John Coy, a West Indian known as “Black Jack”. He had been given a twelve month sentence in 1864 for ‘keeping a bawdy house’. Mary was not to survive much longer. She died after  a fight with Julia Mahoney alias Jane Mathews in Sussex Street in 1874.  We shall await further news from Julie on this one.

——————————————————————-

Julie has very kindly offered to answer any enquiries via email . Her email address is juliepoulter19[at]hotmail.com. I’d be most grateful if you would also put your queries in the comments section at the end of this post. Thankyou in advance. And thank you Julie for your research.

To be continued

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (45): Barefoot and P?, vol one, Introduction (c), pp. 12-17

B&P?1 Introduction (c)

“A way a lone a last a loved a long the” (James Joyce, Finnegan’s Wake)

Next instalment, this time of pages twelve to seventeen. I’ve used some of this material in my blog, and some has remained untouched for twenty-six or so years. Readers may have noticed I’m getting my jollies by adding missing references and notes. I do have heaps of stuff that could be added–i do love a substantive footnote–but I’ll give myself  ‘a restraining order’.

As before, more notes will be added a bit later. I hope you liked the ones in my previous post.

Click on the introduction text a couple of times, or pinch and widen, and the image will be larger.

 

Some notes

As mentioned in the notes to the previous post, most of the extant Irish Workhouse Indoor Admission and Discharge Registers are held in the Public Record Office in Northern Ireland. That they survived at all was thanks to the foresight and skill of a former Deputy Director, Dr Brian Trainor. We are all deeply indebted to him.

As far as I’m aware, outside of Northern Irish Poor Law Unions, and apart from North and South Dublin and Rathdrum (?) in County Wicklow, no others have survived for the years we want. Even then, not all of the Northern Ireland ones have survived. But fortunately Armagh Workhouse Registers do.

So, top of page 12

Cathy Fox PRONI Armagh Indoor Register BG2/G/2 entry 1203

I explained my method of searching for the orphans in these records, in post 5 http://wp.me/p4SlVj-4X

Have a close look there, if you will.

Anne and Jane Hunter PRONI BG2/G/1 entry numbers 3827 and 3828

The Devlin family entries are numerous. For Margaret PRONI BG2/G/1 entry numbers, 608, 1324, 2396, 3700, 5660. BG2/G/2 1507. All of these references should be on the website at www.irishfaminememorial.org

Catherine Tomnay or Tamoney PRONI BG2/G/1 456,1166, 1475, 3967, 4356.

One of the advantages of these records is that they provide information about other family members, about their age, their religion, their occupation, their place of residence, and their condition when they entered the workhouse, and the date they left.

Thus for example, Sarah Ann Devlin was a 15 year old Roman Catholic single female, thinly clothed and hungry when she entered Armagh workhouse 24 April 1847. She left three months later 29 July 1847. But she reentered 16 November the same year, this time the townland of Rathcarby being noted as her place of residence. Six months later, 24 May 1848, she left the workhouse  with her sister Margaret on her way to Belfast to join the other orphans per ship Earl Grey.

page 13   par 2,  I hope this clarifies the use of the word orphan as applied to these young women. They were “to use a modern term, wards of the State”. In the vast majority of cases both parents were dead which is the more commonly held view of ‘orphan’.

page 14 For membership of the Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide Orphan Committees see my blog post 13 http://wp.me/p4SlVj-g4

pages 15-6 Towards the end of that same blog post there is  a copy of an apprenticeship agreement for 15 year-old Anne Smith of the Digby which details the obligations of both apprentice and employer, or Master and Servant. There is another example in SRNSW 9/6193 Particulars of Orphans’ monies No.6 , Apprenticeship Agreement between Ann Deely per Thomas Arbuthnot, “now about the age of fifteen years”, and Frederick Hudson of Ipswich/Moreton Bay, dated 24 April 1850.

page 17 Details of young Margaret Devlin‘s seduction by William Small can be found in Immigration Agent F.L.S Merewether’s  correspondence. [I am unsure if the numbering system at the Archives is still the same. Their staff will be all too willing to help]. See SRNSW 4/4637, 49/672, 17 Oct. 1849, pp.294-5. And 4/4638, 50/178, 14 Feb. 1850, p.66. And 50/190, 50/469,50/762, 50/764 and 50/901, with corresponding pages, pp.76-8 (re seduction), 182, 289-90 (letter to Thomas Small re his son William), 291-2, 331-2. There is more at 4/4639, 51/6, pp.6-7, and 51/225 ‘Would Mr Small make a lump sum of £50?‘, pp.66-7. For information about Mrs Small’s (sic) child at the Protestant Orphan institution, SRNSW 4/4639, 51/354, 10 September 1851, p.104.

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (43): Barefoot and Pregnant? volume one, Introduction (a), pp.1-5

B&P?1 Introduction (a)

I’m still not convinced that this is the best thing to do. But Barefoot volume one is long out of print and for some people, difficult to find. Putting my introduction into the blog also gives me the opportunity to add some references, ‘virtual’ endnotes, as it were. Please remember the introduction was written some time ago and mainly addressed the documents which preceded the Register of Irish female orphans. Not exclusively so, I might add, although my major concern was to ask readers if they agreed with my suggesting the first boatload of Earl Grey orphans “were wrongly condemned from the outset”? It is still worth debating.

Richard Reid, Cheryl Mongan and Kay Caball, among others, have rightly drawn attention to the more positive side of the orphans’ story. I’ve tried to take their work into account in a number of places in my blog. See for example post 7(c)  on The Voyage http://wp.me/p4SlVj-7X

or where i talk about the independent spirit of the orphans, in post 22 on Cancelled Indentures, particularly the section towards the end entitled “Moreton Bay District”. See http://wp.me/p4SlVj-vf

My own favourite ‘success’ story is of Bridget McMahon from Limerick. See http://wp.me/p4SlVj-PV

 Given the different backgrounds of the young women, that there were more than 4,000 of them, and that over time, they were scattered the length and breadth of rapidly changing societies in Eastern Australia, we should not be surprised to find their history is a mixed one. It is as complex as the human condition itself.

I’ll insert my 1991 introduction in stages. It will give the reader time to absorb what it says and i hope, respond to my interpretation.

Some may think I’m treating Surgeon Douglass too harshly, for example. Don’t be afraid to say your piece. You may wish to do some research on Surgeon Douglass yourself. He had both an illustrious and not so illustrious career. A google search may be the place to start. Here’s a link to an entry in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/douglass-henry-grattan-1987

But google won’t alert you to the latest reference I’ve found; Douglass’s xenophobic rant in the New South Wales Legislative Council in 1851. It’s reprinted in Mark Tedeschi’s Murder at Myall Creek, Simon & Schuster, 2016, pp.229-30. It first appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald, 26 November 1851, p.2. See http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/12932367?searchTerm=sydney%20morning%20herald%20Douglass&searchLimits=dateFrom=1851-11-01|||dateTo=1851-11-30

————————————–

“Keats and Chapman were conversing one day on the street…there passed a certain character who was renowned far and wide for his piety, and was reputed to have already made his own coffin, erected it on trestles, and slept in it every night.

‘Did you see our friend?’ Keats said.

‘Yes’ said Chapman, wondering what was coming,

‘A terrible man for his bier’, the poet said“. (The Best of Myles, Myles na Gopaleen, Picador, 1977, p.187.)

———————————————

That will do to start with. If you double click or pinch the pages above, they should become larger and easier to read. I’ll have a look for some references.

Tóg go bog é

Some references.

Page 0ne,

Dunmore Lang’s “dupes of an artful female Jesuit” appears in his letter to Earl Grey printed in the British Banner, 21 November 1849. The link appears in my post 21 towards the end http://wp.me/p4SlVj-q8

see page 34 of the link below

Click to access Letters_of_Dr_John_Dunmore_Lang_in_British_Banner_1953.PDF

Page two,

The best printed record of the various reports concerning the Earl Grey scandal is found in Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council of New South Wales, 1850, volume 1, pp. 394-436. Included there (pp. 407-28) is the report  from Irish Poor Law Commissioner C. G Otway, defending the selection process of the orphans. See also British Parliamentary Papers, 1000 volume Irish University Press edition, Colonies Australia, volume 11, Sessions 1849-50, pp. 510ff. which provides the names of the young women only identified by their initials in the Otway Report. SRNSW (State Records New South Wales) 9/6190 Immigration Correspondence, 12 October 1848, has the minutes of evidence of the Sydney Immigration Board re the Earl Grey. I’m unsure if the same numbering system is still in use.

Page two

R. B. Madgwick, Immigration into Eastern Australia 1788-1851, second impression, Sydney University Press, 1969, Chapter X;

Miriam Dixson, The Real Matilda Women and Identity in Australia 1788 to 1975, Penguin, 1976;

Oliver Mac Donagh, “Emigration during the Famine” in The Great Famine, eds., R.D. Edwards & T. D. Williams, Dublin, 1962, p.357.

Disagreement among practitioners is the ‘stuff’ of history. What I was intimating here is even good historians sometimes get it wrong.

Page Five

British Parliamentary Papers, IUP edition, Colonies Australia,  volume 11, Sessions 1849-50, Papers Relative to Emigration, New South Wales, Fitzroy to Earl Grey, 16 May 1848, Enclosure 1, pp.131-3. In May 1848, Merewether reported on the Hyderabad (arrived 19 February) the Surgeon was ‘unequal to the office and should not be again employed in this service’; ‘the immigrants as a body failed to give satisfaction to the public’; ‘the single females…proved to be utterly ignorant of the business undertaken by them’; ‘several…did not go into service..or very shortly left…for the purpose of going upon the streets’ (p.131).

Re the Fairlie (arrived 7 August) ibid., pp.145-7, ‘a third of the female immigrants arrived in an advanced stage of pregnancy’ (p.145); ‘filthy songs‘ (p.147).

Re the Subraon (arrived 12 April), ibid, pp.147-51.  I have a copy of the Minutes and Proceedings of the Immigration Board at Sydney respecting certain irregularities which occurred on board the ship “Subraon” Printed for the use of the Government only, 1848. The Board met between May and July 1848. It is a ‘negative’ copy i.e. white text on a dark background which makes me think it was printed from a microfilm. My unreliable memory tells me i got it from what was then the Archives Office of NSW. But for the life of me I cannot find the exact reference. Was it at AONSW 9/6197, pp. 147-61? we’ll need to check.

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (42):Barefoot and pregnant? Volume one, Preface.

preface

I was wondering if i should scan my preface and introduction to volume one of Barefoot and Pregnant?

They first appeared in 1991, and again in 1999. The publisher’s interest was to keep costs down. Understandably, that is one reason there are no footnotes. I know I could, or should have provided references at the time. Whether I can do so now is another matter. But if anyone wants a particular reference, I promise to have a go at providing it.

Likewise, I wonder if nowadays I would still hold all the views i gave voice to then. It’s a moot point.

Anyway here’s the preface. Let me know if you think i should scan the intro too.

“Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy” (W.B. Yeats)

T. McClaughlin, “Barefoot & Pregnant?…” Melbourne, 1991, preface

Just click on the image to make it larger.

“Barefoot & Pregnant?”, Melbourne, 1991, preface continued

I thought I’d have a quick look to see if i can find a reference or two which might be considered as endnotes.

On page one, the orphans to South Australia are  called ‘filthy and indelicate’. See British Parliamentary Papers Irish Universities 1000 volume edition, Colonies Australia, volume 13, Sessions 1851-52, Despatch from Governor Young to Earl Grey 8 March 1850, Enclosure 1 in Number 10 from M. Moorhouse at the Children’s Apprenticeship Board, p.255.

On the second page, George Hall was questioned at the South Australian parliamentary enquiry into excessive female immigration, 11 February 1856. Report of the Select Committee of the Legislative Council of South Australia into Excessive Female immigration  Minutes of Evidence, Adelaide, 1856, p.17, q.267. He was an opponent of the orphan scheme, having made known his views to Stephen Walcott, Colonial Land and Emigration Commissioner, in April 1854, when he visited England.

I’ll see if i can put together some other ‘endnotes’.

I’ve mislaid the exact references to Catherine Duffy‘s appearances in the Adelaide Police Court. She appears often in SRSA (State Records South Australia) GRG 65/1 the Adelaide Court Minute Book, should anyone have easy access. Otherwise a search online via Trove is always possible. See, for example,  http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/result?l-state=South+Australia&q=Catherine+Duffy&l-title=41

Susan Stewart per Pemberton is in PROV (Public Record Office of Victoria) VPRS 521 vol.1, 1853-57, Female Prisoners’ Personal Description Registers. Susan appears, for example, 13 November 1855 at entry number 1043 and in early 1856 at number 133. Some of this material may be searched online, I understand.   VPRS 516 is the Central Register of Female Prisoners in Melbourne gaol.

Despite what i say in the paragraph above, it would be good to know how many of the orphans made court appearances, and for what reasons.  Elsewhere in my blog I’ve mentioned some of the problems associated with this.

Here are a few names extracted from PROV VPRS 521; entry 129, October 1854, Amelia Nott who claimed to have arrived by the New Liverpool in 1849; entry 833, Mary Ann Tyrell per Roman Emperor, 1848; Mary Ann Seville (?) per Eliza Caroline, 1850, 1856, entry number 30. A number of entries in the Register name the ships that carried orphans but  not always providing the correct date of arrival. One would have to check the other dates when those ships arrived in Port Phillip.

And in Melbourne gaol records, PROV VPRS 516, we find Jane McGuire per Diadem, Catherine Ellis per Lady Kennaway, Mary McGill per Derwent, Ellen Brennan (Ellen Stewart) per Diadem, Margaret Baker per Eliza Caroline, Elizabeth Dunn per Lady Kennaway. Were these really Earl Grey orphans? What of those who assumed an alias or had taken their husband’s name? It’s not a research subject for the faint-hearted. But what an interesting comparison might be made of orphans in Melbourne gaol and those Julie Poulter has studied in Darlinghurst gaol in Sydney.

It would be interesting to extend this project to include Earl Grey orphans who died in Asylums or other institutions. Here are a few examples; Mary Kelly per Maria who died in Newington Asylum in 1904; Mary A. Weatherall per Lady Peel buried at Dunwich 1914; Margaret Geraghty per Panama died Rockhampton of chronic alcoholism and neglect, 1891; Emma Kelly per Earl Grey died Woogaroo, 1879; Ellen Brodie per Pemberton died Ararat 1883; Eliza Martin per Roman Emperor died Adelaide Destitute Asylum, 1905; Ellen Fitzgerald from Skibbereen per Eliza Caroline died of malnutrition in Waterloo 1881.  I know of others but it is sometimes difficult to confirm an inmate’s orphan status in these institutions.

Not that this changes anything I’ve said in my preface.

Earl Grey’s Irish Famine Orphans (39): Irish Famine women, a challenge or three

IRISH FAMINE WOMEN; a challenge or three+

Some people may have read the centre-piece of this post already. It is the talk I gave at the International Irish Famine commemoration in Sydney in 2013. Tinteán published an edited version sometime later. https://tintean.org.au/2014/03/06/irish-famine-women-a-challenge-or-three/

Today, I want to ask other labourers in the vineyard if they would take up some of my ‘challenges’. Is it true that Van Diemen’s Land bore the brunt of Ireland’s Famine misery? What do we know about the 4-5,000 single Irish women who arrived in South Australia c. 1855-56? Who were they? Where in Ireland did they come from? What happened to them? Over fifty years ago Cherry Parkin included them in her Honours thesis. As far as I know little has been done since.

There are no pretty or informative illustrations in this post. I’ve omitted them because i wanted to emphasize the importance of ‘words’. I hope you will ponder them. Note, too, there is one more example added to the end of my talk. I hope it tells you why i think this is important.

 

page 1 Irish Famine Women; a challenge or three

a chairde

Sul a gcuirfidh mé tús leis an léach seo, ba maith liom a chur in iúl an meas mór atá agam ar muintir na Cadigal don náisiún Eora, agus na shinsear a thánaig rompu a bhí i bhfeighil an dúthaigh seo. (Thank you Tom and Sinead and Síle)

One of the most striking achievements in Irish scholarship during the last eighteen years or so is the sheer range and depth of works on the Great Irish Famine. After years of relative neglect the sesquicentenary of that tragic event seems to have opened the scholarly floodgates. Yet surprisingly, there seems to be no major study of women during the famine. It’s as if a big piece of the jigsaw is missing. There are a number of excellent small pieces but no comprehensive study of Irish Famine women. An exemplary work, the closest yet to what I have in mind, is in fact a work in comparative literature; Margaret Kelleher’s The Feminization of Famine: Expressions of the inexpressible.(1997)

Professor Kelleher claims that “where the individual spectacle of a hungry body is created, this occurs predominantly (tho’ not exclusively) through images of women” [8]. [or Lysaght, 99] Think about that for a moment. If I say “Famine” to you, what mental image comes to mind?…..

For me, it’s an image of Sudanese and Somali women who appeared on our television screens last year. Victims of famine and drought, those women decided to take their hungry and sick children and walk for miles and miles in search of help.

It is an image that is echoed in the very moving stream of consciousness essay by Connell Foley at the end of that brilliant Atlas of the Great Irish Famine, [Cork Up, 2012, p. 678]

…and if you are a woman subsistence farmer in a remote part of the congo

or niger and you have five extra mouths to feed because your brother died

2 of hiv and you are looking at the sky and you are looking at your land

and you are calculating if there will be too little rain too late or too much

so that your basic crop will be ruined and you do not know how you will feed

your children or pay for some medicines but you get up every day

and you do what you can… [Beckett] You must go on…I can’t go on…I’ll go on.

And for the Irish Famine, it’s James Mahony’s London Illustrated News images of women. You probably know “A Woman Begging at Clonakilty”, for money to bury her dead child (Feb ’47), or “Bridget O’Donnell and her children” recently evicted from their holding near Kilrush. (Dec. ’49).

Yet looking thru/over my own research notes, what struck me is not women’s victimisation –but their agency, their stoicism and determination in the face of catastrophe –and the variety of their coping strategies. Women were the leaders in workhouse riots and protests in Cork, Limerick and Tipperary [BGMB records] asserting their entitlement to better treatment and better food. In 1848, 600 women rose en masse in Cork workhouse and attacked the visiting Poor Law Inspector, “having armed themselves with stones, tins and bottles”. In Nenagh, women were the leading characters…dashing saucepans, tins and pints of stirabout to the ground and smashing windows”. In Limerick, [in April 1849,] there was a riot of women screaming and throwing pints of ale at workhouse officers. These women were probably in the second of Professor Lawrence Geary ‘s three famine phases, the protracted period of “resistance’ which came after the initial “Alarm” phase and before the final phase he calls “Exhaustion”. The second phase, according to Professor Geary, saw the slow disappearance of community generosity and focus shifting away from ‘family’ to personal survival.[Mike Murphy lecture]

Women have always been given due/proper attention by historical demographers. Women’s age at marriage, their marital fertility rate and their mortality rate are crucial to any study of famine demography.

Of particular interest here is that more men than women perished during the famine. Women had what Kate McIntyre calls “a female mortality advantage”. An interesting twist to this is David Fitzpatrick’s suggestion, that –since women were in effect the principal guardians of comfort and succour, the primary suppliers of care and affection, they became the holders of the only entitlement, love, that may have been inflated by famine [67]. The mere thought of trying to examine the history of affection during the famine will no doubt be the stuff of nightmares for traditional historians.

If the evidence collected by the Irish Folklore Commission is to be valued,— [there is some debate about the reliability of that evidence, since it was collected long after the event itself. However, it’s too easy to dismiss/Nonetheless, I think we should learn to appreciate the skills of oral historians and the sophisticated ways they assess their source material. Such evidence can tell us something of what it was like to have been there. [O’Grada, Black ’47](Why were women in the oral tradition perceived as suffering the worst of consequences?) ] If the folklore evidence is to believed, women during the famine had a good reputation as providers of charity. The renowned Peig Sayers recounted to the Commissioners the story of a Kerry woman, Bridie Shehan, who tied her dead daughter to her back with ropes, and carried her to the local graveyard where two men helped her bury her daughter. When Bridie made her way back home, her neighbour, Nora Landers, called her in and gave her seven of her own precious seed potatoes. [ O’Grada’s Black ’47, 200-01]

A female outsider, an American visitor, Asenath Nicholson, a widow, who wrote about her travels through Ireland, also has a well deserved reputation for charitable good works. It is from her that we learn of an Irish Famine woman’s task of closing the door on her family’s grave. If I may quote from her work, (Annals of the Famine in Ireland)

A cabin was seen closed one day…when a man had the curiosity

to open it, and in a dark corner he found a family of the father, mother

4 and two children, lying in close compact. The father was considerably

decomposed; the mother, it appeared, had died last, and probably

fastened the door, which was always the custom when all hope

was extinguished, to get in to the darkest corner and die, where passers- by could not see them.

Such family scenes were quite common, and the cabin was generally pulled down upon them for a grave.[ Kelleher, 85]

Clearly then women were very much present in famine times. They were there in the workhouse [in Limerick, Cork, Nenagh (or wherever,)] rioting against their treatment and poor quality food. They were there inside the cottier’s cottage, their domestic domain, when the pile of potatoes on the table grew smaller and smaller and decisions had to be taken as to who got what, and how much. They were there around the family hearth when the decision was made to send their sons and daughters abroad, or to decide if the whole family should emigrate. And women were most likely there, at the very end when they could still close the door to their cottage, their family grave.

This then is our first challenge: a full blown study of Irish women’s role during the famine.

What part did women play in Irish society and economy? What work did they do in the fields, at sowing or at harvest time? Did they help dig ditches, gather sticks, dig turf, feed cattle, pigs and poultry or groom horses by lantern, late on a winter’s night? Was their work confined to a kitchen garden, washing, weaving, cooking, sweeping the yard and cleaning the house? How did all this differ from class to class or region to region before, during and after the Famine?

What exactly was women’s role in family life? Were women the chief providers of affection? What was their sense of moral value? Were they protectors and promoters of religious belief? Did they act as guardians of oral tradition and transmitters of language and culture? Did the Famine overturn traditional family structures and throw traditional mores into disarray? Did women have to find and procure food for themselves and their desperately hungry children by whatever means, travelling miles, begging, and stealing if needs be. [These are some of the questions that spring to my mind. I’m sure you will think of others.]

Without an understanding of women’s role, may I suggest to you, our knowledge of the famine will always remain incomplete?

Our second challenge then is a full-scale, comprehensive study of Irish-Australian Famine women. The important thing, as before, is that we view these women through the lens of the Famine.

When I was preparing Barefoot & Pregnant? in the 1980s I was concerned about identifying people who knew an driochsheal, people who had first hand experience of the ‘bad life’, the ‘bitter time’ of the Famine. The young women who came here as part of the Earl Grey scheme were exactly what I was looking for. These young women obviously are essential to any study of Irish-Australian famine women.

But I think it is now time to cast the net more widely –to include, perhaps, some of the landlord assisted immigrants from the Monteagle estates in Limerick or the Shirley estate in Monaghan, for example– Or at least, the young women who came from workhouses in Clare and Cork to Hobart on the Beulah and Calcutta in 1851 –Or to Sydney, on the Lady Kennaway from Cork workhouses in 1854. These last, I’m sure you know, were the occasion of a fascinating political brouhaha here in NSW from the mid to late 1850s.

6

Let me give three examples to show what can be done—first, Irish female convicts transported to Tasmania, second, government assisted family migrants to NSW and Victoria, and thirdly, the immigration of c. 4-5000 Single females to South Australia in the 1850s.

At the beginning of the 1840s, about 1,000 Irish convicts were transported to Van Diemen’s Land each year. By the famine years, the annual intake had risen to 3,000. The transportation of female convicts, unlike that of males, did not stop during those years. “Tasmania thus bore the brunt of Irish famine misery ”, says Professor Richard Davis [9]. Not everyone would agree. Rena Lohan, a postgraduate student, in her study of Grangegorman, the women’s prison in Dublin, for example, found that most of the prisoners were already hardened criminals. Any link between Irish female convicts and the famine is tenuous, she argued. As always, the issue is complex and open to debate.

Were Irish judges more lenient in their sentencing during the famine? Knowing the difficult circumstances people were in, were they more prepared to accept as a defense, that crimes were committed “on grounds of want”? One such was the Exchequer Baron, John Richards who was willing to send convicts to Tasmania especially when he learned they had nowhere to go and would be without support when their prison term expired. Needless to say, not all judges and juries agreed on this matter. There was no consistent policy.

Did more women commit more crimes in order to be transported? Can we establish a strong link between the famine and the types of crimes they committed? Among the crimes recorded against the names of Irish women arriving in 1849 and 1850, for example, we note, “stealing a turkey’, ‘stealing a sheep’, ‘stealing a cow’, ‘stealing fowls’, ‘killed her child by a bandage, a little girl one month old’, ‘house burning’, which in itself carried a life sentence. Do we really need to distinguish between 7’intention’ and crimes born of desperation? Yet what of those women with criminal records stretching before the famine years?

Assuming we can identify female Famine convicts, what became of them in Tasmania? Were they different from other convicts? Were they less likely to re-offend? Were they less likely to be rebellious or to ‘resist’ the convict system, more likely to be ‘accommodationist’, and willing to accept their lot? Or did Australian conditions rather than their Irish famine background determine what became of them? The issues are complex are they not? Yet Tasmanian convict records are so rich it should be possible to answer many of these questions.

A second category of Irish-Australian famine women might include those who came here as part of their family’s emigration strategy. Richard Reid’s excellent work, Farewell my Children [Anchor, 2011], draws attention to the quite elaborate ways families in Ireland used Government assisted schemes to come to Australia during the famine years and the years immediately after. Manoeuvering the intricacies of bureaucratic regulations, filling out forms, collecting the required references from householders, from their local priest or magistrate or doctor, waiting for notification and arranging to join a ship in England, required skill, patience and detailed planning. Working the system, bending the rules, required a different kind of skill.

As family members discussed their emigration prospects around the hearth, in the domestic sphere, I am sure Irish women made their voice heard. One can surmise how influential women’s strength and determination and emotional clout was, in deciding how the family’s emigration strategy would be played out. Strikingly, Irish emigration to Australia in the 19^th century was to achieve a gender balance. But in the famine, and years immediately following, many more women than men arrived as government assisted immigrants.

Dr Reid emphasises that it is a mistake to think of these young women, or the young 8sons and daughters in a family, being thrust into the unknown. They were often supported by an extensive and intricate network of family, friends and neighbours, sometimes stretching back to earlier convict days or bounty emigration schemes, sometimes needing a network to be established anew, set-up from scratch. We might ask did daughters play as important a role as sons in establishing these networks, not just for their own nuclear family but for their extended family and other members of their local community as well? Or were they less likely than men to nominate family and friends or manipulate Remittance regulations to their own advantage?

If I might illustrate the complications of this family emigration planning further, with an example form the work of an excellent family historian in Victoria, Anne Tosolini. I’ve used this example before in an article published in Descent in September 1999, [137].

Siblings and cousins (sons and daughters) of the Frehan and Gorman families came here from the parish of Lorrha in Tipperary between 1849 and 1854, some of them to Port Jackson and some to Port Phillip. They were to regroup in Melbourne during those years, the men renting and purchasing properties in neighbouring streets in Richmond, close to people who had been their neighbours in Lorrha. The women, however, settled some distance away, in Geelong. When they married, and their husbands later selected land, they were scattered throughout different parts of Victoria, –their strong bonds of kinship thus becoming slowly and perhaps more easily weakened. Was there a ‘gendered’ difference in the colonial experience of the first generation of migrants? Did the women adapt more readily? Were women more willingly acculturated? Were they more independent in their choice of marriage partners? Was the regrouping of their family more likely to be ‘transitional’ than that of Irish men? These are questions about women’s role in their family emigration strategy that can, and still need to be addressed.

My third example of Irish-Australian Famine women is the circa 4-5 thousand young women who sailed into Port Adelaide in 1854, 1855 and 1856. Boatload after 9boatload of young single Irish females—by the Europa, the Grand Trianon, the Nashwauk, Aliquis and Admiral Boxer, for example,—came to South Australia in the mid 1850s as part of what I would call ‘ their flight from famine and its aftermath’. The Famine had opened the floodgates. Like the Earl Grey female orphans, they too might be considered famine refugees.

So many came in such a short time, so many were allegedly ill-suited to the work required of them, so many demanded food and accommodation in immigrant depots, and so many had been sent to Adelaide under false pretences (they had been told in London they could easily walk to Melbourne and Sydney) that South Australian government authorities established a government enquiry into what they called “Excessive Female Immigration”. Lucky for us they did so. In the minutes of evidence to their report we hear the voice of some of the young women themselves. The women called before the enquiry were asked why they came here. Their answers were what we would expect;–ambitious, independent, hopeful, banal.

[“February 15^th 1855 Frances McDowell called in and examined, 32]

What induced you to come out here?—I do not know.

Had you received letters from friends? –I have no friends in Australia.

Did you think you would benefit yourself by coming to this Colony?–I was induced by the published statements to think that I might do well here.”

Some of these women were part of a network already here, and soon left South Australia to join their family and friends in Sydney and Melbourne. But my general impression is that the majority did not belong to such a network. ..Still, until there is an in-depth and thorough study of these women, our conclusions should remain tentative. This surely is a tempting research project for someone living in Adelaide.

Some excellent work has already been done on aspects of this so-called “Excessive” female immigration, –by Cherry Parkin, Eric Richards,Ann Herraman, Stephanie James, Marie Steiner to name a few. After acknowledging the initial troubles these young women had, –some walking 16 miles in the heat of the day, barefoot, to go to a situation, others returning to depot sunburnt, blistered, overworked and cast out after harvest was finished, some found crying, disappointed, despondent and depressed at their prospects—the view of most Australian writers is that these Irish women were generally well cared for and absorbed successfully into South Australian society. Areas of thickest Irish settlement …such as Paddy Gleeson’s Clare Valley were the first to accept and absorb them. The Seven Hills marriage registers demonstrate just how quickly they were accepted.

Other writers, outside Australia, are less upbeat. To quote from two, “The young women settled in badly and most left as soon as they could”. “Those sent into the outback as agricultural labourers barely survived”. (Akenson)

Who exactly were these young women? Which parts of Ireland did they come from? Where did their confidence, –or desperation, come from? What became of them? Were they being realistic in their expectations? Were they disillusioned? In fact, the same sort of questions may be asked of all of our Irish-Australian famine women, whether family emigrants, workhouse women, foundling orphans, convicts or convict families.

Is it possible to view them through the lens of their famine experience? Or at least try to view them from their own perspective? Look at their history through their own eyes, follow in their footsteps? This is my third challenge.

It’s not an easy thing to do. Finding out about the famine in our subject’s locality and even surmising the impact it might have had on our subject’s psyche, and subsequent life, are approaches we may need to take. It especially means our not accepting official sources at face value. They provide only a limited and slanted view of things –which is not that of the women themselves. Dig deeper. Read the sources “against the grain” [perhaps in the same manner as postcolonial Indian historians of the 1980s.] If necessary, rearrange the mental furniture we normally use in studying the past.

In the end, our sources may never allow us to get ‘inside the head’ of individual women. We may never get close enough to know them ‘in the round’–except perhaps through intelligent creative fiction. Which is why I’m very much looking forward to reading Evelyn Conlon’s Not the same sky [Wakefield Press, 2013]which is being launched later this afternoon.

Finally, our challenge is also about taking care with the language we use. Language is a loaded gun. If I may explain this by means of a few phrases, [–‘the Atlantic slave trade‘, the ‘Holocaust‘ and ‘pauper immigration‘.]

My first full-paid university appointment in the 1960s was in the West Indies. For me, a phrase such as “the Atlantic Slave trade” is a Pandora’s box, full of memories and meanings. But at its core is the 12 million people bought and sold like chattel, bought and sold like pieces of farm machinery or livestock, people denied their humanity.

One of the last courses I taught at Macquarie University before I retired included the Holocaust, the industrial mass murder of 6 million Jewish people. It was a subject that troubled me greatly. I found myself insisting upon saying Jewish people as a means of recognising the victims’ humanity. Without that recognition of our common humanity, it can happen again and again, as it did in Cambodia, in Rwanda and in the former Yugoslavia.

Even a seemingly innocuous/straightforward phrase such as “pauper immigration”, [still current in some quarters when writing about the Earl Grey famine orphans,] –has different layers of meaning. It carries a class interpretation. It implies that some immigrants are of less value than others, and hence, as human beings. Many of the young famine orphan girls who came here were bilingual, especially those from the west of Ireland. They spoke both Irish and English. The Irish word “bochtán” –‘poor person’– contains within it recognition of the poor person’s humanity in a way that the phrase, “pauper immigration” [Madgwick, chpt.X] does not. As those young women accommodated themselves to their new Australian circumstances they lost that language, and that world view; they lost that way of looking at the world. [There is a v. interesting essay, on this very subject by Mairead Nic Craith, Legacy and Loss, towards the end of that brilliant work, Atlas of the Great Irish Famine. p.580]

Today, I wish to add a third phrase, “the Irish potato famine” which is gaining currency these days. It is a phrase which many Irish people find insulting. Why is that? What’s wrong with those words?

Sure, failure of the potato crop is a very important part of what happened but as I said in post no.4 http://wp.me/p4SlVj-3I

famine is always about more than shortage of food and starvation. In that post I mentioned the work of Amartya Sen. Do search for him on google and for his colleague with whom he wrote about famine and poverty, Jean Drèze. I see one can even download the whole of Sen’s Poverty and Famines: an essay on entitlements and deprivation from more than one place. Even if you do not agree with his theory of entitlements applied to the Irish case you will realize how complex famines are. Poverty, over-crowding, a vicious land system, poor housing, underemployment, hoarding, thieving, price gouging, gombeen men, ‘culpable’ neglect on the part of government, the quarter acre clause, betrayal of one’s neighbours, and the unstoppable march of disease, are all in the mix. A phrase such as ‘the Irish potato famine’ misdirects our attention and fails to understand the complexities involved. “The Irish Potato Famine”–no; “The Great Irish Famine”–yes.

Let me put this another way. I’ll use the final words of David Nally in his Human Encumbrances.

“How are catastrophic famines to be prevented? One possible answer is provided by those who resisted famine policies in the 1840s: stop creating them”. (231)

Do please think about the words you want to use  before uttering them.

Is minic a ghearr teanga  duine a scornach (it’s often a person’s tongue/language cuts his throat)

My thanks to Tom Power, and  Tom and Sinead McCloughlin for this saying.

Careful as you go. Mind your language.

Trevor McClaughlin 24 August 2013