The Great Irish Famine
The Anger
Some people were very angry that the English government had not done more to prevent the
famine. This caused a lot of anger against Britain and lasted for a long time. Irish journalist John
Mitchel wrote at that time:
“The Almighty indeed sent the potato blight but the English created the famine... a million and
half men, women and children were carefully, prudently and peacefully slain by the English
government. They died of hunger in the midst of abundance which their own hands created.”
This reflects on the widely held view that despite the failure of the potato crop there was still
enough food in the country to feed the population. Instead the “cruel and greedy” English
exported the food leaving the Irish to starve. It was felt that the disgusting bigotry and anti-Irish
prejudice in Britain at the time, particularly the infamous Punch cartoons which compared the
Irish to apes, were proof of the allegation that the British deliberately neglected the starving Irish
in order to destroy them.
Historians generally agree that British policies during the Famine were misguided, ill-informed
and counter-productive, and that had a similar crisis occurred in England instead of Ireland the
British government would have reacted very differently.
OUR VALLEY SANTA CLARITA
PAGE 11