Irish Potato Famine Research Paper

The infamous disaster of the Irish potato famine, also known as The Great Famine was an era in Ireland that lasted between 1845 and 1849, during this time starvation, sickness, emigration, and mostly death were being faced by thousands of people. These causes were being widespread in Ireland because potato plants were being destroyed by a disease called blight. The British government did have negligence toward the Irish during the famine. The famine started as natural disaster, but its causes were being worsened by the actions of the British government, headed by Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel at the time of the famine.

Before the famine occurred in Ireland, the Act of Union took place between Ireland and Great Britain, therefore Ireland was

Potato was such a normal food that people ate, so when people didn’t have potatoes to eat, they starved until there death. A story published in London was about three people; a 25 year-old woman, a 52 year-old man, and a 31 year-old man dying from starvation from Clare County, Ireland. People dying from starvation and published stories about the people that were dying became an everyday thing around the world.

Ireland has suffered with other famines before, but when people started to notice that it was killing people and it wasn’t like any other famine they decided to immigrate to other countries. The people of Ireland started to immigrate to North America and some parts of Great Britain. The British government also noticed that this famine was not like any other famine they had before, but the British government actions didn’t gave to much hope to Ireland because of the actions they were

Soup kitchens were established in Ireland's 130 Poor Law Unions by May. Three million people were being fed by this, the food wasn’t nutritional at all, but it made people happy because they looked healthy. In the summer of 1847, the number of deaths from starvation decreased. The planting of 1847 was successful. The government felt like the famine was over by fall of 1847 because their workhouses were full with over 144,000 people. The workhouses did manage the relief effort because by 1851, 309,000 were in the workhouses. It’s not quite sure when the potato famine did really ended, it did ended gradually, with recovery spreading from east to west, as the number of workhouses increased and the number of Irish people did decreased.

The potato famine did have numerous effects in Ireland; emigration was the biggest effect in Ireland because over 1 million people migrated in the immediate famine period. These 1 million migrants probably ended up going to Australia, Britain, or North America. Agriculture was another thing that was affect by the potato famine because bankrupt happened and it is estimated that over 500,000 people were