School: Barrow (roll number 11850)

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1. The Famine of 1847

   

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   Many people died in the famine time. It was called black '47, because the potatoes that were in the pits blackened and rotted.
   Barrow was very thickly populated that time. Nearly all the people were poor except five or six farmers. They gave the poor people a bit to eat until their own things rotted. One man went to a pit one day, for potatoes, and he fell in to the rotten potatoes. Another man had an acre and a half of potatoes growing.
   When he had them in pits they all rotted except four bags. One man by the name of Darby O Sullivan died of hunger. He had a wife and four or five children. When their father died they were too weak to go out looking for a turnip, or a mangolds, or a bit of dillisk, or sluidí to keep them alive. A few days after their father's death, one of the children died. The mother was not able to go to the burial because she was dying also. Her other children were streached on the floor dying. She threw herself

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   Transcribed by a member of our volunteer transcription project.

   History Edit

   Language

   English

   Collector

   Pádraig Ó Slatra

   Gender

   Male

   Address

   Barrow, Co. Kerry

   Informant

   Mrs Kate Harmon

   Relation

   Grandparent

   Gender

   Female

   Age

   88

   Address

   Barrow, Co. Kerry