As everyone knows—since they closely follow such important events for society as meetings of the Holy Synod—in March last year, the Russian Orthodox Church decided to include St. Patrick of Ireland in the Orthodox calendar. Our saints are missing, God help us with the Western ones. I confess that lately I have sinned literally in everything: with typos, with the houses of another almost saint huddled in a room for $650 thousand, Buffett, and, finally, in that I forgot about Patrick. But better late than never.

I won’t dwell on the saint—he already had the great honor of being included in the Orthodox calendar. And I’ll focus on the Irish. First of all, I want to stand up for their not very healthy habits of drinking rivers of green beer on this day. It would seem that this is their spiritual kinship with us. We also have ancient traditions like“I finally got so drunk that I started snorting and talking into my plate.” (A. Turgenev).

But no, Please guess three times where the tradition of getting drunk on St. Patrick's Day came from? Beer. Tea does not produce itself. And most importantly, he owns production enterprises. It is beer companies like Budweiser 1 and “Millercoors” 2 in 1980, they carried out an aggressive advertising campaign linking St. Patrick's Day and beer. And by a strange coincidence, this has been the case ever since.

Now about the Irish. Just about the recent “Holodomor”, described in detail by the agent of the secret department of “counter-propaganda against the USSR”, Robert Conquest, not without the help of Nazi collaborators warmed up by the CIA. But there was hunger. However, when this happened in a socialist state, all the victims of the natural disaster were carefully counted, multiplied by a thousand for greater accuracy, so as not to forget anyone, and imputed to the Bolsheviks.

But a similar disaster happened in Ireland in 1845-1852, and capitalism had nothing to do with it. Victims of the capitalist regime? Never mind. It's your own fault.

The fact is that the Irish at that time were second-class citizens and a food colony of Great Britain like India and Caribbean Islands where sugar cane was grown. The Irish grew potatoes and other crops. But the potatoes suddenly became infected with late blight - microorganisms that cause a fungal infection. 3

The Irish relied on potatoes for their subsistence in much the same way that Russian peasants depended on their grain crops. Thus, the population of Ireland found themselves in a position where they had nothing to eat. But what about other cultures? There was plenty of other food, but it was intended solely for export for the commercial interests of the British. 3

The Irish have repeatedly sent petitions to the British government asking them to close their borders to food exports while their own population is starving, but the government, guided by the principle of “laissez faire,” that is, providing “complete freedom to the market,” refused to do this. 3

In general, the imperialist powers never interfere in what happens in the capitalist market: they give the invisible hand of the market carte blanche, while they themselves modestly sit on the sidelines. During the Great Irish Famine, the imperialists were completely uninvolved in the Opium Wars in China, for example.

So in this situation, they decided that the market would do everything right: all the food from the Irish would be taken away, but other entrepreneurs would bring it in. And other entrepreneurs had no time to deliver food to the poor second-class Irish. What to take from Goli? What can you do? Laws of the market. You can't argue against them.

So it turned out that, despite the fact that potatoes accounted for only 20% of all crops grown in Ireland, millions of Irish people died of hunger, the rest were forced to move. At the same time, Ireland exported corn, wheat, oats, etc. to Britain for further trade. 3

According to Quinnypike University professor and Director of the Great Irish Famine Museum Christine Canili, who studies the issue, “Ireland produced enough crops for export to Britain that it was enough to feed 2 million people. Obviously, there was rather a food surplus.” 3

But in our time, bourgeois historians attribute everything to nature and the unfortunate fungus.

“This New York student won a $250,000 prize for his research on the destructive microorganism that caused the Irish Potato Famine.”

One of the descendants of the microorganism

And also, according to tradition, on the laziness of the Irish. Probably also due to the lack of entrepreneurial abilities. Fools only knew how to plow in the fields. You won't become rich with such qualities.

By the way, little has changed in our time. The world now produces enough food to feed the entire world's population, yet 815 million people worldwide suffer from hunger. 4

“Myth: There is not enough food. Fact: The world produces enough food to provide 1.9 kilograms of food (3,200 calories) to every person every day- 50% more than necessary).”

But don't dare. The capitalist system is not to blame for this.

In case I've gone overboard with literary devices again and haven't made my point clear enough, the moral of the story, including the introduction, is this:quod licet Jovi, non licet bovi. In other words, what is allowed to Jupiter is not allowed to the bull. And who is our Jupiter now, god and sovereign? Gentlemen bourgeois. They dictate what is allowed to whom. Why on earth? They are waiting in the wings until everyone realizes that the masters are vain and perishable.

1.time.com/4261456/st-patrick-day-2016-h istory-real-saint/

2.millercoorsblog.com/news/st-patricks/

3.ighm.org/learn.html

4.fao.org/state-of-food-security-nutriti on/en/

1. One day, while wandering around the Internet, I discovered photographs with a very strange sculptural composition. I would even emphasize - with a very SCARY composition. Some thin, emaciated people, dressed in rags, look doomedly in one direction. They hold beggar's knapsacks in their hands. One man carries either a sick or dead child on his shoulders. Their mournful faces are terrible. Their mouths are twisted, either in a cry or a groan. A hungry dog ​​is following in their footsteps, just waiting for one of these tired people to fall. And then the dog will finally have lunch... Creepy sculptures, aren't they?

4. It turns out that this is a monument to the Great Famine. And it is installed in the Irish capital - in the city of Dublin. Have you ever heard of the Great Famine in Ireland? I foresee your answer: you know, against the backdrop of the dark pages of OUR history, we somehow didn’t care about Irish problems.

However, it was not just hunger! It was a real cold-blooded Holodomor and Genocide, perpetrated by Great Britain on its small neighbor. After him, tiny Ireland, which is the size of a thimble on a map, according to the most conservative estimates, lost about 3 million people. And this is one third of the country's population. Some Irish historians claim that their land was half depopulated. That Great Famine gave impetus to very important historical processes. This was followed by the Great Irish Migration to America. And they sailed across the Atlantic on “floating coffins.” This is how the Irish gangs of New York, the automobile empire of the Irishman Henry Ford, and the family political clan with Irish roots named Kennedy arose.

This was a small announcement. And now, first things first.

Have you seen Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York? If you haven't already, I highly recommend checking it out. The film is very realistic, heavy, bloody, and as people of the older generation say in such cases, it is a film of life. It is based on real historical events. It’s about how the poor Irish who “came in large numbers” to America, who had no work, no money, no knowledge of the language, were forced to fight for life with the “native” Americans. Their armed riots were the worst in US history. These bloody uprisings were brutally suppressed by the regular army at the cost of even more blood.

5. So why did the Irish end up in America? Why did 15,000 ragged Irish emigrants go ashore every week in New York Harbor? Moreover, these were those who survived along the way, who did not die on the way from disease and hunger.

They sailed across the Atlantic on old, worn-out ships that once carried black slaves. The emigrants themselves called these rotten shells “floating coffins.” Because every fifth person died on board.

Historical fact: in the middle of the 19th century, for a nominal period of 6 years, in New World 5,000 ships with emigrants arrived from Old Lady Ireland. In total, a little more than a million people set foot on the American shore. And if every fifth person died on the way, then you can calculate for yourself how much THIS comes out of the one million who arrived.

10. The most popular signs hanging on houses, offices and shops in American cities were “No Irish to apply for work”, and only in second place was “No dogs allowed”. Irish women were not even taken into brothels because they were too exhausted for this work.

What was it that attracted the Irish to the States in the mid-19th century? Well, yes... of course, how could I forget!? After all, America is the Empire of Good, the Torch of Democracy and the Country of Equal Opportunities for All! It is possible that after these words liberal-minded viewers will stop reading, watching and listening to me, but I will still tell you one figure about the Empire of Good - after finding a new homeland on the east coast of the United States of America, half a million Irish died. That is, half of those who arrived. Once again, for fans of the Land of Equal Opportunity, 500 thousand Irish died in America after moving from Europe. From poverty, hunger and disease.

13. Another question arises: if there were such harsh conditions in the blessed States, then why did the emigrants sail there? The answer is simple - where they came from, it was even worse and even hungrier.

14. The thing is that as a result of long-term British colonization, the indigenous population of Ireland lost all their lands. The very fertile soils in the warm and humid climate on the cozy Green Island, which is heated all year round by the warm Gulf Stream, did not belong to the Celts - ancient people Ireland.

All their land was in the hands of English and Scottish landlords. Who rented it out to the former owners at inflated rates. And what!? Everything is very fair and democratic: suppose a certain Mr. Johnson from London is the legal owner of Irish land, and has the right to set any rent for his property. So, right!?... If you can’t pay, either die, or go to Mr. McGregor, who is from Glasgow, his rent is cheaper - a whole half a penny cheaper!

15. High rents from greedy British landowners led to widespread poverty. 85% of people lived below the poverty line. According to the words and observations of travelers from continental Europe, the population of Ireland at that time was the poorest in the world.

At the same time, the attitude of the British towards the Irish for centuries was extremely arrogant. This is best demonstrated by the words of the Englishman Alfred Tennyson, a great British poet, by the way.

He said: “The Celts are all complete idiots. They live on a terrible island and have no history worth even mentioning. Why can’t anyone blow up this filthy island with dynamite and scatter its pieces in different directions?”

16. Only one thing saved the Celts from starvation. And his name is potato. In a favorable climate it grew very well, and the Irish received the nickname of the most important potato eaters in Europe. But in 1845, a terrible misfortune befell the poor peasants - most of the plants were infected with a fungus - late blight - and the crop began to die right in the ground.

17. It would be nice if it was one such sad year. But there were four of them! For four years in a row, the potatoes were mowed down by a rotten scourge. It was in our days that scientists found the cause of the disease and gave it a name - late blight, and in those years the Irish perceived it as the Heavenly Punishment. The Great Famine began throughout the country. People died in entire families and villages. They died not only from hunger, but also from its inevitable companions - cholera, scurvy, typhoid, and from hypothermia. Due to extreme exhaustion and lack of strength, the dead were buried shallowly, so the remains were dug up by stray dogs and scattered throughout the area. Human bones scattered around villages were a common sight of that time.8.

20. Now remember and understand why the sculpture of a dog is present in the Dublin monument. At the same time, the desecration of graves by dogs is not the worst thing. There were even cases of cannibalism... During the four years of famine, according to various estimates, from one million to one and a half million people died.

You probably have a question: what is the connection between potato fungus and genocide? If there is such an opportunity, then ask some Irishman about it. He'll tell you so-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o! And he will explain that the events of the Great Potato Famine formed the basis of the traditional Irish hatred of everything British. The seeds of this deepest hatred will eventually sprout in bloody shoots. Including in Northern Ireland.

So, what does Britain have to do with it!? And despite the fact that the British owners of Celtic land could cancel, or at least reduce the rent, during the famine. They could, but they didn't. Not canceled or reduced. Moreover, they rent u-v-e-l-i-ch-i-l-i! And for non-payment of rent, peasants began to be evicted from their homes. It is a known fact that the Earl of Lucan in County Mayo evicted 40,000 peasants from their shacks.

23. Greedy English landlords continued to squeeze all the juice out of the emerald country. Whole herds of livestock, barges of oats, wheat and rye left the starving population for England every day. Irish writer and speaker John Mitchell wrote about it this way: “Countless herds of cows, sheep and pigs, with the frequency of the ebb and flow of the tides, left all 13 seaports of Ireland ...”

The British government could have significantly reduced the number of victims. To do this, it was necessary to make a strong-willed decision - to appease the appetites of greedy landowners, completely ban the export of food from Ireland and increase humanitarian aid. But this was not done...

The Turkish Sultan Abdulmecid, when he learned of the scale of the disaster, wanted to donate 10 thousand pounds sterling (by today's standards that's almost 2 million pounds) but Queen Victoria proudly refused help. And then Abdul-Mejid secretly sent three ships with provisions to the shores of Ireland, and with great difficulty they made their way through the blockade of the Royal Navy...

Lord John Russell's speech in the House of Lords read: “We have made Ireland... the most backward and most destitute country in the world. The whole world stigmatizes us, but we are equally indifferent to our dishonor and to the results of our mismanagement.” This speech was drowned in the indifference of the pompous lords, noble sirs and peers who joined them.

24. Many historians consider that disaster not at all natural, but very artificial. They call it deliberate genocide of the Irish. The country has not yet recovered from its demographic consequences. Just think about the following figures: 170 years ago before the Great Famine, the population of Ireland was more than 8 million people, and today it is only 4 and a half. It's still half that size.

Well, yes, in the States, Canada and Australia there are a lot of people with Irish blood - these are the descendants of those very ragamuffins who sailed on the “floating coffins”. Many of them became people. The most striking examples are the automobile tycoon Henry Ford and the 35th President of America John Kennedy, as well as his entire influential Celtic clan. Rumor has it that the dark-skinned 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama, also has a bit of Irish blood in his blood. His maternal grandmother was (allegedly) Irish.

27. When I first learned about the Great Potato Famine, I thought about this... I drew a parallel with Russia of that time period.

The middle of the 19th century, serfdom had not yet been abolished in Russia. But according to the law, in case of famine, the landowners were obliged to find reserves, feed their peasants and not abandon them to their fate, as the noble sirs from Foggy Albion did. I don’t remember any examples at all of Russian nobles increasing their rent during a famine or driving tens of thousands of peasants out of their plots. Our country, which was (and still is) in very harsh climatic conditions, in a zone of risky agriculture (not like emerald Ireland with its velvet climate), has not known such catastrophic shocks.

The twentieth century doesn't count. It has a completely different story. Yes, in times of poor harvests, in years of severe frosts or droughts, famine occurred. But he did not mow down one third of the country's population. And the people did not sail away in millions on rotten boats in search of a better fate. The government provided loans, both cash and grain. Every effort was made to eliminate the famine and its consequences.

It's a different matter in enlightened Europe! Yes, this is not serfdom in bast Russia. This is, you know, a capitalist model, where absolutely everything is according to the law. Tens of thousands of poor, ragged and landless peasants hunched over one legal owner, who, absolutely honestly, first ruined them, and then completely transparently bought up all their land. Everything is extremely honest and democratic! If you don’t want to hunch over Mr. Johnson, it’s your right, go and work hard at Mr. McGregor. Or die. Or swim across the ocean. If you swim, you will definitely become Ford, Kennedy or even Obama.

29. So. Let me sum it up. If the British, these noble Anglo-Saxons, did THIS to their neighbors and almost relatives, then one can understand why they did not stand on ceremony with all sorts of Bushmen, pygmies, Indians, Indians and Chinese.

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Famine in Ireland (1845--1849)

The Great Famine of Ireland (Irish: An Gorta Mor, English: Great Famine, Irish Potato Famine) occurred in Ireland in 1845-1849. The famine was caused by British economic policy and triggered by an epidemic of the potato fungus Phytophthora infestans. As a result of English colonization in the 12th-18th centuries. the native Irish lost their land holdings completely; a new ruling stratum was formed, consisting of Protestants, immigrants from England and Scotland. By the beginning of the 19th century, Ireland served as one of the sources of accumulation of English capital and the development of industry in England. Vast lands in Ireland belonged to English landlords who lived in Great Britain, but who levied huge taxes on Irish peasants for the use of their lands.

Thousands of small farmers (about 6/7 of Ireland's population), or cotters, lived in extreme poverty. Growing potatoes was an escape from hunger. . Potatoes came to Ireland around 1590. Here they gained popularity because they gave a good harvest, and in the humid and mild climate of the island they grew even on infertile soils. It was used both as food for people and as feed for livestock. By the middle of the 19th century. 13 arable lands were under potato plantings. About 23 of the grown potatoes were intended for human food. It constituted the daily diet of the average Irishman. In addition to Ireland, the potato disease spread to other countries, but nowhere did it cause such catastrophic consequences. From the mid-40s. XIX century The agrarian revolution began.

Since all the fields were planted with one variety of potato, the entire crop in the country was affected. The following year, 1846, for planting it was necessary to take infected tubers or low-quality seed potatoes - what was preserved. This caused new crop failures. Many were left without work. Landowners had nothing to pay with.

The government began to provide assistance and hired the most resilient people to build roads. Many had no choice but to go to workhouses - an institution that employed the poor. For their hard work they received food and shelter. The housing there was squalid, cool and damp, and the food was rotten. Not everyone managed to survive. . The winter of 1846-1847 was cold and all outdoor activities were stopped. To make matters worse, landlords, many of whom were in debt, began charging higher rents for their holdings in Ireland. Few of the tenants could pay them, and as a result, thousands of families lost their plots.

Some were evicted, others abandoned their lands and went to the cities. The number of those for whom the only option remained was to emigrate. By the middle of the 19th century. already a quarter of the population of cities on the east coast of the United States was Irish. In 6 years, 5,000 ships crossed the Atlantic. Some were once used to transport slaves. People huddled in cramped conditions, living from hand to mouth for weeks in terrible conditions. Thousands fell ill and died during the journey. In 1847, these ships began to be called “floating coffins.” Of the 100,000 passengers, approximately 16,000 died en route or after arrival.

Although the settlers wrote to their relatives who remained in Ireland about all the hardships of the journey and life in America, the flow did not decrease. Often only 1-2 people could leave a family. Epidemics broke out. The Irish were decimated by typhus, dysentery and scurvy. In 1849, a cholera epidemic claimed approximately 36,000 lives. . The next year the potato harvest was normal, life began to improve.

The government canceled debts associated with the famine. The country's population began to grow again. But in those few years, Ireland lost 20-25% of its population. There are over 40,000,000 people of Irish descent living in the United States alone. President J. Kennedy and automobile magnate G. Ford were descendants of emigrants who arrived from Ireland on “floating coffins” during the “Great Famine.” As a result of the famine, between 500 thousand and 1.5 million people died. Emigration increased (from 1846 to 1851 - 1.5 million people). In 1841-1851 Ireland's population fell by 30%. In 1841 the population was 8 million 178 thousand people, in 1901 - 4 million 459 thousand.

The Great Famine in Ireland. History of a national disaster

IN IRELAND, in the shadow of the “sacred” Mount Cropatrick, there is an unusual ship that looks like a small ship from the 19th century. Its nose is turned west, towards the Atlantic Ocean. This ship will never go to sea: it will not move from the concrete pedestal on which it firmly stands. Images of human skeletons hung between the masts give the ship a gloomy appearance. But this is not a real ship, but a monument cast from metal and officially opened in 1997 in memory of one of the greatest tragedies in Irish history. The skeletons and the ship symbolize the terrible famine of 1845-1850, which claimed over a million lives and caused mass emigration.
Of course, famine did not happen only in Ireland. However, the famine that struck this country was in many ways unparalleled. In 1845 the population of Ireland was eight million. By 1850, about 1.5 million people had died from starvation. Another million Irish in search better life emigrated to other countries, mainly to Great Britain and the United States. Was that famine really “great”? Without a doubt.

What caused it? What assistance was provided to the starving people? What does the history of this disaster teach us? To answer these questions, let's take a quick look at what life was like in Ireland before the Great Famine.

Before the Great Famine
By the beginning of the 19th century, Great Britain owned a significant part of the world, including Ireland. Vast lands in this country belonged to English landlords, many of whom, living in their homeland, far from their estates, charged the Irish huge rents for the land, and paid them very sparingly for their labor.
Thousands of small farmers, or kotters, lived in extreme poverty. Meat, as well as many other products, were beyond their means, and they grew potatoes - the most accessible crop for them: cheap, nutritious and unpretentious.

The role of potatoes
Potatoes were introduced to Ireland around 1590. Here it gained considerable popularity because it gave a good harvest in a humid and mild climate and grew even on infertile soils. Potatoes were used as food for people and as feed for livestock. By the middle of the 19th century, almost a third of arable land was occupied by potato plantings. About two-thirds of the potatoes grown were intended for human food. It usually constituted virtually the entire daily diet of the average Irishman.
The lives of many people depended entirely on potatoes, and this situation was very dangerous. What if there is a crop failure?

Harvest failure again
The following year, 1846, they had to plant low-quality seed potatoes - what they managed to save. But this time too the plantings were affected by late blight. The harvest died - there was nothing to collect, and therefore many peasants were left without work. Landowners simply had nothing to pay them with.
The government began to provide some assistance to those in need - for example, it hired them to work, mainly to build roads, so that they could somehow feed their families.
Someone had no choice but to go to the workhouse - an institution that hired the poor. For their hard work they received food and shelter there. Moreover, the housing was very poor, and the food was often rotten. Not everyone managed to survive.
To some extent, these measures eased the situation of the people. But the worst was yet to come. The winter of 1846-1847 was unusually cold, so almost all outdoor activities were stopped. Various government agencies distributed free food. But the funds allocated from the state treasury to help the poor were almost exhausted in two years, and they were sorely insufficient to help the ever-growing number of people weakened by hunger. To top it all off, another misfortune befell Ireland.
Landlords, many of whom were themselves heavily in debt, continued to charge rents for their lands in Ireland. Few of the tenants could pay them, and as a result, thousands lost their land plots. Some simply abandoned their lands and went to the cities in search of a better life. But where could they go without food, without money, without shelter? The number of those for whom the only option remained was to emigrate.

Mass emigration
Emigration was not new then. Already from the beginning of the 18th century, the influx of Irish emigrants to Great Britain and America did not stop. After the hungry winter of 1845, settlers poured there in a stream. By 1850, 26 percent of New York's residents were Irish - now even more numerous there than in the Irish capital, Dublin.
During six hungry years, five thousand ships crossed the Atlantic, covering a dangerous path of five thousand kilometers. Many of those ships had long since served their purpose. Some were once used to transport slaves. If it were not for the critical situation, these ships would not have gone to sea. There were practically no amenities provided for passengers: people were forced to huddle in terrible cramped conditions, living from hand to mouth in unsanitary conditions.
Thousands of people, already weakened by hunger, fell ill during the journey. Many died. In 1847, ships heading to the shores of Canada began to be called “floating coffins.” Of their 100,000 passengers, approximately 16,000 died en route or shortly after reaching their destination. Although the settlers wrote to their relatives and friends who remained in Ireland about all the hardships of the journey, the flow of emigrants did not decrease.
Some landlords supported those who once rented land from them. One, for example, provided three ships to its former tenants and helped a thousand people leave the country. But for the most part, emigrants had to raise funds for the journey themselves. Often only one or two people from an entire family could leave. Just imagine how tragic this farewell was: thousands of people boarded the ship and parted with their loved ones without any hope of seeing them again!

Diseases and the third crop failure
After two years of poor harvests and the mass eviction of people from their lands, another blow struck the devastated country. Epidemics broke out. People were decimated by typhus, dysentery and scurvy. Those who survived probably believed that the worst was over, but they were wrong.
In 1848, encouraged by the previous season's good harvest, farmers tripled the area of ​​potato fields. But trouble happened: the summer turned out to be very rainy, and the potatoes were again affected by late blight. The crop failed for the third time in four years. Government agencies and charitable societies were no longer able to somehow correct the situation. But the troubles are not over yet. The cholera epidemic that broke out in 1849 claimed 36,000 lives.

Consequences of the disaster
The epidemic was the latest in a series of misfortunes. The next year the potatoes grew well. Gradually life began to improve. The government passed new laws that canceled debts associated with the famine. The country's population began to grow again. Although late blight affected potato crops several times in subsequent years, never again did a disaster of this magnitude befall the country. During those few years of famine, Ireland lost more than a quarter of its population.
Today, crumbling stone walls and destroyed houses are silent reminders of the hardships that once forced many Irish people to move far from their homes. There are now over 40 million people of Irish descent living in the United States alone. US President John Kennedy and Henry Ford, creator of the Ford automobile, were direct descendants of emigrants who arrived from Ireland on one of the “floating coffins” during the Great Famine.

I saw the first impressive monument to the Irish famine of 1845-1849 in Philadelphia several years ago, and then I first learned about this history. The monument, consisting of 35 figures, seems to develop the events of the Holodomor from the very beginning to the emigrant exodus of the Irish from their country. At the right edge, a bronze woman digs potatoes, and a boy, obviously her son, looks at the result of his labor with amazement and fear. There was no result: the crop died on the vine, infected with a previously unprecedented potato fungus, late blight.

The picture shows an element of the monument in Boston.

Pictured is Toronto, Irish Park on the shores of Lake Ontario. This shipyard was used to unload live, half-dead and dead Irish emigrants. Every fifth person died from typhus. I could include more photographs of memorials from New York, London, Kingston (Ontario), Buffalo, Montreal, Quebec City - these are just the places that I personally visited and unknowingly walked past the corresponding cityscape markers. In 29 cities around the world, including, of course, Dublin, there are memorial signs to this event in history.
An Gorta Mor - this word sounds very similar to our language in Irish. The Great Famine, which occurred in 1845-1849, devastated the population of Ireland by a third. Between a million and one and a half million died, at least a million emigrated, and of this million, 15-20% of emigrants died on the way. This is one of the most significant tragedies in Europe of the 19th century. How did this all happen?

Catholic Ireland was the backwaters of the Protestant English empire of that time. The processes in Australia and India worried the British much more than what was happening on the nearest island. Formally, the country was called the United Kingdom of England, Scotland and Ireland, but in fact the last part in the minds of the British fell out of the formula.

The land of Ireland was divided among land lords, many of whom lived permanently in London. Their lands were managed by local managers. The effectiveness of management was determined by how much money the manager could squeeze out of the tenants. The land lords' possessions were truly enormous, reaching hundreds of square kilometers. All income from the lands went to the mother country, and it was millions, in today's money billions of pounds. Since the economy was subsistence, payment for land rent was taken in kind, most often with livestock or free labor on livestock farms. Everything that Irish peasants grew was sent by steamship to Cardiff and London. The best land in Ireland was given over to pasture. The British have traditionally loved meat. The Irish got empty potatoes. That's all they ate. It was impossible to grow anything else on the tiny plots.

The population of Ireland in 1841 was about 8 million. With the exception of a small part of the urban population, these were the poorest peasants, living on patches of rented land and feeding themselves from it. 2/3 of people lived below the then poverty level. The system was designed in such a way that at any moment they could be kicked out either for non-payment (which happened very often) or because the land lord decided to repurpose his lands, for example, for livestock farming. The industrial revolution had long since taken place in England, but in Ireland they still dug potatoes by hand. By the way, I have a good one personal experience this process. Until 1996, I owned a house and land in a godforsaken village in the south of the Pskov region. I write these lines and remember my neighbor Semenych, shouting to the horse “But! go! damn it!” I have the rare ability these days to plant potatoes with a horse and plow. Almost like the Irish peasants of the century before last, only they probably weren’t very good with horses. So this is all very clear to me.

It is not that the Irish were completely unfamiliar with famine before 1845. Anyone who has grown potatoes on a normal food scale, and not just for fun, knows how capricious and unstable a vegetable it is. The failure of the potato harvest, like the harvest, depends on God knows what. But in the normal course of events, a lean year is usually replaced by a fruitful one, so the main thing here is to overwinter. Everything changed with the advent of late blight, which was brought to Europe in 1844, most likely from America. This fungus does not die over the winter. The amazing disease was discovered in the summer of 1845 and caused alarm. Anxiety gave way to panic when a 50% crop shortage was discovered. Politicians began to hold rallies in parliaments at all levels, but you know how slowly everything happens even now. Kingdom United, right? This means that import duties are general. Reducing food prices was possible only by reducing duties, and this was opposed by the agrarian lobby of the main island. Landlords, meanwhile, did not even think of entering into the position of tenants. During the leanest months, steamships with provisions successfully sailed from Dublin. Attempts to plug the food gap at the state level inevitably ended in nothing. Ireland was left to its own devices. The Dublin authorities sent delegations to London with pleas for help. Intellectuals asked to give local authorities more independence in order to be able to somehow regulate the situation. But all efforts were in vain because they were seen as threats to the existing order.

Then it was 1846, and again the peasants planted potatoes, already infected with the fungus. We dug up a quarter of what was planted. People rushed to Dublin for meaningless public works that paid a pittance. As is usually the case, poor people had many children. Children died first. There were a lot of crazy moments. Thus, the Turkish Sultan, horrified by the scale of the disaster, equipped three ships with food to help the Irish. The Royal Navy set up a blockade of the coast specifically to prevent these ships from unloading, since England was in tense relations with Turkey, and accepting a handout from the enemy was politically unacceptable. Turkish sailors broke through the blockade and abandoned the ships in the harbor, because it was impossible to unload them otherwise. Or the government bought a ship full of corn from India for a hundred thousand pounds. The corn turned out to be inedible. The money was spent, the budget was cut, everyone remained in business. What else is there to talk about when the chief official who oversaw the distribution of government aid wrote that “the misfortune was sent from above to the Irish to teach them a good lesson”? The government believed in the theory of the free market, which was supposed to force idle people to work. Therefore, help was refused to everyone who had land. The fact that the entire harvest harvested from this land was used to pay rent was not taken into account. To get help, people gave up land with their shacks just like that, for a certificate. But the help was actually one-time. In addition, debtors were driven out of their homes by armed police. People were left without housing, without food, without clothing. Crowds died right on the roads leading to Dublin.
In 1848, cholera was added to the famine, and then typhus. The exodus has begun. People stormed ships to escape the trap. Long-decommissioned vessels were called “floating coffins”; many fell apart and sank on their way to America and Australia. The owners of the tubs made good money from these transportations. For the first time in human history, the word “diaspora” arose.

This is an engraving from a London newspaper in 1848, depicting a real woman named Bridget O'Donnell, who lost two children, but still has two left. Like a photographic fact. There are a lot of such engravings and reprints on the Internet.

It cannot be said that emigrants were very welcome on this shore. America needed successful, energetic people, but what arrived were sick half-corpses, unfit for creative activity. At the places where the “floating coffins” were unloaded, typhoid barracks like prisons were urgently built, in which people were marinated while they either died or recovered. In the background of the photo, taken in Toronto, is a stone wall in the shape of a ship with hundreds of names of those who died without ever leaving the barracks in the city. I read some excerpts from Toronto newspapers from 1847-49. It’s impossible to believe; today’s metropolis of many millions had only 20,000 inhabitants at that time. In three months, 38,600 dying Irish arrived in the city, of whom 1,100 died immediately. There was nowhere and no one to bury them. It was a humanitarian disaster on a regional scale.

The entire Boston Memorial. It can be seen that it consists of two sculptural groups, say, successful and not very successful. Modern American historiography sweetly avoids the politically incorrect aspects of the Irish landing. The official comments on the monument say that the second group are modern Irish who have succeeded in the promised land, and they seem to be looking back at their unfortunate ancestors. I see it differently. The second group are prosperous native Bostonians who disgustedly turn away from the lice-infested, hungry living skeletons. What do people do, deprived of their livelihood, alone in a foreign country, without a language and with the only skill to dig potatoes? They are organizing ghettos. And gangs. With the arrival of the Irish, crime in all American cities increased significantly. Decent people did not want such a neighborhood. Me too, let's come here in large numbers. By the way, I wouldn't blame them too much.

In just one year, the Irish population in Boston grew from 30 to 100 thousand people. On the homes and offices of many Bostonians, the inscription “The Irish do not apply for work” appeared next to the “no dogs allowed” signs. The Irish were hired only for the dirtiest work and were given contemptuous nicknames such as “paddy” and “buddy.” Large potatoes began to be called "tits", alluding to emaciated Irish women. They were unsuitable even for the role of prostitutes. In addition to dystrophy, a huge number of women went crazy from deprivation and hunger, and even after 50 years in Boston insane asylums, the bulk of the patients were victims of the Holodomor and their descendants. The Irish were a favorite subject of Boston cartoonists. They were portrayed as idiots, drunkards, thieves, and crazy people.

Therefore, this Philadelphia memorial, in which people with bright faces disembark the ship and a native in a hat greets them with a joyful gesture, does not adequately reflect the true story. But there are also modern facts. The historical mill grinds well. 44 million people in North America call themselves descendants of the Irish. The biggest name among them is John Kennedy. 29 American presidents, including Reagan, the Bushes and Obama (and in general all recent presidents, starting with Truman) have Irish roots in their ancestry. People of Irish descent are very powerful in American politics. There are many of them among deputies of all levels and city mayors. That’s why new Holodomor memorials are appearing: all three that I showed here opened just a few years ago.

Many modern Irish people demand that the Holodomor be recognized as genocide. I wouldn't put the question so harshly. Genocide, by definition, is the deliberate destruction, in whole or in part, of a significant group of people based on nationality, race, religion or ethnicity. In the history of the Irish famine, all the components of genocide are present, except for the most important one: the word “conscious”. The causes of misfortune, from the generally accepted point of view, were greed, stupidity, and poor government. In the famous words, “this is more than a crime: it is a mistake.” However, the issue of genocide is constantly being raised and is becoming louder. For example, the New Jersey State Legislature decided to consider the Irish Holodomor a “second-level genocide.” The definition, frankly speaking, smacks of ambiguity.