The Rev. Mr. Webb, incumbent of Caharagh, then volunteered a statement—hear it, ye rich, who have not that mercy and compassion for His poor, which the God of all so strictly requires at your hands,—"I have been told by some on the road," said the Rev. gentleman, "that this poor man has frequently divided amongst the labourers his own scanty food."
There were two physicians at the inquest, of whom Dr. Donovan was one; having made a post-mortem examination, no disease was discovered that could account for death. There was no food in the stomach or small intestines, but a portion of raw, undigested cabbage. The physicians said they had seen hundreds of dead bodies, but declared they had never seen one so attenuated as that of M'Kennedy. The representative of the Board of Works, when asked to explain why it was that a fortnight's wages was due to M'Kennedy, said, that the money was sent to the wrong pay-clerk. It had really come, but through some mistake, had been sent to Mr. Notter, and was by him expended in payment of his own district, when it should have been paid on the Caharagh line. "But these stories," he added, "received in gossip, are turned against the Board of Works." It is not very clear what this official meant by stories, but there is one thing plain enough in the matter: Mr. Notter's men must have been in arrear of their pay as well as those on the Caharagh works, or there could be no opportunity of expending the Caharagh money upon them. If Mr. Notter had got his own money together with the Caharagh money, he certainly would not require both remittances. There is another thing pretty obvious too: if the money had been directed to the overseer of the Caharagh works, Mr. Notter would not be justified in paying it away to his workmen. In reference to the flippant pertness of the Board's officials, the Rev. Mr. Townsend, the incumbent of Abbeystowry, said: "We have here M'Kennedy's death and the cause of it sworn to. That evidence proves that our people are dying by the ditch-side for want of payment of their hire. We take no such statements, sir, on gossip, nor shall we be told we do." The jury returned the following verdict: "We find that the said Denis M'Kennedy, on the 24th day of October, in the year aforesaid, at Caharagh, in the county aforesaid, died of starvation, owing to the gross negligence, of the Board of Works."
The Times, commenting on Lord John Russell's letter to the Duke of Leinster, said: "We in England consider it the first duty of the landlord to provide extraordinary employment to meet extraordinary distress; we do not wait until an Act of Parliament converts a duty into a necessity. In Ireland, even with special facilities, it has been very sparingly and tardily done."[182] This remark about Irish landlords has much truth in it. They took every means of shifting responsibility upon the Government; they lost no opportunity of publicly declaring and of endeavouring to prove that the duty of employing the people rested with the Government and not with them: then, when the vast system of Relief Works which sprang up under the hands of the Government in two or three short months did not prove perfectly satisfactory, it became quite the fashion with the landlord class to denounce the Board of Works, and through it the Government. To be sure there was much reason for this, but the landlords, of all others, had no right to cast the stone; for, in the interests of truth and justice it must be said, that the Government made some efforts to save the people, whilst the landlords as a body, made none whatever. Their views were put in a striking manner at a meeting of landowners and farmers held at Aghada, in the County Cork. Mr. Fitzgerald, a landowner, attacked the Board for doing unprofitable work. They had, he said, a staff of incompetent officers, who were, moreover, absurdly numerous, there being, he asserted, an officer for every workman in the works at Whitegate. The reply to this attack is obvious enough. If the Board of Works were doing unprofitable work, they could not help it, they were compelled by Act of Parliament to do it; and when the Government enabled the country to undertake profitable works, where were the landlords? They were in conclaves here and there, elaborating objections to the Government plan, instead of affording aid to carry it into execution; they seemed to make it a point to throw obstacles in its way, and certainly showed anything but a disposition to make it a success. Very likely, the Board of Works had too many officers; doubtless they could not all be competent, or even trustworthy persons, there being ten or eleven thousand of these raked together from all quarters in three months. Mr. Fitzgerald next attacked the farmers for not employing the workmen. In fact, according to him, every class of the community had responsibilities—was called on to make exertions and sacrifices to save the people from famine, except the landlords—the owners of the soil of the entire kingdom. He expressed his opinion, that the proper way to begin the business of the meeting was, to pass a vote of censure on the Board of Works and send it to the Lord Lieutenant. The Chairman, Richard G. Adams, thought Mr. Fitzgerald's suggestion a good one. So it was, from the landlord's point of view; it being their policy to turn attention away from themselves and their shortcomings, and make the Board of Works the scapegoat of all their sins. Mr. Fitzgerald proceeded: the farmers, he said, were banking their money. He had cut out of the Times the article on the increase of deposits in the Irish Savings' Banks, which he intended to have read for the meeting, but he had unfortunately mislaid it. No matter, there could be no doubt of the fact. No one present opened his mouth in defence of the unfortunate Board of Works, but a Mr. Kelly took up the cudgels for the farmers. He said, few farmers in that district had money to put in Savings' Banks, but if the farmers had hundreds, as was asserted, surely the gentlemen ought to have millions. When the gentlemen complained of want of means, no wonder the farmers did the same. There was not, Mr. Kelly maintained, enough of corn in the haggards of the country to last until the 1st of June,—
Mr. Fitzgerald: The haggards are in the Savings' Banks.
Mr. Kelly: You will find them in the pockets of a great many landlords. I don't say in yours.[183]
In Bandon there was a somewhat similar meeting. Lord Bernard, who presided, told his hearers in solemn accents that the Government was awfully responsible for not either assembling Parliament, as they were called upon to do, or at least providing effectively for the relief of the people. His lordship recommended the suspension of the Poor Laws as a measure that would be advantageous at the present emergency! Undeveloped though the poor law system was in Ireland at the time of the famine, it still afforded much relief in many places. It is hard to see what Lord Bernard hoped to gain from the suspension of the Poor Laws during the famine, unless exemption from his own share of the rates.
Turning over the public journals during this period is the saddest of sad duties. It is like picking one's way over a battle-field strewn with the dead and dying. "Starvation and death in Dingle;" "Deaths at Castlehaven;" "Death of a labourer on his way to the Workhouse;" "Coroner's inquests in Mayo;" "Four more deaths on the roads at Skibbereen." Such are specimens of the ghastly headings that lie before us. One of those deaths at Skibbereen calls for more than a passing word; it is that of Jeremiah Hegarty. As in M'Kennedy's case we have here what is seldom attainable, an account of the evidence given at the inquest upon his remains. He was a widower and lived with his married daughter, Mary Driscoll, at Licknafon. Driscoll, his son-in-law, was a small farmer. He had a little barley in his haggard, some of which he was from time to time taking privately out of the stack to keep himself and his family from dying of starvation, although Curley Buckley, his landlord's driver,[184] had put a cross and keepers on it.
Mary Driscoll, daughter of the deceased, being examined, deposed that her father eat a little barley stirabout on Saturday morning, but had not enough; "none of us," she said, "had enough. We all lived together—nine in family, not including the infant at my breast. My father went to work; my husband worked with him; three pints of barley meal was the only thing we had from Thursday before. I had no drink for the infant," she said; by which, I suppose, the wretched being meant the nourishment which nature supplies to infants whose mothers are not in a state of starvation; "it ate nothing. On Thursday we had nothing but a quarter weight of Croshanes.[185] We had but a little barley—about a barrel, and, God help us, we could not eat any more of that same, as the landlord put a cross on it, I mean it was marked for the rent." She here gave the name of the landlord, on being asked to do so. He wanted, she said, to keep the barley for the last rent, £2 17s. She simply and frankly acknowledged they had been taking some of it, but their condition was such that it melted the heart of the landlord's driver, Curley Buckley, who told them "to be taking a little of it until the landlord would come." The poor Driscolls were not bad tenants, they owed their landlord the last rent only, but they were responsible for another debt. "We owed," Mary Driscoll said, "ten shillings for the seed of the barley; we would sooner die, all of us, than not to pay. Since a fortnight," continued this wretched woman, in her rude but expressive English; "since a fortnight past, there was not one of us eat enough any day."
Driscoll, the husband of the last witness, was examined. He said: "If he" (meaning the deceased) "was paid the wages due to him for working on the road, it would have relieved him, and he might be now alive; but," he added, "even if we had received the money, it would be hardly sufficient to keep us alive." Referring to his own case, he said he was but one day working on the road, and that he was six weeks looking for that same.
Dr. Donovan had made a post mortem examination. He found the stomach and upper part of the intestines totally devoid of food. There was water in the stomach, but nothing else. Want, the doctor said, was the remote—exposure to the cold the immediate—cause of death. The jury found that the deceased, Jeremiah Hegarty, met his death in consequence of the want of sufficient sustenance for many days previous to his decease; and that this want of sustenance was occasioned by his not having been paid his wages on the Public Works, where he was employed for eight days previous to the time of his death.