All the claims of the Exchequer, arising out of the Relief operations of 1846 and 1847 have now been described, and it must be borne in mind that the several localities received full value for what they have to pay. They were saved from a prolonged and horrible state of famine, pestilence, and anarchy, which was the main consideration; and they had, besides, the incidental advantage of the labour bestowed upon the Roads and other public works, especially in the poor and wild districts of the West, where lines of road have been opened with the aid of the relief grants and loans, which, although much wanted, could not have been undertaken for years to come without such assistance. The rest of the expenditure, including the large donations made to Relief Committees previously to the passing of the Act 10 Vic. c. 7, the cost of the staff of the Board of Works and of the Relief Commission, the Commissariat staff, and the heavy naval expenditure, has been defrayed out of the public purse; without any demand for repayment.

Hitherto our narrative has been confined to what was done by the Government, but the voluntary exertions of private individuals contributed their full share towards this unprecedented act of public charity.

It is highly to the honour of our countrymen in India, that the first combined movement in any part of the British empire was made by them. On the arrival of the news of the first failure of the potato crop in the Autumn of 1845, a meeting, presided over by Sir John Peter Grant, was held at Calcutta, on the 2nd of January, 1846, for the purpose of concerting measures to raise a fund for the relief of the expected distress; and a committee, consisting of the Duke of Leinster, the Protestant and Roman Catholic Archbishops of Dublin, and six other persons, was solicited to act in Ireland as Trustees for the distribution of such sums as might be subscribed. This example was followed at Madras and Bombay, and the result was that a sum of 13,920ℓ., contributed as follows, was placed at the disposal of the committee:

Bengal8,200
Bombay2,976
Madras1,150
Ceylon718
Hong Kong, 18th Royal Irish82
Mobile, U. S.192
Toronto, C. W.300
England, including 200ℓ. from Lord John Russell302
£13,920

The whole of this sum was distributed between the 24th of April and the 21st of December, 1846, and was entirely independent of the large subscriptions from different parts of British India subsequently added to the funds of other societies. More than 2000 letters were received by the Trustees of the Indian Relief Fund; and by a strict attention to economy, they were enabled to distribute 13,920ℓ. at an expense of 180ℓ.

In the United Kingdom, the Society of Friends were, as usual, first in the field of benevolent action. When the renewed and more alarming failure of the potato crop in the autumn of 1846 showed the necessity for serious exertion, a subscription was opened by them in London in the month of November in that year; members of the Society were sent on a deputation to Ireland, and those who resided there aided by their personal exertions and local knowledge. On the 6th January, 1847, a committee, of which Mr. Jones Loyd was chairman, and Mr. Thomas Baring and Baron Rothschild were members, invited contributions under the designation of the “British Association for the Relief of extreme Distress in Ireland and the Highlands and Islands of Scotland.” On the 13th of January, 1847, a Queen’s Letter was issued with the same object, and the 24th of March was appointed by proclamation, for a General Fast and Humiliation before Almighty God, “in behalf of ourselves and of our brethren, who in many parts of this United Kingdom are suffering extreme famine and sickness.” A painful and tender sympathy pervaded every class of society. From the Queen on her throne to the convicts in the hulks, expenses were curtailed, and privations were endured, in order to swell the Irish subscription. The fast was observed with unusual solemnity, and the London season of this year was remarkable for the absence of gaiety and expensive entertainments. The vibration was felt through every nerve of the British Empire. The remotest stations in India, the most recent settlements in the backwoods of Canada, contributed their quota, and 652ℓ. was subscribed by the British residing in the city of Mexico, at a time when their trade was cut off, and their personal safety compromised by the war with the United States. The sum collected under the Queen’s letter was 171,533ℓ. The amount separately contributed through the British Association was 263,251ℓ.[47]; and this aggregate amount of 434,784ℓ., was divided in the proportion of five-sixths to Ireland and one-sixth to Scotland. But besides this great stream of charity, there were a thousand other channels which it is impossible to trace, and of the aggregate result of which no estimate can be formed. There were separate committees which raised and sent over large sums of money. There were ladies’ associations without end to collect small weekly subscriptions and make up clothes to send to Ireland. The opera, the fancy bazaar, the fashionable ball rendered tribute; and, above all, there were the private efforts of numberless individuals, each acting for himself and choosing his own almoners, of which no record exists except on High. Upon application being made to the managers of the Provincial Bank of Ireland to permit English charitable remittances to pass without the usual charge, it turned out that they had been in the habit of doing so for a considerable time, and that the amount sent through that one channel, in the six months ending on the 4th March, 1847, exceeded 20,000ℓ. In the contemplation of this great calamity, the people of the United States of America forgot their separate nationality, and remembered only that they were sprung from the same origin as ourselves. The sympathy there was earnest and universal, and the manifestations of it most generous and munificent. The contributions from this land of plenty consisted principally of Indian corn and other kinds of provisions, and the cargoes were, for the most part, consigned to the Society of Friends, whose quiet, patient, practical exertions, commanded universal confidence. The freight and charges on the supplies of food and clothing sent to Ireland by charitable societies and individuals, as well from the United States and Canada on the one side, as from England on the other, were paid by the Government, to an amount exceeding 50,000ℓ.[48]; all customs dues were remitted, and the meal and other articles were to a great extent taken charge of by the officers of the Commissariat, and held by them at the disposal of the parties to whom they had been consigned for distribution; by which means the necessary harmony was preserved between the operations of the Government and those of the private associations, and the bounty of the subscribers reached the destitute persons for whom it was intended, with as small a deduction as possible for incidental expenses. Thus, when the British Association was desirous of giving the cultivators on the Western Coast of Ireland an opportunity of purchasing seed at a low market price at the close of the sowing season of 1847, five large steamers were collected by the Government, which were loaded in a remarkably short space of time, with oats and other seed provided by the Association, and were sent forth, each to its appointed section of the Western Coast; so that every harbour accessible to a steamer, from Kinsale to Londonderry, was looked into, and what remained unsold was left in the Government depôts for subsequent sale or gratuitous distribution. On the other hand, the Government received much assistance and support from the operations of these benevolent societies, and they were especially useful in bridging over the fearful interval between the system of relief by work and relief by food. Several gentlemen, with a noble self-devotion, volunteered their services to the British Association, among whom Lord Robert Clinton, Lord James Butler, Count Strzelecki, and Mr. Higgins, were distinguished by their zeal and ability, and by the fortitude with which, for months together, they endured the pain and risk attending the immediate contact with hunger and disease.

A large committee, with the Marquis of Kildare at its head, was formed in Dublin under the name of the “General Central Relief Committee for all Ireland,” the contributions received by which amounted to upwards of 50,000ℓ., independently of 10,000ℓ. in cash and an equal value in food, entrusted to this committee from the sum raised by the Queen’s Letter. British North America contributed through this medium the munificent sum of 12,463ℓ., including 5,873ℓ. from Montreal; 1571ℓ. from Quebec; and 3,472ℓ. from Toronto. The United States gave 5,852ℓ., of which 3,199ℓ. was from New Orleans. British India 5,674ℓ.; the Cape of Good Hope 2,900ℓ.; Australia 2,282ℓ.; South America 772ℓ.; the Military 386ℓ.; Scotland, France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Gibraltar, the Channel Islands, West Indies, the Ionian Islands, &c., 2,168ℓ.; Ireland, independently of local subscriptions, which were very considerable, 9,888ℓ.; and England, over and above the 20,000ℓ. remitted from the produce of the Queen’s Letter, 8,886ℓ.

Subscriptions were received to a smaller amount, but from an earlier period of the distress, by another committee established in Dublin under the name of the “Irish Relief Association for the Destitute Peasantry,” which was announced to be a reorganization of the Association formed during the period of famine in the West of Ireland in 1831. The list of patrons commenced with the names of the Archbishop of Dublin and the Duke of Manchester; and, independently of some cargoes of corn, flour, &c., from Canada and the United States, the funds placed at their disposal amounted to nearly 42,000ℓ., among the contributions to which, the following were conspicuous:—England, 17,782ℓ.; Ireland, 6,151ℓ.; France, 1,390ℓ.; Italy, including 1,481ℓ. from Rome, 2,708ℓ.; British North America, 2,821ℓ. (1,165ℓ. of this being from Quebec); United States, 847ℓ.; India, 5,947ℓ., of which the large proportion of 4,981ℓ. was from Madras; West Indies, 1,043ℓ.; Australia, 2,314ℓ.; and from the officers and men of various regiments, and the pensioners and constabulary, 508ℓ.

But the most considerable of the Dublin Charitable Committees was that composed of members of the Society of Friends, of which Mr. Joseph Bewley and Mr. Jonathan Pim were the Secretaries. The contributions placed at their disposal since the 3rd of December, 1846, in money and provisions, have been to the amount of upwards of 168,000ℓ., of which no less than 108,651ℓ. is the estimated value of provisions (7,935 tons) consigned to them from the United States of America. Of the subscriptions in money, 35,393ℓ. was remitted by the London Committee of the Society of Friends; 8,494ℓ. by members of the Society and others in Dublin; and the large sum of 15,567ℓ. by persons residing in the United States. The provisions received from America were as follows:—

Estimated Value.
Tons£s.d.
FromNew York4,496  58,299150
”Philadelphia1,870¼24,948180
”New Orleans  349   7,538 50
”Newark, N. J.  316¾ 5,141 00
”Baltimore  262½ 3,913100
”Richmond, V.  252½ 3,486150
”Charleston  169   2,362 00
”Alexandria, V.  102   1,422100
From Sundry other Ports,
United States, America		  117   1,518 710