Pressure upon the workhouses.

On the 29th August 1846, the returns for the week showed that the inmates of the several workhouses amounted to 43,655, and the numbers continued to increase until on the 17th October, four of the workhouses were reported to be full,[[149]] and most of the others became so shortly after, although they fluctuated in this respect from time to time. The aggregate weekly returns however showed a continual increase down to the end of February 1847, when the inmates amounted to 116,321. From that time the number decreased, but the decrease was probably owing to the distressed circumstances in which the unions were themselves placed, rather than to any abatement of the general distress. There can, it is observed, be few situations more painful than that of a board of guardians in the present condition of Ireland, surrounded by an appalling extent of destitution, yet without the means of relieving the sufferers. “Possessed of a workhouse capable of holding a few hundred inmates, the guardians are looked to with hope by thousands of famishing persons, and are called on to exercise the mournful task of selection from the distressed objects who present themselves for admission as their last refuge from death.” It was no longer a question whether the applicants were fit objects for relief, but which of them could be rejected and which admitted with the least risk of sacrificing life. Were persons in the last extremities of want to be denied admittance, or on the other hand were those already admitted to be made the victims of over-crowding?—The course which prudence dictated was the one most opposed to human sympathies. Eyewitnesses of the distress which was endured, the guardians could not always resist the appeals made to them; and applicant after applicant was admitted to the workhouse, long after the sanitary limit had been passed.

Overcrowding of the workhouses.

It was the duty of the commissioners to resist all such impulsive yieldings, and they failed not to urge upon the guardians the necessity for such resistance on their part, without which the limited means of relief at their disposal would be sacrificed. They were told that effectual relief, even to the extent of the existing accommodation could not be given, if contagious disease took possession of the workhouse; and that in attempting to go beyond due sanitary limits, the guardians would turn what was designed and adapted for good purposes into an active evil, and deprive themselves of the power of using effectually those means of relief which had been placed at their command. In some instances orders under seal were issued, prohibiting the guardians from admitting beyond a certain number. The commissioners likewise “called into action the proper functions of the medical officers of the workhouses, and placed upon them the direct responsibility of advising and warning the guardians of those limits, beyond which their admissions could not be extended without danger.” Notwithstanding these precautions however, such was the fearful prevalence of distress, especially in Connaught and the south of Ireland, that all considerations of this nature were borne down, and the workhouses became crowded to an extent far beyond their proper capacity, the consequences of which were in some cases very disastrous.

The workhouse hospitals were prepared for cases of sickness occurring among inmates, presumed to be in an average state of health, and they were generally found sufficient for the purpose. But now unhappily, almost every person admitted was a patient—was either suffering from dysentery or fever, or extreme exhaustion, or had the seeds of disease about him. Under such circumstances separation became impossible, diseases spread, and the whole workhouse was changed into one large hospital, without the appliances necessary for rendering it efficient as such. |Mortality among the union officers.| This state of things was not a little aggravated by the illness retirement or death of many of the principal officers. The usual difficulty of replacing a master or a matron, or medical officer when suddenly removed, was much increased by the dangerous nature of the service, there having been great mortality among these officers. During the first four months of the current year, at least a hundred and fifty were attacked with disease, of whom fifty-four had died, including seven clerks, nine masters, seven medical officers, and six chaplains—a number unusually large, and calculated no doubt to excite some indisposition to undertake such duties.

Mortality in the workhouses.

The weekly mortality in the workhouses went on increasing from 4 in the 1,000 at the end of October 1846, to 13 in the 1,000 at the end of January 1847,—20 in the 1,000 at the end of February, and 25 in the 1,000 at the middle of April; the number of inmates at these periods respectively being 68,839—111,621—116,321—and 104,455. In the last week of February, when the number of inmates attained its maximum, the deaths amounted to 2,267; whilst on the 10th of April, when the inmates had been reduced to 104,455, the deaths of the preceding week were 2,613, thus showing an increase of mortality notwithstanding a reduction in the number of inmates. The people had in fact become so exhausted by the severity of the distress, that in many cases death occurred immediately after admission. This was the time when to escape famine and pestilence at home, the great rush of immigrants to Liverpool and the western coasts of England and Scotland took place, and it is needless to say that the pressure must have been fearful to cause such an outpouring of the population.[[150]] We must not omit to state however, that at this time great exertions were being made in many, indeed it may be said in most of the unions to obtain increased accommodation for fever patients, by erecting or hiring buildings temporary or permanent according to the urgency and nature of the case; and also in like manner for increasing the means of workhouse accommodation, so as to bring it more nearly up to the wants of the period. The money expended upon these objects was in some instances obtained by way of loan, and in others was defrayed directly from the rates; but in all cases there was a considerable addition to the current expenditure by the provision thus made for affording additional relief.

Emigration.

Emigration was regarded by many persons as the most prompt and effective remedy, under the circumstances then existing in Ireland; and government was appealed to for assistance in promoting it, by defraying the expense of passage and outfit for the emigrants. But it was thought highly probable that the emigration which would take place independently of any such inducement, would be quite as large as the United States and Canada could with advantage receive; and the government therefore limited its interference to appointing additional agents to superintend the embarkation of the emigrants, and to increasing the fund applicable to the relief of the sick after their arrival in the colonies.[[151]] In 1846 the emigration from Great Britain amounted to 129,851. This was the largest ever then known; but in the first nine months of 1847 the number of emigrants was 240,461, nearly the whole of them from Ireland, and proceeding to Canada and the United States, whence large remittances had been sent by former emigrants to enable their relations and friends in Ireland to follow them. Within the same period 278,000 immigrants reached Liverpool from Ireland, of whom only 123,000 sailed from thence to foreign parts; and the remainder must therefore have continued a burden on the inhabitants, or wandered about the country begging, or died of disease the seeds of which they had brought with them, and which proved fatal to a great number of other persons as well as to the immigrants themselves. It was the same everywhere.[[152]] |Mortality among the emigrants.| In the United States, in Canada and on the voyage out, the poor emigrants seeking to escape from famine at home, were assailed by disease whithersoever they turned, and very many of them sunk under its ravages. During this fearful crisis, the deaths on the voyage to Canada increased from 5 in the 1,000, to about 60; and so many more arrived sick, that the proportion of deaths in quarantine to the numbers embarked, increased from a little more than 1 to about 40 in the 1,000, besides still larger numbers who died at Quebec, Montreal, and elsewhere in the interior.[[153]]

Financial state of the unions.