The Global Irish Famine Way extends internationally the National Famine Way Ireland and will be the largest heritage trail in the world. It is designed as a physical and digital heritage trail that will for the first time tell the global story of the Great Irish Famine.
The compassionate reception of the Famine Irish around the world has a universal message resonant today and expressed by the trail’s dedication:
“Dedicated to all those who offer hope through compassion and success through opportunity to the stranger on your shore.”
“Tiomnaithe dóibh siúd a thugann dóchas trí thaise agus rath trí dheiseanna a sholáthar don choimhthíoch a thagann chun na tíre.”
Contents
Overview
Purpose
Project Partners
Organisation
Outcomes
Launches: Canada, Ireland, UK
Future Sites
Conferences 2024 and 2027
Appendix I – Historical Background
Appendix II National Famine Way Stages, Walk 20-25 May
Overview
Starting at the National Famine Museum, the National Famine Way is a 165km trail in Ireland that traces the footsteps of 1490 tenants from Strokestown, Roscommon, to Dublin in 1847 during the Great Irish Famine. It was be their last journey on Irish soil and their first on their way to new lives as part of the Irish diaspora.
The Global Irish Famine Way extends the National Famine Way to follow the journeys of all the Irish Famine emigrants around the world, including the UK, Canada, the United States, South Africa, and Australia. The Bronze Shoes and access to information that mark the National Famine Way will also mark each significant location on the Global Irish Famine Way.
Purpose
The international extension of the National Famine Way as the Global Irish Famine Way traces the journey of the Irish Famine emigrants around the world with a series of sites marked by Bronze Shoes and QR codes accessing local information and links to the National Famine Way mother website in Ireland. Locations include sites in the UK, Canada, the United States, South Africa, and Australia.
The Global Irish Famine Way:
- creates a physical and digital living history of the Famine Irish as a significant event in the development of the Irish diaspora and in its own right an event of global significance.
- imparts a universal story more relevant than ever, a story of human agency in the face of catastrophe and of the compassion the immigrants encountered on their journeys to new futures.
- promotes public history, public awareness, shared international heritage, local engagement, research, discourses on humanitarian relief, and heritage tourism.
- To receive a set of Bronze Shoes, local organisations must enter into a legal agreement with an authority for the long-term maintenance of the marker, erect a plinth and install a QR code.
Project Partners
The Embassy of Ireland, Ottawa, and the National Famine Museum, Strokestown Park (Irish Heritage Trust), County Councils (Roscommon, Longford, Kildare, Westmeath, Meath, Fingal, and Dublin), with academic experts, local community groups, and heritage agencies including Parks Canada and related stakeholders globally.
Organization
Under the aegis of the National Famine Museum of Ireland and the Embassy of Ireland Ottawa, there is an informal leadership group comprising academic and other experts, supported on the ground by a volunteer network of GIFW Local Committees.
Outcomes
Anticipated outcomes include:
- Enhancing public awareness of the global significance of the Famine and its role in the development of our diaspora.
- Deepening the links between Ireland, the UK, Canada, the US, South Africa, and Australia and promoting our shared heritage.
- An opportunity to thank recipient countries, settler and Indigenous, for their compassionate response to the Irish humanitarian disaster and to recognise the heroic efforts of first responders and fundraisers.
- Recognise that most Irish survived and prospered in their new homes, adding to the rich contribution of previous generations of Irish emigrants.
- Promote the universal message still relevant today: to the strangers on your shore, offering hope through compassion and success through opportunity.
- Uniting widespread groups of Irish community activists around a common project.
- Political outreach to political and community leaders, academics and activists.
- Promotion of public discourse on responses to humanitarian crises, their causes and solutions.
- Heritage tourism, linking Famine sites in Ireland to related global locations.
The Voyage of the Bronze Shoes: Launch of the Global Irish Famine Way, Canada:
In collaboration with the Marine Institute of Ireland, the cargo of Bronze Shoes will depart on the RV Celtic Explorer from Galway, arriving at St John’s Newfoundland and Labrador on 8 May. On 9 May there will be a reception by the Embassy for the crew and members of the Marine Institute, Canadian researchers joining the Celtic Explorer’s research in Canadian waters, those involved in the refit of the Celtic Voyager at St John’s (which has been sold to Nunavut), the Irish community, academics, and VIPs. On the morning of 10 May, The Bronze Shoes will be carried ceremoniously to St John’s Basilica for a commemorative event and the installation of the first Bronze Shoes. There will be a symposium on the events of 1847 and associated links between Ireland and Canada.
Over the following months, Bronze Shoes will be transported up the St Lawrence to Quebec City for installation at sites including Grosse Île, Montreal, Ottawa, and Toronto, with other possible sites at Middle Island and St John (New Brunswick), and Niagara (Ontario).
The Famine Walk: Launch of the Global Irish Famine Way, Ireland
Sunday 19 May is the National Famine Commemoration Day. The Walk with the Bronze Shoes along the National Famine Way will take place 20-25 May concluding in Dublin. The National Famine Museum is collaborating with Country Councils, tourism promotion agencies, performing artists, and local schools to promote the Global Irish Famine Way. For further details see Appendix II.
Liverpool Irish Festival: Launch of the Global Irish Famine Way, UK
After arrival in Dublin and temporary display, the Bronze Shoes will be stored until transferred to Clarence Dock Liverpool in October where they will be paraded to the Famine Memorial for installation as part of the Liverpool Irish Festival between 17th and 27th of October.
Future Launches
Outreach is ongoing to establish partners to develop sites in Canada, the US, South Africa, and Australia. It is envisaged that each site will develop a local Irish heritage trail.
Conferences 2024 and 2027
The Embassy is co-hosting a conference with St Michael’s College at the University of Toronto entitled Canada, Ireland and Transatlantic Colonialism 28-30 May which will reference the Global Irish Famine Way and the broader context of the Famine in Ireland within the colonial framework.
Plans are underway for a major conference in 2027 (180th anniversary) hosted by the National Famine Museum of those involved in the Global Irish Famine Way.
Eamonn McKee
Ambassador of Ireland
Ottawa
1 May 2024
Appendix I – Historical Background
The National Famine Way is a marked heritage trail from Strokestown to Dublin that follows the 1847 journey of 1490 tenants and family members from the estate there on their way to Canada, via Liverpool, in an emigration scheme sponsored by their landlord Denis Mahon (assassinated the following November). The trail is marked along its 165km route by over thirty bronze shoes cast from a pair found bound together and hidden in the thatched roof of a 19th cottage.
The Strokestown tenants were part of almost 100,000 people who fled the Irish Famine to Canada in 1847. Upwards of 20% died during this exodus. Over 8,000 died on the voyage. In Canada, malnourished and stricken with typhus and other diseases, they died in numbers on landing. The two main burial sites were the quarantine station at Grosse Île (5,400 remains) and at Blackrock Montreal (6,000[1]). Other burial sites are located at Toronto and Kingston (around 1,000 each); Partridge Island (601), Alms House Saint John (595) and Middle Island (96) both in New Brunswick[2]; Ottawa (360[3]); Cornwall (50) and elsewhere, some sites lost to memory.
Recent research by Prof Mark McGowan, not yet publicly available, indicates that over 70 Canadians died assisting the Irish on their arrival from disease contracted from the Irish. New research also details fundraising by Indigenous nations and bands to offer relief. Acknowledging these outstanding examples of compassion forms an important dimension to the Global Irish Famine Way.
In Britain, while Liverpool was a major embarkation point for Famine emigrants heading across the Atlantic, the city and its hinterland also attracted Famine emigrant settlement. According to census returns for 1851, the Irish-born population of Lancashire doubled over the previous decade to 191,000, or 10% of the population while the Irish-born population of Liverpool itself rose to 22%.
In the US, half of all immigrants were Irish in the 1840s. It has been estimated that upwards of two million Irish emigrated to the US between 1845 and 1855, almost a quarter of Ireland’s population. Some 7000 famine emigrants were interred at the Staten Island Quarantine Station, New York, in 1847 alone. A simple monument marks the remains of a common grave for those who died on Staten Island, estimated to be in the thousands but many buried in haste without records. By 1855, one-third of New Yorkers were Irish-born. The Irish Hunger Memorial is located at Battery Park City, Manhattan. There is an Irish Famine Memorial in Boston, a major entry point for Famine emigrants, as well as Philadelphia.
Earl Grey, the Colonial Secretary, established the Pauper Immigration Scheme to relieve pressures on Irish workhouses during the Famine and labour shortages and gender imbalances in the colonies. The first ship, appropriately called the Earl Grey, departed on 3 June 1848 and arrived in Sydney on 6 October. 1848 and 1850, ships carried over 4114 orphan girls from every country in Ireland to Australia, landing in Sydney, Adelaide and Melbourne (Port Philip).
The website for the Irish Famine Memorial Sydney reads: ‘The memorial to the Great Irish Famine and the young women who came from the workhouses of Ireland to Australia between 1848 and 1850 on a special emigration scheme is the vision of the Irish community in Sydney. The Irish Famine Monument was commissioned by the Historic Houses Trust of NSW (HHT) [name changed to Sydney Living Museums in 2014] and funded by donations from Government bodies, the Land Titles Office and the Irish Community. It was inspired by the call of the President of Ireland, Mary Robinson during her Sydney visit in 1995, that all Irish communities remember the Irish Famine and strive to alieviate poverty in the world today.’ The monument was supported by the Emigrant Support Programme.
The Famine Rock, Melbourne reads: ‘Erected by public subscription and unveiled on 6 December 1998 by His Excellency, Richard O`Brien, Ambassador of Ireland, in the presence of Councillor Brad Matheson, Mayor on the 150th anniversary of the arrival in Hobson`s Bay of 191 Irish orphan girls on the Lady Kennaway – Melbourne Irish Famine Commemoration Group.’
According to research carried out by Dr Ciarán Reilly at NUI Maynooth, 61 young women were sent from Wexford to Cape Town in South Africa, 20 of whom departed in May 1849. He writes ‘The success of this little-known scheme was helped by the fact that there were a number of Irish priests in Cape Town, including the Reverend Arthur McCarthy from County Wexford, who received the Wexford girls and secured employment for them, ensuring that they did not fall victim to the vices of the city.’ (Irish Independent, 5 June 2020).
Eamonn McKee
Ambassador of Ireland
Ottawa
Appendix II National Famine Way Stages, Walk 20-25 May
| May 2024 | ||||||||
| DAY 1 | DAY 2 | DAY 3 | DAY 4 | DAY 5 | DAY 6 | |||
| DATE | 20 th May – Mon | 21 st May – Tues | 22 nd May – Weds | 23 rd May – Thurs | 24 th May – Fri | 25 th May – Sat | ||
| START / FINISH | Strokestown – Clondra | Clondra – Abbeyshrule | Abbeyshrule – Mullingar | Mullingar – Longwood | Longwood – Maynooth | Maynooth – Dublin | ||
| DISTANCE | 20 km | 32.6 km | 27.3 km | 30.3 km | 28.75 km | 27 km | ||
| TIME | 9 am – 4.30 pm | 9.00 am – 5.00 pm | 9 am – 4.30 pm | 9.00 am – 5.00 pm | 9.00 am – 5.00 pm | 9.30 am – 4.00 pm | ||
[1] An estimate based on contemporaneous accounts but subject to confirmation.
[2] William Spray records the following: Deaths at sea 823; Miramichi 96; Alms House at St John 595; Partridge Island 601. Total in 1847 2,115, not including Fredericton and St. Andrew’s.
[3] 314 deaths reported by the Bytown Emigrant Agent, from June to August, 1847, as published in the Bytown Packet, September 4, 1847, with an additional 46 deaths recorded by the Bytown Emigrant Hospital from September to December 1847, according the archives of the Sisters of Charity of Ottawa.
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