Ireland Newsletter October 2016 - Irish Halloween Traditions and Quotations

THE HUMBLE FAMINE POT By Mattie Lennon
In 2011 Donegal man, John Cassidy was strolling on the banks of the Clogher River, in the townland of Cullenboy when he found an old famine-pot, broken in pieces. He had it welded, restored and mounted outside Leghowney Community Hall.

Such was the interest shown by American tourists that I decided to do some research on the whole Famine-pot/Soup–kitchen aspect of the famine.

Famine Pots in Ireland

I found that because of bigotry, pride, misguided patriotism and inherited false information, this aspect of the potato failure was almost air-brushed from our history.

Professor Christine Kinealy of Quinnipiac University explained:
'....when the potato failed for the second time in 1846 a number of Quakers in Ireland, followed by Quakers in England and Quakers in America decided to do something in the way of direct intervention. And they started to fund-raise....'

In November 1846 a Dublin Quaker, Joseph Bewley, wrote to Quakers all over Ireland pointing out the seriousness of the situation. I found from Rob Goodbody's book 'A Suitable Channel, Quaker Relief in the Great Famine', that the Quakers brought 294 Famine pots into Ireland in the 1840s.

'The first major shipment of supplies received from Great Britain in February 1847 included a consignment of soup boilers. These were landed at various places along the west coast, the largest number, ten, going to Killybegs. The supply of boilers was greatly enhanced by the donation of no less than fifty-six of them from the Quaker iron manufacturers, Abraham and Alfred Darby of the Coalbrookdale Iron Company.'

Over the period of the famine the Quakers supplied pots to twenty-seven counties.

At one stage, at Templecrone, County Donegal, there were in operation four famine-pots, being used twice a day to give out 600 gallons of soup at a cost to the local organisers of £2 10s.

Rob Goodbody, with typical Quaker humility, insists that the Quakers weren't the only group to provide relief. But his book gives facts and figures to indicate that their humanity, generosity and organisational skills saved tens, if not hundreds, of thousands from the mass-grave.

While Donegal was the hardest hit of any County in Ulster there was severe hardship in other parts of the country. Dr Ciaran Reilly of NUI Maynooth points out that the Quakers played a big part in the midlands:

'Without them the number of deaths would have been far greater.

Dr. Reilly pointed out that as the famine progressed that other people, '....both Catholic and Protestant' got involved in the provision of relief and that some of those set out to line their own pockets. Dr Reilly points out that in the process those unscrupulous people added ingredients not fit for human consumption to the soup. It was at times described as 'poison'.

The Government didn't want to give food free because they thought it would make people lazy so the set up Public Work Schemes. This involved starving peasants, during the harshest winter for a hundred years, doing heavy manual work, for pennies, building roads 'going nowhere' and 'famine-walls'.

It didn't work and in 1847 the Government decided to allow more soup-kitchens, modelled on what the Quakers had already done. But, Professor Kinealy says, the Government, '.... hadn't really thought it through'.

Once again the Quakers came to the rescue and brought in 'hundreds of cauldrons'.

Father Anthony Gaughan, Historian, told me of how the Presentation Sisters, at their convent in Listowel, fed the starving people of North Kerry during the 1840s. He said:

'So if you are asking about Famine-pots and soup-kitchens you could say they were in the Presentation Convent in Listowel'.

Some famine-pots have survived and can be found in the farms of Ireland. John Cassidy has taken steps to keep this aspect of our history alive. He has arranged to have miniature ceramic famine-pots made.

You can find out more at: www.irishfaminepots.com

Editors note: Mattie Lennon is one of the Founders of the Irish Famine Pot movement. If you know of any famine pots in Ireland please do tell the organizers about it at their website. You can also view some of the photos of famine pots that they have learned about at: http://www.irishfaminepots.com/new-gallery/

Dr Ciaran Reilly discusses a Famine Pot in Edenderry

JACK FARRELL - A Story by Mattie Lennon
You could always know when a Ballinastockan person was telling lies ....you could see their lips moving.

But that changed slightly when a Tallaght man Jack Farrell inherited a small cottage in Kylemore. I suppose you could call it the Latin quarter of Ballinastockan. Jack and his elderly mother moved in to it. Jack Farrell - A Story

He didn't fit in all that well with the natives because you see Jack always told the truth. It could be said of Jack Farrell that all his stories ran parallel with the highest ideals of veracity.

I'll give you an example. One year he was digging potatoes for my father. The father, Tim Lennon, was after making a scarecrow (a crow-fright) he called it) of which he was very proud.

'Did you ever see a better crow-fright than that, Jack,' says he.

'Wait till I tell you, Tim', said Jack,

'When I was working for the Bird Flanagan below in Greenhills one year the crows were playing havoc with his potatoes. I made a scarecrow. And do you know what I'm going to tell you? Do YOU know what I'm going to tell you? So realistic was that scarecrow that not alone did the crows not take another potato but they left back some that they took the week before.'

Jack would often relate how as a teenager he was at a house-dance in Firhouse. And a visiting dancer - a fine young fellow who had the book-learnin', was going the next day for an interview with a view to joining An Garda Siochana.

Opinions were divided as to whether he was of the required height. Until Jack stated, with some authority,

'That man is not the full eighteen hands high'.

Paddy Toomey, a stone cutter who only lived two fields away, went home and returned with a six-foot rule. And sure enough the prospective polisman proved to be half an inch short of the required height.

What was to be done?. This was before the era of 'brown envelopes' and anyway times were poor.

Jack hit on a plan. He would go on to explain to us, how, when the dancer's back was turned, he (Jack) took appropriate action. With the maximum alacrity Jack picked up an ash-plant. He gave the young man a belt of the stick on top of the head - 'a fellandy' he called it. The young man in question had a good thick head o' black hair and the resulting bump brought him up to the required height. He joined the guards, made a good polisman but according to Jack he was ever after known as 'lumpy-head'.

Jimmy Norton told Jack about one day he was ferreting and he caught 100 rabbits. Maybe he did. But Jimmy was from Ballinastockan so he probably caught five or six anyway.

Farrell ups and tells him about one day when he was shooting down at Balrothery. He was using a muzzle loader and after he tamped down the powder didn't he forget to remove the ramrod before he fired at a clatter of wild ducks flying overhead. They must have been flying in formation, one above the other, because didn't the ramrod spear three of them.

Gravity then took over and ramrod and ducks fell into the Poddle River and the ramrod went straight through a salmon. As Jack was getting out of the river with his day's kill didn't he trip over a rabbit and kill him.

One night in a rambling house the subject of the old age pension came up. When the Pinshin was brought in in 1908 the authorities had difficulty proving the age of the applicants since registration of births only became compulsory in 1864. If you compare the 1901 and 1911 census you will find that some people aged nearly 20 years in that decade.

An applicant would be asked if they remembered a particular event (usually an Act of God) and then asked to swear an affidavit. A favourite bargaining line was 'I remember the Big Wind.'

Jack Farrell, who was sittin' in the corner, came up with the following story: Jack's father farmed in Killarden (it was at the back of Jobstown ....and still is. He went for the pension and was asked if he remembered the Big Wind. The Big Wind as you all know was on 6th January in 1839 so if Jack's father remembered it that would leave him over 70 in 1908.

Farrell senior was more than equal to the challenge. According to Jack his father told the pension officer that, on Sunday sixth of January 1839 he was sitting at the fire, as a child, when a squall of wind took the roof straight off the house and it landed somewhere about Kippure. A pot of potatoes that was hanging on the pot-rack was blown up the chimney and at the top wasn't it struck by lightning. The steam that came out of it was fright to the world and ....they were the first potatoes in Ireland to be boiled by electricity.

Do you know the creels (baskets) that you see on the backs of donkeys in Bord Failte postcards and such like? (John Hinde made a fortune out of them.) Well up our way they're called 'cleeves' and they're held in position by a 'cleeving-straddle' - which is a saddle-like harness with a spike, or hook, on either side to hold the cleeves.

Anyway Jack Farrell was telling us about how he was using said mode of haulage to draw out turf on the Featherbed mountain. Due to inadequate upholstering, didn't the cleeving-straddle irritate and cut the ass, leaving a nasty lesion on either side of his backbone.

The weather being warm of course the flies attacked the open wounds, which festered (savin' your presence) developing into two raw nasty-looking holes in the ass's back.

The ass, tired after a hard day's work, went out and lay down at the back of the house under a hawthorn tree. And what do you think but didn't a couple of haws fall into the holes in his back. The holes eventually healed but the next Spring didn't two little whitethorn trees sprout out of his back.

Do you know what Jack did? He waited for them to grow fairly strong and then he sawed them off about four inches from the base. And thereafter he had the only ass in Ireland with a permanent cleeving-straddle.

And now you are going to ask me if Jack Farrell ever told a lie so, I'll tell you now. He did.

It is said that you should only tell lies to your wife or the police. Well the one lie that Jack Farrell told was to his poor old mother.

A Redemptorist Missioner in the course of a rip-roaring sermon on the evils of drink told the congregation that making poitin was a reserved sin. Which means that the penitent would have to go to the Bishop for forgiveness. Jack had made the odd drop of poitin and he told his mother that he would have to go to Rome to go to confession. So, he made his way to the Eternal city.

Daniel O'Connell died on his way to Rome but Jack was just ready to head for home when he was bitten by an Italian Mosquito. It proved fatal. I went to Rome in 1990 for the World cup and I found a place called Bocca Della Verita. Which, as you all know, means The Mouth of Truth. And it's claimed by them that knows that that's where Jack Farrell is buried.