The Irish Famine (jan 1, 1842 – jan 1, 1852)

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Ineffective farming methods, unstable mono-cultures focusing on a single breed of crop, and political and economic disenfranchisement of Catholic Irish, would lead to Ireland suffering more than any other part of Europe during the blight of 1842.

A blight would spread through Europe, killing vast quantities of crops and putting a strain on food supplies for the European population. Ireland however, was hit the most severe losing 25% of its population as 1,000,000 died and 1,000,000 more fled the country.

Inefficient and ineffective aid provided by the British Whig Government and hampered by anti-Irish prejudice among many civil servants and politicians, would exacerbate the crisis. While the Tory government initially acted promptly and somewhat successfully in aiding Ireland, Prime Minister Peel's ministry would collapse and be replaced by a Whig one.

For years the Whig government refused to aid Ireland, blaming the problem on the Irish and believing the market would offer a solution.

Nonetheless, private charitable contributions were widespread perhaps raising as much as £1.5 million, a third of which being raised in Britain with English Protestants, ironically, being the single largest contributor of aid outside of Ireland. These would include a young Abraham Lincoln, Queen Victoria and the Pope.

Private citizens in the United states would donate hundreds of thousands of dollars in good and cash, including the Choctaw Nation which only 16 years after the trail of tears, donated $170.

The Religious Society of Friends, or "Quakers" likewise thrust themselves into aiding the struggling Irish during the famine, even when the British Government themselves did not.

"We must not complain of what we really want to obtain. If small farmers go, and their landlords are reduced to sell portions of their estates to persons who will invest capital we shall at last arrive at something like a satisfactory settlement of the country"
- Charles Trevelyan, the civil servant responsible for government relief at the time.

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