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Emigration

After the peace of 1815, rural Ireland underwent a dramatic transition. With the collapse of the war boom, grain prices collapsed. Landlords were still demanding wartime rents after peace prices had returned. This led to conflict - tenants were unable to meet the demands being made on them. Many resident landlords were in dire economic straits. They sought a solution to their problems through consolidating the small farms into large tillage holdings or into pasture land for the grazing of cattle. This pushed thousands of families off the land, and demolished their habitations.

The disastrous famine of 1822 was especially severe in Clare. Daniel O'Connell in a letter to his wife, dated 4th May 1822 states: 'All are actually starving in Co Clare and nearly so in Kerry. The distress is extreme and the want spreading'. Any emigration resulting from this famine generally ended up on Merseyside, with Irish labourers building docks, water ways, public buildings and factories in Lancashire and beyond. It was not long however until English economists proclaimed that the swarming of Irish pauper workers evicted from the land, into English factories at reduced wages, threatened the standard of living of British workers and so in time the English Government established a Poor law or 'workhouse' system for Ireland.

After 1822 emigration to Australia was more attractive than to America due to the fact that it was mainly aid-provided. Convict transportation from the county pre-1822 was insignificant, amounting to only 82 people, 9 of whom were females. Between 1821 and 1840, however, 636 Clare people were transported to NSW, principally for petty crime - stealing bread, butter, clothing, killing sheep for meat, all done in the name of survival. More serious crimes, including the stealing of cattle, earned life sentences. These convicts sent home word about the superior kind of life available in the colonies, which set the pattern for subsequent emigration especially from Tipperary, Clare and South East Galway, evoking memories of Whiteboys, Terry Alts and Ribbonmen.

In the 1820's quite a number of free settlers with capital entered Australia. They were mostly the sons of landlords, of merchant and professional classes. Some commissioned officers at British Army outposts such as India, sold their commissions and for the money purchased ranches in Australia. For £1,000 one could purchase more than 2,000 acres of good land. They needed shepherds, stockmen, ploughmen, artisans, miners, and they in turn came from amongst evicted tenants and others as 'indentured' labourers, whose passages were mostly paid for.

'Improving' landlords such as Col Wyndham, offered free passage to tenants and their families to emigrate to Canada or Australia. Many families availed of the offer; the only alternative was eviction. The poor law was enacted in 1838 and the county was divided into Poor Law Unions each administered by a Board of Guardians. Originally, there were only four unions in Clare - Ennis, Kilrush, Scariff and Ennistymon. Each had a workhouse which at Ennis and Kilrush could accommodate 800 inmates while Scariff and Ennistymon were expected to cater for 600. Between 1850 and 1852 other workhouses were provided at Corofin, Ballyvaughan, Kildysart and Tulla. Most of the inmates were evicted tenants and orphans, and others left destitute, by the Great Famine. The Boards of Guardians discovered that it was cheaper to pay the passage to Australia for an able-bodied inmate, than to maintain him in the workhouse, and very many of those in receipt of poor law aid availed of such offers. At that time also there was an imbalance in the colony between males and females, and the governors were clamouring for greater female immigration. The Boards of Guardians in the Poor Law Unions considered that they should lessen the burden on their finances, by offering free passage to Australia to orphan girl inmates between the ages 14 and 18 years. The workhouses during the period 1840 -1862, were homes for the most destitute children in Ireland. One boat the Thomas Arbuthnot arrived into Sydney on the 3rd February 1850 with a cargo of orphans, including eighty-two girls from Co Clare workhouses. A number of wealthy citizens in Australia to-day are direct descendants of those girls.

The colonial bounty system, to aid would-be immigrants, came into being in 1837 but was revised in 1840. It granted pecuniary aid under certain conditions to persons bringing into NSW from the UK (including Ireland) agricultural labourers, shepherds, tradesmen, female domestics and farm servants. The sum of £38 would be paid as a bounty for any married man, of the above description, and his wife, neither of whose ages on embarkation to exceed 40 years; £5 for each child between 1 and 7 years; £10 for each child between 7 and 15 years and £15 for each above 15 years; £19 would be allowed for every unmarried female domestic or farm servant not below 15 nor above 30 years, coming out under the protection of a married couple as part of a family.

The Gold Rush of the 1850's brought thousands of emigrants, almost overnight into Victoria. In the year 1856, 278 emigrants from Clare arrived on assisted passages into Victoria; Tipperary were next with 206 and it is remarkable that all Leinster including Dublin City only provided 222. Large concentrations of Clare people settled at Ballarat and Bendigo.

Emigration to South Australia only began in the 1840's and was much encouraged by Charles Bagot, land agent for Bindon Blood who lived at Rockforest, Kilkeedy and who was supervisor of the Burren road system. He chartered a boat, the Birman, which arrived into Adelaide in 1840! His son discovered copper at Kapunda. Several North Clare families, probably prompted by Bagot, settled in the district - Kerin, Canny, Linnane, Davoren etc and all have descendants there to-day. Dr Blood, first medical doctor in Kapunda and first Mayor of the town, emigrated from Corofin in 1844. Part of the town of Clare, in the nearby Clare Valley, the great wine-producing area in South Australia is called Inchiquin. One sees 'Inchiquin Port Wine' in every bar in South Australia.

Very many Clare people attained eminence in the professional and business life of Australia. An account of all of them would make a substantial volume. We shall mention but a few. Michael Durack and his family from Maherareagh, in the Parish of Iniscaltra, arrived as an 'indentured labourer' into NSW in May 1853. His son Patsy Durack extended his ownership of land over thousands of square miles. Dame Mary Durack now living in Perth, wrote Kings in Grass Castles describing in detail the fabulous achievements of the Duracks. Paddy Hannon born at Gurteen, Quin, on 24 April 1840, son of John Hannon and Bridget Lynch, discovered two nuggets of gold north of Coolgardie on 15th June 1893 and this was the beginning of the fabulous 'Golden Mile'. A statue of him stands on the main street of Kalgoorlie and a bust of him is to be seen in the DeValera Library in Ennis which was presented to the Clare Co Council in 1988 by the Corporation of Kalgoorlie. A Clareman Patrick Lynch owned two hotels in Kalgoorlie in the last century and was an ardent supporter of Home Rule for Ireland.