Remembering Canada: the place of Canada in the memorializing of the Great Irish Famine

AbstractOver 250,000 Irish migrants ventured to British North America during the years of the Great Irish Famine. Recently, Canadians have commemorated their role in assisting Famine refugees in several eastern Canadian cities and at quarantine stations in New Brunswick and Quebec. When the commemorations and monuments were being constructed, revisionist historians in Canada questioned, with some success, the centrality of the Famine to the entire process of Irish migration to Canada. Some historians have claimed that such commemorations will continue the "problem" of viewing all of the Irish migration to Canada through the lens of the Famine. While acknowledging the domestic historical conundrum about remembering the Famine in Canada, this article, however, proposes a different perspective: how is the Canadian role in the Irish Famine migration documented by Irish historians and memorialized in the Famine commemorations in Ireland itself? Through an examination of monuments to the Famine, Irish folk and theme parks, local and national museums, and formal public commemorations, the article will explore how the Irish depictions of the Famine diaspora to Canada, when evident at all, compare to Irish discussions of migration to the UK, the USA, and Australia.Keywords: Irish Famine migrationCanadamemorialisationmonumentsmuseumstheme parks Notes on contributorProf. Mark G. McGowan is principal emeritus (2002–2011) at St Michaels College, University of Toronto, and teaches in the History Department at the University of Toronto. He is the author of many books and articles on religion and ethnicity in Canada including The Waning of the Green: Catholics, the Irish, and Identity in Toronto, 1887–1922 (1999); Creating Canadian Historical memory: The Case of the Famine Migration of 1847 (2006); Michael Power: The Struggle to Build the Catholic Church on the Canadian Frontier (2005) and Death or Canada: The Irish Famine Migration to Toronto, 1847 (2009). The latter book was made into a docudrama by the same name and has been featured on RTÉ and History Television.Notes1. CitationBoston Pilot, 20 November 1847.2. CitationLimerick Reporter, 4 May 1847.3. CitationWoodham-Smith, The Great Hunger, 210.4. See CitationGray, "Memory and the Commemoration of the Great Irish Famine."5. This interplay between the facts of the Famine and the concerns of contemporary commemorators is suggested in CitationMark-Fitzgerald, "Towards a Famine Art History," 199–200.6. A recent example of the latter is CitationCoogan, The Famine Plot.7. Magnus Rodell, "Monuments and the Places of Memory," 111–112.8. CitationCarr, What is History? 30; Creighton cited in CitationMoir, Character and Circumstance, x.9. Comments to this effect are plentiful in CitationReport on the Public Consultation Program.10. All figures are derived from CitationColonial Office Papers, reel 1746.11. CitationAkenson, The Irish in Ontario, 29–32.12. Colonial Office Papers, 384/82, 175. The precise figure for New Brunswick is 16,589. Other colonies received fewer: 2000 emigrants disembarked in Nova Scotia and Cape Breton; 993 in Newfoundland; and Prince Edward Island received 536 emigrants.13. CitationHouston and Smyth, Irish Emigration and Canadian Settlement, 34.14. CitationSpray, "The Difficulties Came Upon Us Like a Thunderbolt," 124. The figure presented is lower, namely, about 1600 or more, in CitationWright, "Partridge Island," 136; this is below the official account for reasons unknown.15. CitationHouston and Smyth, Irish Emigration and Canadian Settlement, 21.16. CitationMcGowan, Death or Canada, 97. See also CitationTucker, "The Famine Immigration to Canada, 1847."17. CitationHouston and Smyth, 4–5 and 21–22.18. The most complete accounts of Irish migration to the Americas are found in CitationAkenson, The Irish in Ontario, 3–47; CitationHouston and Smyth, Irish Emigration and Canadian Settlement, 13–42 and Miller, Emigrants and Exiles, 103–30.19. Emily CitationMark-Fitzgerald, Commemorating the Irish Famine, 57–63; there were famine memorials at Partridge Island, New Brunswick; Kingston, Ontario (1892); Toronto, Ontario, with a monument dedicated to Bishop Michael Power, who died serving the famine refugees in 1847; and the Black Stone erected in Montreal in 1858.20. See CitationJ.G. Hodgins Papers. Also see The Quebec Telegraph, "CitationMonuments File;" CitationDriedger, An Irish Heart, 221; CitationWright, "Partridge Island," 126–149.21. See CitationGrosse-Île National Historic Site Development Concept and CitationGrosse-Île National Historic Site.22. www.radharcfilms.com/archive/337.html. The first was aired on 7 January 1993, followed over the next three weeks by Ireland and the Making of Canada, The French Connection, and Orange and Green.23. CitationGlobe and Mail, 22 August 1994.24. CitationHill, "From Famine to Fraud."25. CitationJackson, "Famine Diary."26. CitationMcGowan, "Famine, Facts, and Fabrication," 51. See also CitationMangan, Robert Whyte's 1847 Famine Ship Diary.27. These figures were calculated from the shipping lists in CitationO'Gallagher and Dompierre, Eyewitness Grosse-Île 1847, 340–356.28. CitationCharbonneau and Drolet-Dube, A Register of Deceased Persons at Sea and on Grosse Ile, 62; and CitationO'Gallagher and Dompierre, Eyewitness Grosse-Île 1847, 223. For a more thorough explanation see CitationMcGowan, "Famine, Facts, and Fabrication," 55, in particular footnotes 48 and 49.29. Mahon's story is told rather well in CitationDuffy, The Killing of Major Denis Mahon.30. Gallagher and Dompierre, Eyewitness Grosse-Île 1847, 340–356. Dr. Ciaran Reilly of the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, has discovered estate records indicating that the assisted passengers from the Mahon estate in 1847 probably numbered close to 1490, since young children were either missed or counted as one half person in the official records.31. CitationDodd, Dillon, and Sherwin, eds., The Great Irish Famine and Famine Today.32. CitationWilson, Thomas D'Arcy McGee, 357–359.33. CitationCameron, On the Take.34. A helpful background is provided by CitationHamrock, The Famine in Mayo.35. A helpful background is provided by CitationHamrock, The Famine in Mayo, 138–140.36. The Heritage Centre sells a book which does acknowledge migration. See CitationFoynes, The Great Famine in Skibbereen, 54 and 86–87. More detailed is the monograph by local historian Patrick CitationHickey, whose work presents statistics on migration and mortality of emigrants from Cork to Saint John, New Brunswick. See CitationHickey, Famine in West Cork, 222–227.37. CitationDoherty and Doherty, A Walk through Doagh Famine Village, Inishowen, County Donegal.38. O'Gallagher and Dompierre, Eyewitness Grosse-Île 1847, 341 and 354.39. The Scotland from Cork and the Lord Seaton from Belfast arrived on the same day. The former had lost 60 of the 560 passengers and carried 160 sick, while the latter had lost 20 of the 301 passengers and held 46 sick passengers. The Urania from Cork also arrived with 11 of the 200 passengers having died and with 55 sick. See CitationCharbonneau and Sevigny, 1847 Grosse-Île, 50. In the end the Dunbrody's first voyage cost eight lives out of the 312 (2.6%); Urania cost 36 lives out of the 200 (18%); The Scotland cost 166 lives out of 564 (29.4%); and the Lord Seaton 51 lives out of 301 (16.9%). See CitationCharbonneau and Drolet-Dube, A Register of Deceased Persons at Sea and on Grosse-Île, 103–108.40. Limerick (50); Cork (33); Dublin (27); Sligo (26); Belfast (21); New Ross (15); Waterford (14); Derry (11); Liverpool (72); Glasgow (30); London (19). See CitationCharbonneau and Sevigny, 1847 Grosse-Île, 21.41. CitationMcGowan, Death or Canada, 31–33.42. CitationCrowley, "Sites of Memory," 619.43. CitationMcGowan, Death or Canada, appendix E.44. The events were the occasion of the making of a documentary film, The Great Irish Famine: Remember Skibbereen produced by Harvest Films Production for the Skibbereen Heritage Centre.45. Catherine O'Keefe to the author, 15 May 2009, Skibbereen, West Cork, Ireland.46. Email from Terri Kearney to the author, 12 May 2013.47. See CitationShanahan, "The Irish Question in Canada;" CitationClarke, Piety and Nationalism; CitationCottrell, "Irish Catholics and Political leadership in Toronto, 1855–1882;" CitationHorrall, "Canada and the Irish Question;" CitationWilson, Irish Nationalism in Canada; CitationMcGowan, The Waning of the Green.

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