The Long Way Out 1854 - The decision to leave
The Long Way Out
1854
It is generally
thought[i]
that The Great Hunger lasted from 1845 till 1852. Yet Edward and Catherine
Griffin did not emigrate till September 1854. This suggests it was not famine
itself which was behind the move. If so, what other forces were at work?
While Edward Rae
was listed as Edward and Catherine’s landlord in Griffith’s Valuation in 1847[ii],
John Rae was also listed as a landlord for one section of Corkaboy townland.
The Raes also went by the name Langford Rae, and John Langford Rae may have
been the more dominant member of this land-owning family.
According
to Property owners County Kerry circa 1870, Langford Rae of Keel House,
Castlemaine, Kerry (about six and a half miles from Tralee as the crow flies)
owned 5,870 acres and Edward Rae at the same address owned 564 acres.[iii]
An interesting
anecdote from the London Daily News suggests another way out of poverty for
people like Edward, and the role the landlord would play in facilitating it. From
1853-1856 Britain was fighting a war against Russia in the Crimea:
London
Daily News, 10th November 1855, page 2, column 3
Headed
"NAVAL AND MILITARY."
DUBLIN,
Nov. 9.
THE
KERRY MILITIA.—TRALEE, MONDAY.—On Saturday last, Mr John Langford Rae, of Keel,
in this county, presented in this town the unprecedented number of 57 recruits,
obtained for the Kerry Regiment, between the fair of Castlemaine, on Thursday,
and the market day here, on Saturday. If I am correctly informed, Mr. Rae,
optionally and conditionally, on getting a company, pledged himself to bring
one with him ; and if the realisation of that promise be 120 men, certainly
half the number in two days is a pretty fair earnest of its redemption. I
understand that the men are all labourers and farmers' sons on his own
property, and that of his three brothers. Many of them are the labourers
employed by M. Rae himself in draining, embanking, and farming operations, who,
now that Mr. Rae is bartering the ploughshare, battering mallet and pick, for
the sash and sword, think it better to secure a "clean decent life"
with him ; while others are the younger sons of small farmers on the property,
who would never wear that "honoured badge and dear cockade," if their
light hearts did not beat to follow their master.[iv]
By the time these
events took place (November 1855) Edward and Catherine had been living in South
Australia for nearly a year, but it is likely that conscription into the
British Army – only voluntary if you consider that the alternative is grinding
poverty and disease – was one option which would have weighed on Edward’s mind before
they made the decision to emigrate. However, by this time he had a family to
consider as well.
The ship which
took Edward and family to Adelaide in 1854 was the Coromandel. It was not the
same Coromandel which had been part of the first convoy of ships delivering
emigrants to South Australia, however.[v]
The 1854/55 Coromandel passenger list mentioned only three families from County
Kerry. One, of course, was our heroes, Edward and Catherine Griffin, and three
children – Mary, Thomas and Ellen. A second was the Walsh family (John and
Mary, and their four children). I have not been able to find any more
information about the Walshes.
However, the
third family, the Murphys, appear to supply some tantalising background to the
puzzle about Edward and Catherine’s actions.
William Murphy is
a very common name in Ireland, as you would expect. However, a search of Griffith’s
Valuation[vi]
leads us to a William Murphy who was a tenant in Castledrum townland, and whose
“house and land” (total value 15 shillings) was only a few hundred yards from Edward
and Catherine’s more valuable residence (10 shillings, although the land value
of three pounds eight shillings was split between Edward and his co-tenant
Timothy Sheehan, whose residence was valued at 4 shillings). A search of the Griffith’s
Valuation maps places this house at Boolteens, immediately opposite the Roman
Catholic Church which was the closest one for Edward and Catherine.
Furthermore, a
search of the Kilgarrylander marriage register for William Murphy tells us he
married Mary Sheehin on 12 February 1839. The name of one of the witnesses was
Timothy Sheehin. The marriage was held in Castlemaine, but both William and
Mary are listed as Castledrum residents.
A search of the
South Australian Register of Births, Deaths and Marriages mentions a William
Murphy who died in 1880. He is buried in the graveyard of St Agnes Catholic
Church, Marrabel, in the mid-north of South Australia. He is not alone. A few
yards away lie the remains of Edward Griffin.
When William and
Mary Murphy emigrated in 1855 they brought with them their son, Daniel, aged 8[vii].
Interred with William Murphy in his grave in Marrabel is Daniel Murphy, who
died in 1877 aged 30[viii].
Edward’s wife,
Catherine Griffin, nee Sheehan, died at the age of 82 at Hammond (otherwise
known as Pinda district) on 7 May 1900. William’s wife, Mary Murphy, nee
Sheehin, died at Pinda in 1906.
None of this
proves conclusively that Edward and Catherine Griffin and William and Mary
Murphy even knew each other, let alone decided jointly to emigrate. Nevertheless,
the circumstantial evidence is compelling.
Lord
Almighty, will ye have a look at that!
Edward
Griffin did not often get to Tralee in the summer, but this time he had to meet
someone. He was up very early.
“Where
you off to then?” Catherine had asked him the night before.
“Tralee.
Bill Murphy wants to talk to me about emigratin’. He’s got some news.”
Catherine
did not reply immediately. She was knitting in front of the turfen, smoky fire.
America. She’d heard lots of stories from friends, about friends of friends.
Some good. Some, not so good. America. Knit one, purl one. One thing’s for sure,
she thought to herself – there’s no future here.
The
fire smouldered in the dark. The clicketty-click of knitting needles.
Otherwise, silence. They had managed to secure a bed for their three children
and Mary, now aged 6, Thomas, 5, and Ellen, just 2, were curled up together,
asleep. Edward had built a pen outside for the pigs so they had more room
inside the house, at last. Catherine knew they would have to decide soon about
emigrating.
“You’ll
be leavin’ early then. I washed your breeches and shirt. Don’t want you
smellin’ like pigs in front of them townfolk. And tell Bill to tell Mary not to
worry about them eggs. We’ve got plenty now.”
A
clear sky greeted Edward in the morning and he hurried off towards Tralee. The
road diverged towards Castlemaine, but he took the walking track to the left at
Boolteens, around Quarry Hill and Knockmichael Mountain[ix].
Three hours later he was standing on Prince’s Quay, staring in wonder at the
mighty Jeanie Johnston[x].
The three-masted barque was a regular visitor to Tralee, bringing timber from
Canada. On the return she became an emigrant ship. On this day she was
welcoming aboard an incredible 240 hopefuls, even though she was built to carry
only forty[xi],
and Edward stared in wonder at the long line of men, women and children who
were consigning their immediate future to the fates. More than a few were
praying, crossing themselves as they wobbled awkwardly up the gangplank,
carrying their carpetbags and whatever other precious items they could. It was
a sunny day. Jeanie squatted in the duck pond quay, while navvies clambered
like ants up and across the masts preparing her for the long voyage ahead.
Aside
from the passengers, the landing swarmed with fare-thee-wellers. Everywhere
were tearful parents who knew they would probably never see their sons and
daughters and grandchildren again, despite the brave promises to return. Soon,
mother, soon, we will embrace again. To be sure, my darlin’, to be sure. Some
were alone, refugees from the workhouse and their own country, driven away by
famine and uncaring landlords. Some were following the family trail across the
Atlantic to join established communities in Canada or America. Here’s a group
of orphan girls being shepherded through the throng by matrons. There’s a
wealthy family, escorted aboard by agency men, to take up residence in their
cabins.
The
air smelled of tar and horse dung. The sound of wailin’ an’ keenin’ rose and
fell, and finally fell away as the sobbing reality of departure approached.
Edward was transfixed by the scene before him – he knew this was his future,
and that of Catherine, and his family. There was no place for people like him,
a Kerryman cottier whose few skills included growing ‘taters and feeding pigs.
His children will have a better future – they will grow up raidin’ books an’
ridin’ trains in America. The Great Famine had destroyed not only his potato
crop. It had destroyed a way of life. Besides, there were too many Irish, for
God’s sake. Everybody knew it. And everybody knew that the only solution was to
get out of Ireland, to build a new life somewhere else.
He
made his way slowly through the crowd up Prince’s Quay, pausing often to
observe the parade of humanity in despair before him. In Market Square he found
the alehouse where he had agreed to meet up with Bill Murphy. Bill always had a
plan, and was great company. They played caid together for Kilgarrylander
parish. He married[xii]
a Sheehan girl as well, Mary, and they already had four clann. Catherine and
Mary were old friends. Last August they all went to the Puck Fair[xiii]
in Killorglin together. What a great day that was. He was a good man to have on
your side in a crisis. Like Edward, Bill tried to grow lumpers and corn on his
plot at Castledrum.[xiv] Today’s
plan was how to get out of here, Edward hoped.
Bill
was late, as usual. Edward sat musing over his red ale, while outside the
residents of Tralee went about their business. The fish sellers squatted over
their pots, while the smell of the pig market in Brogue Maker’s Lane filled the
smoky air with an all too familiar scent. Beggars loitered and pickpockets
hovered.
“So,
what’s up, then?” Edward was quick to get to the point once Bill had arrived.
“Your
future, boyo, that’s what’s up. Ever heard of South Australia? They want you.”
This
wasn’t what Edward had expected to hear. He wanted to join the excited
passengers on the Jeanie Johnston, at this moment preparing to depart Tralee
Basin for a quick trip across the Atlantic to Canada, or America. He’d heard
that the Americans had raised taxes on fares to America, but that you could
walk from Canada to America. A new life in New York, or Boston. Going to
Australia was not part of the plan.
“Australia?
Not likely – that’s where they send all the convicts. No way Catherine would
agree to that.”
“Not
South Australia. No convicts there – it’s a free colony. And they’re desperate
for labour, people like you.”
Edward
was clearly not impressed. But Bill had a plan.
“Remember
the O’Sullivans from Killarney?”
There
were thousands of O’Sullivans in Killarney. Edward looked blank.
“Ignatius
O’Sullivan. Married Honora Griffin – remember?”
He
knew Honora was distantly related. Cork girl, I think.[xv]
Bill
took another sip of his red ale. Even though he was a cottier like Edward, Bill
had a gentlemanly air about him. Tall and wiry, but elegant at the same time. When
he spoke people listened, because when they spoke he listened, and cared. It
was in his eyes. He was a good man, was Bill.
“Well,
Honora and Ignatius emigrated to South Australia years ago, and now they want
to sponsor anyone willing from County Kerry if they will come out and work
their land for them. They’ll pay for the voyage for you and Catherine and your
three little ones. It’s an opportunity, Edward. You should take it. We’re
going.”
“You’re
going!?” So this was the news Bill wanted to tell me, Edward thought, and you
want me and Catherine to go as well! Well, well! As well!
“Well?”
Edward
was still trying to get his head around Australia. Australia? That’s the other
side of the world! Once you go there you never come back! He assumed they would
go to America. At least he had heard of people who had gone to America and then
returned. Australia meant saying goodbye to everything – forever.
Bill
wasn’t giving up. “Honora and Ignatius have a daughter, Mary[xvi]
, who married this Patrick Cash fella from Blackwater in County Wexford[xvii]
. Now Patrick has written to the parish priest in Killarney asking for
volunteers to come out to South Australia – that’s how I heard of it – and I
thought of you and Catherine straight away.”
Outside
the market was in full swing. Not that there was much that people could buy.
Poverty was everywhere. And disease. If one didn’t get you the other would, and
most likely both. The Tralee Workhouse[xviii],
set up to accommodate a thousand poor souls, including some from Kilgarrylander
parish, had been swamped with the destitute and desperate. Edward knew that if
it wasn’t for the benevolence of Edward Rae, his landlord, all his family might
be calling the Tralee Workhouse home as well. This thought focused his mind.
South Australia. God help us.
Bill
was nobody’s fool. He could see it wasn’t Edward he had to convince. Fair
enough. It’s a whole family making the move.
“It’s
a good Catholic community. Ignatius built a whole church – St Mary’s. Only the
second one in the whole colony. Lots of Kerry men and women, all building a new
life. No greedy landlords. And no convicts. You and Catherine will be able to
build a new life without all this,” he said, pointing to the scene in the
square. “Your kids – think of them.”
Bill
was a good man, and he was right.
Edward walked home into the chilly wind, kept warm inside by one red ale too many and dreams of the future. He didn’t want to raise the issue with Catherine, not just yet. Once he mentioned
emigration she would want him to say what he wants to do, and he needed his own
time to think about it. The absurdity of emigrating to South Australia. Absurd.
“So
what did Bill want to talk about?” Catherine said at breakfast.
The
time had come, so Edward outlined their conversation in the pub in Tralee. As
expected, Catherine was unimpressed.
“But
they’ll pay for the passage. We should think about it.”
Edward
did not like getting into pointless disagreements with Catherine. Usually their
differences were settled through the attrition of silence and time, but this
issue wasn’t going away, and they would have to make a decision soon. Both knew
it.
Outside,
the kids were rolling a hoop across the field. One of the dogs kept barking.
Ellen, the youngest, was running behind. Inside, Edward and Catherine wrestled
with their thoughts over a pot of boiling Indian corn. They were both familiar
with the horror stories of the coffin ships[xix] to North America - crammed into
disease-ridden vessels, unable to escape, and even when you got there no-one
wanted you. For too many it was a death sentence. But the alternative? Three
months at sea, at the mercy of wind and weather, exiled to a godforsaken place
on the other side of the world, on a promise from someone unknown? The furthest
Catherine had travelled on a boat was the half a mile across Castlemaine
Harbour on the ferry.
“But
what will we do? All I can do is sew and collect turf. Who wants that? We’ll
starve.” Usually so assured, Catherine’s voice betrayed her terror.
“We
won’t starve,” Edward replied unconvincingly. “I can work a plough – we’ll be
fine, to be sure.”
Catherine
was no longer the fairie who bewitched him all those years ago, but his salad
days were behind him as well, as he realised. But a different love was
replacing the passion of those unforgettable times – one rooted in familiarity
and certainty. They didn’t have to keep repeating it, it just was. This was
life, together, and with three clann, and God willing lots more to come, they
knew whatever the future might hold, they would face it together.
Bill’s
words that at least there was a Catholic community in South Australia, and
Irish, and Kerrymen, gave Catherine some reassurance.
“We’ll
put our faith in the Lord then, as we always do,” said Catherine finally, as
they both stared into the boiling cauldron. “I’m seein’ Mary on Wednesday at
market. We’ll talk.”
Mary,
Thomas and Ellen appeared at the door. It was time to eat.
After
Mass on Sunday at Boolteens Bill and Mary met up with Edward and Catherine.
They all walked slowly back to Corkaboy. The Murphy clann (Jane, Mary, Daniel
and Catherine) teamed up with the Griffin clann (Mary, Thomas and Ellen),
half-running, half-walking ahead of them. The two women were deep in conversation, while
Bill and Edward kept an eye on the kids’ shenanigans, and talked potatoes and
politics. Mary was enthusiastic about the South Australia option, and was
clearly trying to get Catherine keen as well. Edward was also unsure, but knew
he would go if Catherine could be persuaded.
At
home Catherine boiled some water for a cup of tea all round. The kids took
turns riding on the back of their very patient sow. Ellen kept falling off, and
Daniel and Thomas ran alongside holding her in place when she finally found her
balance on top of the unimpressed pig, laughing with delight. The adults sat
outside in the shade of one of their apple trees. It was another sunny, clear
day – there was nothing prettier than Dingle Peninsula on days like this. Even
the wind had dropped away to a light breeze.
The
conversation turned to the journey. Bill told them what he knew. There will be
a ship that will take them to Adelaide. He didn’t know where it would leave
from – maybe Cork, or maybe Southampton. Tralee only served ships bound for
America, he thought.
What
do we take, Catherine wanted to know. Mary said she thought they could take a
suitcase each, and that’s it. That’s what she’d read in the Kerry Examiner, the
local newspaper. Catherine mulled this thought over her cuppa. She didn’t own a
suitcase – never needed one. Now she’ll need five! “And you’ll need six!”, she
said to Mary. “Might be seven by then,” Mary replied secretively, with a
knowing laugh.
“What
about the sailin’?” Catherine asked.
“These
ships, they sail around the world all the time. We’ll be fine,” Bill chipped
in, trying to sound as convincing as he could. They had all read plenty of
accounts in the Kerry Examiner of ships that didn’t make it – wrecked on some reef
somewhere, with no survivors. Best not to think too much about that.
The
two women knew they needed each other, and if one went and the other stayed
then both would regret it. They also realised emigrating to South Australia
would mean a life of isolation from all they knew, all they were familiar with
- the easy company of the markets, the friends they treasured, the Kerry they appreciated
now more than ever. But they also knew that this was the lot of all Irish now –
begone and be done wid yer. Your time here is up. It was as if God had deserted them, and yet He
was all they had.
All
seven children crowded round while Edward picked the juiciest apples he could
find to hand to them. Little Ellen had scraped her knee and needed some comforting.
Catherine spat on the wound and rubbed the pain away. The others went back to
teasing the sow, who had run to the far corner of the field to escape them, but
was a little more accommodating when presented with half a dozen apple cores.
Catherine was staring intently at the scene.
“It’s
for them, ain’t it. Not us. It’s for them. God knows we’ll be dead soon enough,
but they deserve somethin’ better, and I’m goin’ to give it to them, even if I
die in the tryin’.” Catherine’s words came from a very deep place, and took
Edward and the others by surprise. No-one felt any more needed to be said.
They
had some lunch and passed the lazy afternoon in the dappled sunlight, half
dozing, half chatting about a world that suddenly seemed irrelevant and unimportant.
When the shadows lengthened and the wind got chillier the visitors walked the
short distance towards Boolteens back home, and Edward and Catherine prepared
the fire to boil some potatoes. Ellen nursed her sore knee, while Thomas and
Mary stripped off to stand in the washbasin before getting into their bedclothes.
Edward
thought he would feel elated, overjoyed, once Catherine had agreed. Instead he
felt the dread of the prisoner about to be transported for life. He thought he
could hear his mother Mary wail in her grave at Kilgarrylander churchyard.
Catherine felt nothing, dead, excommunicated.
But
at least a decision had been made. If it is God’s will, He will take care of us.
We are in His hands. It is decided. They will go.
[i] Coogan,
T. (2012) The Famine Plot, England's Role in Ireland's Greatest Tragedy
[ii] http://griffiths.askaboutireland.ie/
- insert edward+griffin+kerry
[iii] http://members.madasafish.com/~cj_whitehound/family/Langford_Raes.htm
[iv] http://members.madasafish.com/~cj_whitehound/family/Langford_Raes.htm
[v] https://published.collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/e-books/zi21520902.pdf
[vi] http://www.askaboutireland.ie/griffith-valuation/
- enter william murphy kerry
[vii] http://www.theshipslist.com/ships/australia/coromandel1855.shtml
[viii]
http://freepages.rootsweb.com/~deadsearch/genealogy/marrabel.htm
[ix] 1837
historical map from http://map.geohive.ie/mapviewer.html
[x] https://mykerryancestors.com/emigrant-ships-port-tralee-1828-1867/
[xi] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanie_Johnston
[xii] https://churchrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/ enter william murphy marriage 1839
[xiii]
https://puckfair.ie/history
[xiv] http://www.askaboutireland.ie/griffith-valuation/
- enter william murphy kerry
[xv] https://www.ancestry.com.au/family-tree/person/tree/24090092/person/142086829047/facts
[xvi] https://www.ancestry.com.au/family-tree/person/tree/24090092/person/142086829063/facts
[xvii]
https://www.ancestry.com.au/family-tree/person/tree/24090092/person/142086829063/facts
[xviii]
https://irelandxo.com/ireland-xo/history-and-genealogy/buildings-database/tralee-workhouse
[xix] https://www.historyplace.com/worldhistory/famine/coffin.htm
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