Ireland The Great Famine

The potato, a simple starch to some, mass murderer to others. It is often hard to believe that simple things such as potatoes can be such a devastating thing to engulf a nation. This is of course the Great Hunger, also known as the Great Famine. It was one if not the most devastating events in Irish history. Costing Ireland an estimated 800,000 lives to hunger , and even more emigrating out to other nations. Though this number does not stack up to other tragedies in size, this made up roughly 10 percent of the population alone, not accounting for those who had left. But what did the loss of the potato crop do to Ireland. Potatoes started in Peru when the Spanish discovered them, they proceeded to bring the back to Europe and that’s where …show more content…
At first glance it makes a lot of sense but that isn’t what this is about. Britain did seem to take advantage of Ireland in the long run and pushed its people even more than before. The British seemingly were doing wrong to the Irish people. Taking advantage of what they need and giving it to them for extensive labor, and giving them little in return. All of that is true, but in the end, it was a bad choice and did little to keep Ireland afloat, but it may have still kept those that were there going. So even though Britain did more bad then good it seems. They still did not set the left blight loose but they did put Ireland in a weak financial state, even prior to the famine. They had taxes on their crops and became so dependent on a crop because it’s what they could afford. This could all put the British to blame and make the name the Great Genocide reasonable. But with that option there are still …show more content…
It helped its economy early on, and became a large portion of what the poor, and almost everyone ate. It gave them a sustainable export to Britain and other areas, as well as helped them pay the taxes the British enforced. But with the good it brought, it also brought the bad of the famine, and the detriment to a large mass of its population, nearly bringing it down two million people. Either because of death or emigration. The potato converted a large mass to being catholic, and also brought the irish around the world. All of this can be attributed to a single starch that changed the course of Ireland, and set it on the path that it is still following today. This is why the potato may be one of the worst and most impactful things to ever go to