Irish internal migrations (search, estate, population, grandmother)

[SunGrins]

I know some of my Irish ancestors lived in Tralee in Kerry in the 1860s and somehow managed to survive the potato famine. They may have lived outside Tralee and relocated there. I've been focusing on County Kerry in my research but my DNA evidence seems to be from other parts of Ireland... Kilkenny and Cork and Limerick (based on some cousin DNA). Was there a general shifting or internal migration in Ireland during the famine? I'm guessing there might have been a movement from the country to the cities. Anybody know about this or know of a good source?

[theoldnorthstate]

The dates I get for the potato famine were 1845 to 1852, before circa 1860. So perhaps internal migration was related to something different such as industrialization

Just suggest you don't limit your research to potato famine

Good luck

[kevxu]

The decades following the Great Famine were a time widespread social disruption in many parts of Ireland - though not all. The ownership of most of the land of Ireland, including entire villages and parts of cities, was in the hands of a very small number of persons and families. The famine has caused a great loss in revenues and some landlords had attempted relief schemes as the famine continued, which further depleted their fortunes. Thus, after the famine was over many landlords were unable to pay taxes, etc. and their estates were encumbered.

One solution that some landlords tried (among them that of my paternal grandmother's family) was to terminate the leases of as many existing tenants as possible, and to rent as much of their lands to prosperous private individuals who were willing to try to make money from it.

In other cases the courts began schemes that made it easier for broke landlords to get rid of their estates - and their debts. Nevertheless, even in 1870 (according to British sources) 302 proprietors - 1.5 of the total number, owned 33% of the land in Ireland, and if you notch that down 750 families owned 50% of the land. Thus, the great bulk of the population were renters from large landlords, and their fate was entirely contingent up the financial solvency of their lords, any desperate measures a landlord might take to clear his or her estates to make them attractive to buyers, as well as the actions of courts who were trying by this time to sort out the entire mess and avoid civil disturbances.

In the case of my family mentioned above they were terminated as a group around 1850, my part of the family migrated to Canada after a couple years of having no rented holding; my distant cousins part of the family were able to established themselves as tenants in another part of the county.

I used to have copies of a packet of letters sent by my grt-grt grandmother's brother in east Co. Galway, written in the late 1870's and very early 80's, in which he mentions a series of tenant evictions in that era as local landlords attempted to consolidate their estates, and to sell off portions.

Bottom line: It is entirely possible that a family relocated from an area under the pressure of these circumstances and found a holding elsewhere. (Many, of course, migrated.)

It is a tedious business, but if you have good verifiable data as to where your family lived, try to see whose tenants they were at that time. After that you may be able to follow their tenancy back or forward in time through Irish records.

[Cryptic]

I know in general terms that the famine did not impact all areas of Ireland equally hard. I believe that the impact was worse in the poorer western portions of the country.

Also, the Irish famine was mostly a "rolling famine". Rolling famines only affect the more vulnerable and can fade, then re-occur again, or re-occur in an adjacent area, or skip over areas, and "land" in a new area based on food availability, macro economic policies, local food prices, infrastructure problems, or the impact of poorly managed relief programs.

Such famines can be harder to manage than famines where the only issue is the simple lack of food for everyone. The rolling nature of the famine may have impacted internal migration. There was also a "minor" famine in the 1880s.

[SunGrins]

Thanks Kevxu and Cryptic -- It is a puzzle. I'm thinking part of the trail goes to Castleisland around 1820 but DNA implies a wider geographic spread as the few DNA cousins I've contacted have no family history in Kerry. My Scollard family (Scollard and Moran) came over to the US in 1876. Tralee parish records show them in Tralee for about 20 years before that and Scollard seems to be a Kerry name...not common elsewhere. Moran or O'Moran seems to be more common elsewhere but also in Kerry. The other family (McSweeney) seemed to be everywhere and nowhere but came to the US earlier, around 1850s. They all seem to be connected in Ireland through the Morans....sisters, I think. They settled in St. Louis, MO in Kerry Patch and ran a small grocery.