ON THIS DAY: 13 FEBRUARY 1847: Illustrated London News describes the scenes Clonakilty

A writer from the Illustrated London News describes what he sees in Clonakilty

“I started from Cork, by the mail (says our informant), for Skibbereen and saw little until we came to Clonakilty, where the coach stopped for breakfast; and here, for the first time, the horrors of the poverty became visible, in the vast number of famished poor, who flocked around the coach to beg alms: amongst them was a woman carrying in her arms the corpse of a fine child, and making the most distressing appeal to the passengers for aid to enable her to purchase a coffin and bury her dear little baby. This horrible spectacle induced me to make some inquiry about her, when I learned from the people of the hotel that each day brings dozens of such applicants into the town.”

They included this illustration of the woman and her child and more harrowing details of the starving people they met. While massive amount of food and resources left our shores from our ports.

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