Landscape of Loss

                                                                                    ‘Landscape of Loss’- County Mayo

Between 1846 and 1850, just over one million Irish people died of starvation. This was due to 'The Great Famine' (An Gorta Mor), a direct result of the potato crop failure (an Irish staple), due to a nationwide potato blight disease. As one year after another passed by, and still no potato crops, the numbers dying of starvation was mounting. For many, emigration had become a means of escape, and over a million people were forced to hastily emigrate to America, England, Canada and even Australia, in order to survive.

A large proportion of the dead and the emigrants were located west of the River Shannon, with higher than average numbers, in County Mayo. In March of 1849, in the town of Louisburgh, hundreds of sick and starving, men, women and children were gathering. They came on foot, from all the surrounding countryside, to await the arrival in the town of the so-called, Guardians. These two high powered administrators,
the poor relief officer and the poor law inspector, were supposed to supply some food and entry tickets to the workhouse. To the people’s dismay, the two men had left to go hunting at The Adelphi Lodge (as guests of the Marquis of Sligo), leaving instructions in the town, for the poor applicants to present themselves at the Adelphi Lodge, the next day for inspection and approval.  

That cold bitter evening, with sleet, snow and bitter ice-cold winds, 600 men, women and children, set out on foot, to walk overnight, the 15 miles to the Hunting Lodge on the shores of Doolough Lake. When they arrived in sleet and rain the next day
the two ‘gentlemen’ were taking lunch and were not to be disturbed. Eventually, they appeared, and assistance was refused, sending the crowd of starving people away, empty handed. The large group attempted to make their way back in even worse conditions than their previous day’s journey. Almost all of the 600 fatigued and exhausted people perished, dying of sickness, starvation, fever, and despair, on route back to Louisburg. Their skeleton corpses were scattered all along the 15 miles of exposed road along by Killary Harbour. Some had remnants of grass in their mouths, many were swept into the Fjord, with the blinding snow and piercing wind. During the Famine years, the population of County Mayo fell by almost 30%. Emigration became a long-term legacy of the Famine in County Mayo, with successive census showing a steady decline, right up to 1971.

On the day I arrived at Lennaun Cemetery on the outskirts of the village, the low-lying mist that was with us all the way down through Doolough Valley, had just lifted above the hills either side of Killary Harbour, leaving a haunting stillness in its wake.
As I sat in the graveyard, looking out towards the Great Atlantic Way, a line from a Seamus Heaney poem summed up the atmosphere and gave me the title of my photograph, ‘Landscape of Loss’. 

                                                                         An Gorta Mor – The Great Famine (1845 – 1850)
                                                                                                                                                                         

                                                                                                                                                                          O’Doule Jan. 2022