h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Re: The History of the Celts entry "1845-49 AD The potato famine in Ireland. Millions die or migrate to America, Australia, New Zealand, England." http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A207479 Please insert Canada after America. Canada was second only to the United States as a destination for famine Irish. Hundreds of thousands of Irish immigrated to Canada (then still a British colony) during and shortly after the Irish Famine. It was the destination of the most destitute Irish people, because the fare to Canada was much lower than those to the United States, or Australia and New Zealand, and sometimes fares were paid by British wanting to solve two problems, move the famine Irish on, and settle their underpopulated Canadian territories. Coditions were so bad on the floating "coffin ships" or "fever ships", many died during the voyage. Most survivors were screened/quarantined on the island of Grosse-�le, in Quebec which was the quarantine station for the Port of Qu�bec and until World War II, the main arrival site for immigrants coming into Canada. Many many more died there of cholera from the ships. Most survivors were sent to Montr�al, and many orphaned children were adopted into French-Canadian families, becoming Qu�b�cois. The Irish settled in eastern Canada, Quebec, Upper Canada (now Ontario). Some did go on to the United States. - Grosse �le is now the site of the Irish Memorial National Historic Site of Canada. "...1847 took a heavy toll: over 5 000 people died at sea, and 5 424 people were buried at Grosse �le. Thousands more died in cities elsewhere in Canada. "http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/qc/grosseile/natcul/natcul1b_E.asp" - "In 1847 alone, the year of the Great Famine, over 90,000 Irish immigrants arrived in Canada, which at the time had a population of approximately 1.5 million people..." Tucker, Gilbert �The Famine Immigration to Canada, 1847,� American Historical Review, Volume 36, Issue 3 (April, 1931), p.548. - "Approximately one million Irish landed in Canada in the century before the First World War, three quarters of them before 1855, and almost half a million in the years 1825-45...The peak year of Irish migration to Canada was undoubtedly the Famine deluge of 1847, when more than 100,000 Irish arrived, many of them destitute and ill. At the quarantine station of Grosse-�le some 5,000 died and a similar number was reputed to have perished in Montr�al, with several hundred more dying in Kingston and Toronto. Changes in navigation laws reduced Famine traffic in subsequent years, and in 1848-54 migration fell to pre-Famine levels." Source: Irish Emigration and Canadian Settlement: Patterns, Links, and Letters, by Cecil J. Houston and William J. Smyth (1990) http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/irlande/021019-1200-e.html References: (too many to include all): 1) Library and Archives Canada Irish Emigration and Canadian Settlement: Patterns, Links, and Letters, by Cecil J. Houston and William J. Smyth (1990) http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/irlande/021019-1200-e.html William J. Smyth is the President Emeritus of the National University of Ireland, Maynooth and a former Vice-Chancellor of the National University of Ireland. A geographer who has published widely on the Irish in Canada, in collaboration with Professor Cecil Houston, University of Windsor. 2) Government of Canada, Parks Canada http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/qc/grosseile/natcul/natcul1c_E.asp#stats 3) Elliott, Bruce S. Irish Migrants in the Canadas: A New Approach. McGill-Queen�s University Press, 1988. 4) "An Unprecedented Influx": Nativism and Irish Famine Immigration to Canada. Scott W. See; American Review of Canadian Studies, Vol. 30, 2000. Pat Bowie