Potato Famine - Lack of Food and Shelter

As reporters and illustrators for various newspapers visited the Irish countryside, they were appalled by what they saw.  Out of their former homes, and no longer able to make ends meet, Irish families could not cope.

The caption, of this drawing, is "Sketch in a House at Fahey's Quay, Ennis - The Widow Connor and Her Dying Child."  The article (from The Illustrated London News, January 19, 1850) provides more detail about the deplorable conditions:

In one small room, not 20 feet square, I found congregated fifteen people, young and old, exhibiting nearly all the phases of want and squalor. From the smoke which filled the place, it was a Rembrandt scene, and it was with difficulty I could make out the forms of the wretched groups, or of the squalid and dying child on the floor.

Credits

Image, and quoted passage, from "Conditions of Ireland:  Illustrations of the New Poor-Law," an article from the January 19, 1850 issue of The Illustrated London News.