They are Irish, all of
them; Irish, every man, woman, and child. Glance down these narrow courts and
filthy alleys that open upon you at every step, and again and again you
recognise the race; "there abides he in his squalor and unreason, in his
falsity and drunken violence, as the ready-made nucleus of degradation and disorder."
Alas! that is should be so; that centuries of neglect - of wrong legislation -
should have reduced a people capable of so much to so low an ebb as this; to be
a plague-spot upon the garment of her more fortunate sister - a breeder of
paupers for a land that has already far too many of her own. Let us take a
group, - a fair sample of this unfortunate and improvident class. It is a
family picture, and one that it pains the heart of the philanthropist to
witness. The man who comes first, in his rough gray coat, and other garments of
curious make, lounges slowly along, partly from fatigue, partly from habitual
indolence; his hands deep sunk in his pockets, his eyes wide open with
astonishment as he contemplates the (to him) wondrous sights around. His wife
follows close on his heels; one child held in her arms she endeavours to
shelter from the rain beneath her scanty shawl, while another is slung at her
back, bending her nearly double with the burden. Three others cling about her
garments, and partially running by her side, keep pace with her, as strong in a
mother's love and hope, she tramps sturdily along. This is a
family picture, as we said. But a few days ago, these parents, with their
wild-looking children, were in Connaught, doing badly enough in all conscience,
yet with a "chance" before them. They are now in London, with no
chance at all; and but one hope - the workhouse.
—Watts Philips, The Wild Tribes of London, 1855.
As in most
cultures, outsiders permeating the ecosystem of another nation can cause upset,
misinformation, and discrimination. In the early 19th century,
England saw an influx of Irish immigration hitherto unparalleled in the
country’s history. The Emerald Isle had befallen hard times, poverty and famine
consuming almost the entire population—the cause of which is still debated to
this day. As detailed in a chapter of The
Million Peopled City, a contemporary account of London’s immigrant population,
between 1841 and 1851, an estimated 1,289,133 Irish emigrated with 257,372 in
the year 1851 alone (Garwood, 245). Based
on missionary statistics collected in 1851, it was determined that the Irish
working class was “the largest class which exists among our teeming population.
No other class at all approaches to it. The metropolis of England probably
numbers more Irishmen among its inhabitants
than the metropolis of Ireland itself. The Irish population of London equals
the entire population of the three next largest towns of Ireland, viz., Cork, Belfast, and Limerick” (245-246). The effect of this perceived “takeover” led
to speculation and commentary from academia and popular culture alike.
Thomas Carlyle,
one of the most important and influential thinkers and historians of the day,
dedicated an entire chapter to the Irish in his political book Chartism—so titled, “The Finest
Peasantry in the World.” He provides an interesting perspective on the Irish
people, simultaneously blaming improper British rule for their poor condition,
while also damning their race as inherently immoral, and therefore responsible
for its own punishment by god (27-28). He
begins his argument by bringing up the New Poor-Law, which essentially instituted
a policy that “whosoever will not work ought not to live” (24). The problem he
presents is that a poor man who is willing to work may not always be able to
find it, while “Legislation presupposes the answer—to be in the affirmative”
(24). The tension created due to the lack of jobs could presumably be cause for
ill feelings toward the Irish workforce, although his further comments remain
questionable, to say the least.
Punch Magazine - John Leech, 1848. Caption reads: "The British Lion and The Irish Monkey. Monkey (Mr. Mitchell). 'One of us MUST be "Put Down."'" |
Immethodic, headlong, violent, mendecious: what
can you make of the wretched Irishman? A people that knows not to speak the
truth, and to act the truth, such people has departed from even the possibility
of well-being. (27)
Carlyle’s
analysis undoubtedly influenced the popular intellectual theories and attitudes
to Irish immigrants, as is evidenced in further writings from later in the
period.
But what of
popular culture? For the masses of Victorian England, many would not have the
skills or opportunities to justify their prejudices with Carlyle’s analysis. And
yet, there was no shortage of discrimination, hatred, and mistreatment from the
lower classes to the neighboring race. One way the illiterate or uneducated
could consume their biases was in the visual form. Across the Victorian period
and even longer into the twentieth century, a repertoire of racist imagery
pervaded in visual media. Common tropes of Irish depictions include wild mobs, drunken
and sloppy women, often engaging in immoral or disorderly behavior.
Thomas Rowlandson - "Wild Irish Paddy", 1818. Caption reads: "Wild Irish or Paddy from Cork, with the coat buttoned behind." |
The evidence of
this impact on English lower classes can be seen in an excerpt from Richard
Rowe’s contemporaneous novel Episodes in
an Obscure Life. The narrator encounters Bessie, whose transcribed dialect
illustrates her personal social status.
She was very much disappointed when she was told
that the Great Fire after all had not been caused by Roman Catholics. 'They'd a
done it, if they could, though,' she commentated. I can't abide them wild
Hirish - they's so savage, an' they's so silly. There's Blue Anchor Court close
by the Rents as is full a' Romans, an' they's al'ays a-pitchin' inter each
hother wi'out knowin' what's it all about. Law, 'ow they do send the tongses
an' pokers flyin' of a Saturday night! An' the women is wuss than the men, wi'
their back hair a-'anging' down like a ass's tail. They'll tear the gownd hoff
a woman's back, and shy bricks, an' a dozen on 'em will go in at one, hif he's
a-fightin' wi' their pal an' is a-lickin' on 'im, or heven hif 'e ain't - an'
the men's as bad for that. Yes, the Henglish fights, but they fights proper,
two and two, an' they knows what they's fightin' for, an' they doesn't screech
like them wild Hirish - they's wuss than the cats. No, it ain't horfen as
Hirish hinter-feres wi' Henglish hif the Henglish doesn't worret 'em. Why
should they? What call 'as sich as them to come hover 'ere to take the bread
hout o' the mouth of them as 'as a right to 't?' (16-17)
"Comic Almanack" - George Cruikshank, March 1838.
Depicts a caricature of a St. Patrick's Day celebration. |
Aside from
analyses and dissemination of information based on artistic or philosophical
license, some published their conclusions of the impoverished Irish based on actual
observation and experience. From this came both positive and negative
evaluations, though the harshness of the negative reviews brings into question
how much of the authors’ biases already existed upon visiting the slums they
wrote on. Thomas Beames recounted his observation of Rookeries, the most
abysmal living areas of London, and came away with nothing but contempt for the
mass Irish population that inhabited it.
Nine-tenths of the inhabitants are Irish; do we,
then, set down to Irish nurture this amount of wretchedness and immorality? The
Irish coming to London seem to regard it as a heathen city, and to give
themselves up at once to a course of recklessness and crime. It would be
difficult, with our free institutions, to stop these descents of Irish upon our
great towns; … they bring their bad habits with them, and leave their virtues
behind. The misery, filth, and crowded condition of an Irish cabin, is realised
in St. Giles's. The purity of the female character, which is the boast of Irish
historians, here, at least, is a fable. (37-38)
In a book of
compiled letters called London Labour and
the London Poor, Henry Mayhew offers a more balanced view. In 1850, he
spent time collecting accounts of asylums for the houseless poor in central
London. The Irish occupied a staggering number, more than one half of the total
applicants for refuge. He noted the general attitude of his countrymen to that
of the Irish immigrants.
I found among the English a general dislike of
the Irish. In fact, next to a policeman, a genuine London costermonger hates an
Irishman, considering him an intruder. Whether there be any traditional or
hereditary ill-feeling between them, originating from a clannish feeling, I
cannot ascertain. I am inclined to believe that the prejudice is modern, and
has originated in the great inflex of Irishmen and women, intermixing, more
especially during the last five years.
More telling is
an excerpt in which he relays the words of an informant—a staff member of the Holborn
Workhouse. The man, who came into everyday firsthand contact with destitute Irish,
had much gentler and honest words to say of them than any account I have thus
encountered.
"The Irish Girl" - Ford Madox Brown, 1860.
A favorable and more accurate portrait of an Irish citizen. |
The Looking Glass Caricature Annual - Robert Seymour, 1830. Depicts Irish arriving on boats in Liverpool from Dublin. |
Bibliography
—Beames,
Thomas. The Rookeries of London: Past, Present, and Prospective.
London: Thomas Bosworth, 1852.
—Carlyle,
Thomas. Chartism. London: James Fraser, 1840.
—Garwood,
John. The Million-Peopled City. London: Wertheim & Macintosh,
1853.
—Mayhew, Henry. London
Labour and the London Poor. London: Griffin, Bohn, and Company, 1861.
—Philips, Watts.
The Wild Tribes of London. London: Ward and Lock, 1855.
—Row,
Richard. Episodes in an Obscure Life. London: Strahan & Co.,
1871.
Images
Images
- http://punch.photoshelter.com/Rint-v-Potatoes
- http://punch.photoshelter.com/British-Lion
- http://art.famsf.org/thomas-rowlandson/wild-irish-paddy-1963302529
- http://punch.photoshelter.com/irish-frankenstein
- http://www.victorianlondon.org/cruikshank/1838-mar.gif
- http://punch.photoshelter.com/young-ireland
- http://collections.b
ritishart.yale.edu/v ufind/Record/1669297 - http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O80610/liverpool-and-dublin-steam-packets-print-seymour-robert/
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