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The Nineteenth Century
--- Ireland. Including emigration.
This book was first published in 1990 and has been reprinted many times since. It has won a string of awards, has been translated into many foreign languages and has been filmed.
This book is about three children during the Irish potato famine. The father of Eily, Michael and Peggy O'Driscoll has gone to try and find work on the roads. After the death of their baby sister their mother goes to look for their father. In her absence the children get a visit from the landlord's overseer and his assistant. There is no man in the house so the children will have to go to the workhouse.
In happier times the children's mother had often told them stories about their two great aunts. The children decide to go to the aunts. They will have to walk and it will take weeks but it will be better than the workhouse and, after all, the aunts are family.
They plan their escape carefully. They get help from an old woman in the village - Mary Kate. She knows about herbs and remedies and she gives the children some of her cures and some good advice. For example they are to keep away from other people on the roads for they will carry the sickness and they are not to eat any strange berries or mushrooms.
So twelve year old Eily, nine year old Michael and seven year old Peggy set out on their long journey. At the start they have some food with them but when that is finished they have to survive on berries and nettle leaves and the occasional rabbit, rat or hedgehog which Michael manages to kill. Once they even draw blood from a cow. At one time they are attacked by crazed dogs. They make good use of Mary Kate's remedies when Michael cuts his leg and it becomes infected and when Peggy gets the fever.
But Under the Hawthorne Tree is far more than the story of these three children. It gives a comprehensive picture of Ireland at this time and really brings home to the reader the plight of the Irish people during the potato famine. Here are some examples. At the beginning, when baby Brigid dies the priest is ill and the family have to bury her themselves under the hawthorne tree. They have no coffin so they have to use the chest which holds the family treasures. Then weakened by disease the Irish fell prey to sickness and disease and the children saw a man on horseback pulling a slide on which were piled four or five skeleton-like bodies. At one time they think they might have to go into a workhouse after all but when Michael reaches one he finds that it is full up. From the inside shrieks and groans can be heard while outside crowds of people just lie on the cobblestones.
And yet while millions of the Irish are dying of starvation and disease grain is still being exported to England.
A heartrending story which really brings home to the reader the true horror of the potato famine.
The book comes with a useful historical note.
10+
This book was first published in 1991.
This is a sequel to Under the Hawthorne Tree. It is six years later. The worst effects of the Irish potato famine are now over but life is still hard in rural Ireland. Aunt Lena is now dead and Aunt Nano is running the shop with the help of Eily and Peggy. Many of the houses in Castletaggart are now empty as the occupants have either died in the Great Famine or have left. The shop has few customers.
The landlord is selling all his property and moving to Dublin. He offers to pay for Aunt Nano and the three children to go to America. But Nano is too old to travel. Eily is about to get married and Michael has just found work at the Big House as a stable boy.
But thirteen year old Peggy is determined to go to America. She knows she will not find a job in Castletaggart. Eventually it is agreed that she can go.
There is the farewell party - the American wake - and then Peggy travels on the cart to Queenstown. The Atlantic crossing is horrendous. The accommodation in steerage is dirty, stuffy and cramped. They have to sleep two or three to a bunk. When there is a storm steerage is flooded and they all have to take to the upper bunks. But eventually the ship arrives at Boston. A doctor comes on board for a medical check and at last Peggy finds herself on American soil.
At first she lodges with Margaret Halligan at the Shamrock Agency. Mrs Halligan finds her employment in a lodging house. But the proprietor is a drunkard and Eily runs back to the Shamrock Agency. She is then placed as a kitchen maid in a big house and we follow her life there until Thanksgiving Day. We are shown the details of her work, her relationships with the cook Mrs O'Connor and the other maid Kitty,and her problems with the spoiled, petulant daughter of the house. There is a new housekeeper. She is mean and unkind and there is an amusing description of how Peggy gets rid of her.
After only six months Peggy is settled in America and has a good job. But Peggy is a girl of spirit and she is ambitious. She is determined that she is not going to be a skivvy all her life and at the end of the book we feel that we have not heard the last of Peggy.
It is Mrs Halligan who sums up Peggy's character best. "You are a born survivor."
Wildflower Girl is an engrossing story which gives an excellent picture of Ireland in the 1850's, the emigrant ships and the life that faced the emigrants in New England.
It would be useful if this book could be read in conjuction with Farewell to Ireland by Malachy Doyle in the Franklin Watts Sparks series.
10+
This book was first published in 1997. It is the third and final volume of the trilogy which started with Under the Hawthorne Tree.
At the end of Wildflower Girl it would seem that the troubles of the three O'Driscoll children are finally over. Eily is married, Michael is working as a stable lad at the Big House and, far across the Atlantic in Boston, Peggy has a secure position as a kitchen maid.
But early on in Fields of Home there are signs of clouds on the horizon. Eily and her husband are tenant farmers. Eily visits a friend and hears rumours that the tenant farmers are going to have their rents raised.
In Boston, too, Peggy has her problems. Miss Roxanne is about to be married and Kitty, Eily's best friend, is going away with Roxanne to be her maid. Peggy knows she will be lonely without Kitty.
Back in Ireland Eily sees an old woman evicted from her cottage because she cannot pay the rent.
After this the story switches to Michael. All seems to be going well for him. He is doing well in his job as stable boy and he is riding in races. There is a feast and dancing to celebrate the end of the harvest and Michael spends the evening dancing with one of the maids.
But even for Michael this happy state of affairs is not to last. The Big House is set on fire - whether by a disaffected stable lad or tenant is never discovered. There is no loss of life, but the house is burnt to the ground. The family decide to go to their estate in England. Michael and the rest of the staff now lose their jobs. Michael accepts a mare and colt in lieu of payment. He takes them to Eily and the farm.
Then another blow. The farm rent is doubled. Eily and the family strive to raise the extra money but eviction and the spectre of the workhouse loom ahead.
But Michael has a surprise in store. Can he save the farm?
Across the Atlantic Peggy has a surprise of her own.
This may be the end of the trilogy but for Michael and Peggy their future lives promise to be full of excitement.
This is an engrossing story which brings to life the Ireland of the mid nineteenth century and contrasts the lifestyles of the English landlords with the plight of the tenant farmers.
10+
This book was first published in 1998. It is one of the Sparks series of short historical novels for Key Stage Two readers. It is about five thousand words long.
Mary Ellen Connolly and her young brother Frankie are about to leave Ireland and emigrate to America. They are going to join their older brother Jim and his wife. The night before they leave all their friends and neighbours come to say good-bye to them. There is singing and dancing, tea, whisky and beer to drink and scones and soda bread to eat.
After this description of an "American wake" the story moves on. Mr Connolly drives a cart and takes Mary Ellen and Frankie to Queenstown where they embark on the Orlandia, the Cunard steamer which is to take them to America. This is near the end of the nineteenth century and conditions are much better than on the "coffin ships" of fifty years ago but steerage is still dark, crowded and airless. Frankie sneaks into the First Class just to look around and sees the contrast there.
Mary Ellen and Frankie make friends with Hannah, a Jewish girl and Sam, an English boy. Like Mary Ellen and Frankie Sam is from a poor family and is emigrating because he hopes to find a job and a better life in America but Hannah has a sadder story to tell. She is from Russia and her house was burnt down and her baby brother died.
The last section of the book describes the arrival in America but all their troubles are not yet over. They have to go to Ellis Island where they are given medical checks and questioned as to whether they have somewhere to stay and money or a job to support themselves.
Comes with useful notes on:emigration, American wakes, steamships, the Jews and Ellis Island.
A short but interesting novel written very sympathetically and which humanises the subject of emigration.
7+