The Great Irish Famine of 1846 was called "God's Famine" when an unknown, uncontrolable disease (which we now know as potato blight) turned Ireland's potato crop to slime. By definition, God's Famine is the general scarcity of food brought about by divine intervention. But the statistical commisioner, Captain Larcom, in 1847 found the total value of the agricultural produce in Ireland to be £44, 958. That was enough to feed the eight million people living in Ireland plus another eight million besides. One might ask why then this "Great Famine"?
             It is true that in the early nineteenth century, the potato did dominate the lives of two thirds of the Irish population, but there was plenty of other food sources like wheat, barley, cattle and corn. It is safe to say that, in reality there was no scarcity of food and the failure of the potato, though a factor, had little to do with the root cause of the famine.
             It is difficult to grasp the enormity of the tragedy that wiped out three million people in half a decade. The truth of the matter is, that when the blight struck Ireland was powerless to help herself for she was a conquered nationwith her destiny in the hands of a strong alien ruler - England. This monstrosity had not happened just because the potato crop failed, but rather in the name of British rule in Ireland.
             Forced by the Act of Union with Great Britain, the economy of Ireland was assemulated into the economy of England. This social and economic change was to shape the destiny of the Irish and have a direct effect on the disaster to come. So completely was the history of one the reverse of the other that what meant victory and prosperity for the englishman meant degredation and ruin for the irishman. This point is undeniably made clear by the historian Robert Kee, "Freedom for one meant slavery for the other" (3:18).
             Modern day reasessment of the famine shows how Ireland was set up for disaster by the ...