The Famine

If this has been done before recently then just tell me.
Assume that the British Government hadn't been so worried about the profits of the grain merchants and had shipped in excess wheat and other cereals in an attempt to at least ameliorate the Irish famine. I presume it would not have got rid of Irish Nationalism as there is far too much history between the English Rulers and the Irish (and with due cause) for that to happen. What would the results be apart from a smaller diaspora.
 

Sior

Banned
F.S.L. Lyons characterised the initial response of the British government to the early less severe phase of the famine as "prompt and relatively successful."[55] Confronted by widespread crop failure in the autumn of 1845, Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel purchased £100,000 worth of maize and cornmeal secretly from America. Baring Brothers & Co initially acted as purchasing agents for the Prime Minister. The government hoped that they would not "stifle private enterprise" and that their actions would not act as a disincentive to local relief efforts. Due to weather conditions, the first shipment did not arrive in Ireland until the beginning of February 1846.
William Smith O'Brien, speaking on the subject of charity in a speech to the Repeal Association, February 1845, applauded the fact that the universal sentiment on the subject of charity was that they would accept no English charity. He expressed the view that the resources of this country were still abundantly adequate to maintain the population and that until those resources had been utterly exhausted, he hoped that there was no one in "Ireland who will so degrade himself as to ask the aid of a subscription from England".[45]
Mitchel wrote in his The Last Conquest of Ireland (Perhaps), on the same subject, that no one from Ireland ever asked for charity during this period, and that it was England who sought charity on Ireland's behalf, and, having received it, was also responsible for administering it. He suggested that it has been carefully inculcated by the British Press, "that the moment Ireland fell into distress, she became an abject beggar at England's gate, and that she even craved alms from all mankind." He affirmed that in Ireland no one ever asked alms or favours of any kind from England or any other nation, but that it was England herself that begged for Ireland. He suggested that it was England that "sent 'round the hat over all the globe, asking a penny for the love of God to relieve the poor Irish," and constituting herself the agent of all that charity, took all the profit of it.[47]
Large sums of money were donated by charities; Calcutta is credited with making the first donation of £14,000. The money was raised by Irish soldiers serving there and Irish people employed by the East India Company. Pope Pius IX sent funds and Queen Victoria donated £2,000.
Quaker and Irish politician Alfred Webb later wrote:
Upon the famine arose the wide spread system of proselytism ... and a network of well-intentioned Protestant associations spread over the poorer parts of the country, which in return for soup and other help endeavoured to gather the people into their churches and schools...The movement left seeds of bitterness that have not yet died out, and Protestants, and not altogether excluding Friends, sacrificed much of the influence for good they might have had..."[72]
In addition to the religious, non-religious organisations came to the assistance of famine victims. The British Relief Association was one such group. Founded in 1847, the Association raised money throughout England, America and Australia; their funding drive benefited by a "Queen's Letter", a letter from Queen Victoria appealing for money to relieve the distress in Ireland.[73] With this initial letter the Association raised £171,533. A second, somewhat less successful "Queen's Letter" was issued in late 1847. In total, the British Relief Association raised approximately £200,000 (c. US$1,000,000 at the time).
Private initiatives such as The Central Relief Committee of the Society of Friends (Quakers) attempted to fill the gap caused by the end of government relief and eventually the government reinstated the relief works, although bureaucracy slowed the release of food supplies.[74]
 
I do not dispute any of the above. However why then did my O Level History (taught in England) hark on that the problems in Ireland had as one of their causes the lack of response to the famine?
 
I do not dispute any of the above. However why then did my O Level History (taught in England) hark on that the problems in Ireland had as one of their causes the lack of response to the famine?

AFAIK it's not the lack of resaponse so much as its inadequacy. Too little, often too late, and frequently delivered the wrong way. Now I'm sure that even with the best of intentions, no government response in the world could have averted disaster. But the fixation on crude means-testing, the unwillingness to provide help in place and the fear of doing anything that would interfere with The Action of The Free Market exacerbated the problems.
 

katchen

Banned
There had been previous famines in both Britain and Ireland (more in Britain) and the continuing famine caused by enclosure of rural lands for sheep raising before in England. But before the 1830s there had been one "action of the free market" that had saved a lot of lives but was no longer a legal option.
I am speaking of bonded servitude for a period of 7 years in return for transportation to British colonies. Yes, the British transported convicts to Australia and were starting to provide "assisted passage", in which settlers paid off their passage with a mortgage on the land they received in Australia, but the incentives were not the same and the profits not nearly high enough to scale up the program for what was needed. Besides, the famine was caused by a blight brought by contaminated nitrates from Peru. And it hit all potatoes.
 
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