SOCIAL HISTORY

[Ticker]

The Travellers of Ireland
Irish Travelling People

Irish Poor removed from England to Ireland

Easter Rising 1916

Broken links- please let us know if you find a new link to this information

[Christopher]

I've come across the occasional query asking about life in this part of Ireland or that part of Ireland in the days when the poster's ancestors lived in Ireland. With a little bit of luck there should be several sites on the net which, when added to this thread, will paint a picture of what it was like to live in this country.

There were many One room Schools, in rural areas of Ireland, in the late 1800s and early 1900s. There were no Job Centres in the 1800's so the fair day, where animals and produce were sold, included the hiring of labour. The Hiring Fairs, which were usually held in May and November, provided much needed labour for the two heaviest seasons in the farming calendar. The practice of holding continued in parts of Ireland until the 1930's.

The Muckross Research Library contains a good article on Ireland in 1930s - 1940s.
Mytelegraph.co.uk Life and Trade in Rural Ireland covers the mid 1940s - 1950s.

[Christopher]

Click here to learn a little bit about "The Big House and Landed Estate Life" in Ireland. This section of the askaboutireland.ie website tells the stories of the country homes of Irish landlords, their families, tenants and way of life from their origin in the 18th century to the demise in the early 1900s.

[Berni]

hi christopher
many thanks for these links
berni

[Christopher]

Jennie Hodkinson's website has a page about Victoriana ... which has short articles about the Victorian Era Poor - Servants, Farm Workers, Living Conditions and Workhouses. They probably relate more to England but give a rough idea what life would have been like in Ireland too.

[Christopher]

1. "The Grail of Catholic Emancipation" © 2002 Des Keenan
2. "Ireland 1800-1850" © 2001 Des Keenan
3. "Pre-Famine Ireland: Social Structure" © 2000 by Desmond Keenan
4. "Ireland 1850-1920" © 2005 by Desmond Keenan
5. "Post Famine Ireland- Social Structure Ireland as it Really Was". © 2006 by Des Keenan.
6. "The True Origins of Irish Society" © 2003 by Desmond Keenan

[Christopher]

Sean McCartan has an article on his website about "Changes that occurred in the Lifestyle
of Ulster's Rural population between 1820 and 1914." 

[Christopher]

"The Wicklow World of Elizabeth Smith 1840-1850" was written by the Scottish-born wife of a west Wicklow landlord. Elizabeth kept a daily record of household, local, national and even international events which she wrote primarily for her children when they grew up.

[Christopher]

Click here to read Letters from Home on RootsWeb Genealogy of Co. Longford.

Click to see the Letters from Ireland page on Irene McCollor's website.

Thomas Crawford Stephenson wrote a series of letters back to his family in Omemee describing his adventures in England and Ireland in 1898. Letters to his mother and father, Thomas Stephenson Sr. and Eliza Worrell, described his travels to the land of his ancestors in County Fermanagh and County Tyrone - www.ontariogenealogy.com/irelandletters.html