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Listen to this episode of the Jody Halstead Podcast: Traveling in Ireland.

This episode highlights the National Famine Museum at Strokestown Park and the National Famine Way.

For those seeking a meaningful and unhurried journey through Ireland’s rich heritage, Strokestown House and Gardens, along with the redeveloped National Famine Museum, offer the ideal destination. Located in the heart of beautiful County Roscommon, this unique experience is perfect for visitors to embrace slow travel during the summer months.

Connected directly to the National Famine Way, a fully waymarked 165 km trail from Strokestown to Dublin, the site offers a mindful walking experience that begins—or ends—at the historic gates of Strokestown Park. This evocative trail retraces the footsteps of 1,490 men, women, and children who were forced to emigrate during the Great Famine. The journey is not only scenic but deeply reflective and historically significant, allowing visitors to slow down, connect with the landscape, and engage with stories of resilience and hope.

At the heart of this journey lies the National Famine Museum, housed within the stable building, adjacent to the historic Strokestown Park. The museum uses original famine documents from the Strokestown archive to explore the Great Hunger from the perspectives of both landlords and tenants. Visitors can take time to delve into the circumstances that led to forced migration, the social upheaval of the time, and the enduring legacy of the Famine.

Continue to read the full article from Advertiser.ie.

Article written by Dr Eamonn McKee

The first Bronze Shoes of the Global Irish Famine Way were unveiled in Ottawa on Saturday. It was a ceremony of emotions: pride, poignancy, and joy under the blue skies of Canada’s capital city.

The Irish had done so much to build Ottawa from its earliest days when it was known as Bytown. Since the 1820s, an Irish community had taken root and prospered to this day. The Irish community had rallied around the project to establish the Bronze Shoes. They had raised funds and mobilized to ensure that the City Council approved the project. The Irish Seniors of Ottawa were our frontline troops. We are so proud of them. We are proud too of Michael McBane who had kept the story alive of the common grave that was the fate of over 300 Irish famine refugees who arrived distressed in the summer of 1847 from an Ireland ravaged by hunger and disease. The city’s development in the 20th century had erased any visible trace of the graveyard. But Michael knew it was there.

We began the day with Mass at the chapel of the Sisters of Charity, the Grey Nuns, whose heroism had saved countless victims of disease and hunger. The chapel is a magnificent space, vaulting white walls of cathedral scale. The Grey Nuns shared in this pride because it was their forebears, led by Sister Bruyère and her small band of young nuns, who had come to the aid of the Irish, braving an unknown and potentially fatal disease to care for them. When their efforts failed, they buried them with dignity in the cemetery that is now known as Macdonald Gardens Park. The Oblate Fathers, doctors, nurses, officials and lay people had also volunteered and risked their lives to help. Overall, eighty Canadians died that summer helping the Irish up and down its coast, from Miramichi to Niagara.

There was poignancy is our remembrance of those lying in the soil beneath our feet. Men, women, children, families taken by typhus, a disease of unknown cause, spread by the awful conditions in which they had been forced to flee. Converted lumber ships without enough food, water, or sanitation taking them across the North Atlantic. Upwards of 7000 Irish packed standing room only on barges taking them to the Ottawa and Gatineau Valleys to find their people, find hope and a future. Poignancy too in the fate of all emigrants forced to leave their homes by necessity.

And there was joy too. That we had succeeded in only two years to turn an idea into a reality, a monument to our dead. That that monument was the first of the Global Irish Famine Way that will trace the journey of all famine refugees around the world, a journey of 40,000km to Canada, the US, South Africa, Australia, and Tasmania. Joy that they had created a diaspora of 70 million who had wielded great influence wherever they had gone. Joy at the thought that while many had died, most had survived and prospered, their descendants part of a great global community.

At Macdonald Gardens Park, speakers addressed the large crowd, all with different things to say about the significance of the day. Mayor Sutcliffe and half the City Council. Anishinaabe Elder Claudette Commanda offered a welcome of wisdom, love, and warmth. She could sense the presence of the dead alert to the living memorial above them.

Michael McBane was Master of Ceremonies, those speaking also included the Irish Ambassador John Concannon, James Maloney MP, Nicolas McCarthy of Beechwood National Cemetery, Theresa Kavanagh (who spear-headed approval on the City Council), Kay Hegarty of the Senior, Caroilin Callery of the National Famine Museum of Ireland and founder of the National Famine Way Ireland, our historian Professor Mark McGowan, and finally I spoke just before we unveiled the Bronze Shoes. There was music and poetry. Caroilin and I hugged at the sight of this solid, emphatic, empathetic monument of granite and bronze. The Global Irish Famine Way had its first marker in Canada.

We closed with prayers from Sister Rachel Watier, Oblate Father Robert Laroche, and Rev. Dr Karen Dimock.

People came to touch the shoes. The Bronze Shoes invite this response, fingertips feeling out the history here, the reality of the dead beneath us, the awareness of how and why they died. Everyone who touches them is part of our community of memory.

The Bronze Shoes are a memorial to the dead. They are a symbol too of the journey onward of the living who had passed that way. The Bronze Shoes are themselves on the move, with unveilings due in St John’s, Grosse Île, Quebec, Montreal, Saint John, Toronto, Hamilton, and Niagara. Along this central trail, other sites will be added over time. We will collect more stories, find more dead, honour them with our recall and ceremonies, celebrate their resilience and their achievements. Grow our community of memory.

The late renowned Irish Poet Eavon Boland’s chilling Famine Poem “Quarantine” comes to mind in such landscapes.

Eavan Boland’s “Quarantine”

In the worst hour of the worst season
of the worst year of a whole people
a man set out from the workhouse with his wife.
He was walking—they were both walking—north.
She was sick with famine fever and could not keep up.
He lifted her and put her on his back.
He walked like that west and west and north.

Until at nightfall under freezing stars they arrived.
In the morning they were both found dead.
Of cold. Of hunger. Of the toxins of a whole history.
But her feet were held against his breastbone.
The last heat of his flesh was his last gift to her.
Let no love poem ever come to this threshold.
There is no place here for the inexact
praise of the easy graces and sensuality of the body.

There is only time for this merciless inventory:
Their death together in the winter of 1847.
Also what they suffered. How they lived.
And what there is between a man and woman.
And in which darkness it can best be proved.

See the  Famine Walkers below engaging with local school children from the Downs who have come out in costume to greet them.

ONGWOOD POET – LIAM MC DONNELL, penned this poem while watching the 2017 Famine Walkers pass on the Longwood stretch of the Canal, pondering on what his ancestors might have thought of our Missing 1,490 as they trudged the very same path  some 170 years before.

Strokestown Exodus     by Liam Mc Donnell        1/5/2017

It was the children first that saw it

Moving along  the bank of the canal 

A stark cloud murmuring 

A dark crowd ,

 a funeral maybe !

But who was dead ?

Not enough colour to be 

A circus or carnival 

They remembered the fun of the last one . 

Their mothers called them in , ”twas best 

They told them what the old men had said about the dread of people coming from the West 

”Twas never good .

They reminded them of the last shower that came with pikes

That drive the cattle mad

Through ditches and dykes

And spiked the horses of the soldiers who did come with cross and drum and tartan skirts on them. 

“More bloody Seamusachas I’d bet” But no this crowd showed no scars of war yet,

Nor fire in their belly .

Gaunt though they spoke in spittle tongue.

As though they’d seen the devil. 

Like scavenger crows they walked

Darting into hedges where they

Might rob an egg from a birds nest or grasp

A supple nettle  in the hope that 

They might get kindling to

Boil in a skillet of potatoes,

 brought five days ago 

From their deserted homes in Strokestown ;

The Mahon estate 

The landlord they’d come to hate

Had become associated with the blight 

Someone had turned out his light .

He would have known Travellion

Of the tight fist 

Who hung on to his “ingein male”**

Like his life depended on it 

Laisse faire was the air of his mantra 

he’d learned from his master ,

Russell the spiteful thief

“They d got their idolitariius God back in 29 now let him save them “

But this time there’d be no rebellion 

No need, more would die from the typhoid instead than any orchestrated pitch fight .

Had they a notion 

their fate to be 

Russian Roulette  with the Atlantic Ocean would they have gone like herded cattle 

These quiet people of Roscommon 

Richard Tye was not the first descendant of the 1,490 famine to make a return journey to his homeland. Indeed, in 1887, Father Patrick Quinn himself “was able to realize the cherished dream of his life and to see once again his native land of Ireland, whence he had gone many years before under such trying conditions”. According to the Hayes papers, “in Ireland it was his good fortune to find members of his family still living, in the persons of several nieces and nephews. One of them, Miss Mary Quinn accompanied him on his return to Canada and remained with him until his death”. [‘Second Parish Priest of Richmond 1864-1914’, n.d., Richmond County Historical Society, Melbourne, Quebec, Hayes Papers, 03-G-F- 26.62.]. Read about this visit in a contemporary report in the Roscommon Herald of May 23rd 1931.

Roscommon Herald 23 May 1931

Jim Callery from Roscommon has successfully completed the 165-kilometre National Famine Way, marking the achievement to coincide with his milestone birthday.

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Ireland’s history is rich and complex, with the Great Famine being one of the most significant events. The Irish Famine, known as an Gorta Mór, the Great Hunger, in Ireland, changed not only Irish history but, arguably, the history and future of countries across the globe as over one million people died from hunger and other famine related diseases while up to two million emigrated.

Read the full article from Ireland Family Vacations online.

Exceptional response to the National Famine Way Commemorative Walk 2024 and launch of Global Irish Famine Way

The National Famine Way Commemorative Walk took place over six days from Monday 20th to Saturday 25th May 2024 passing through six counties and celebrating with seven local authorities along the way. Led by the Ambassador of Ireland to Canada, Eamonn McKee and representatives of the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail the walk culminated in the launch of the Global Irish Famine Way. The walk began at the National Famine Museum | Strokestown Park in Roscommon, it follows the National Famine Way™ for 165km to EPIC The Irish Emigration Museum in Dublin’s Docklands. The National Famine Way™ is a collaboration between Waterways Ireland, the Irish Heritage Trust and the county councils along the route. The local authorities involved are Roscommon, Longford, Westmeath, Meath, Kildare, Fingal, and Dublin.

An exciting element was an evocative scene at the new Dublin/New York Portal with a symbolic passing of bronze shoes from one side of the Atlantic to the other. In a touching silent tableau representatives of the National Famine Way and the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail held out the bronze shoes towards the portal almost touching the bronze shoes reaching towards them across 3,000 miles. In New York Gareth Hargadon (Vice Consul General at the Irish Consulate) and Elizabeth Stack (Irish Historical Society New York) replicated the pose from the other side.

The walk began with a dramatic re-enactment of the events in 1847 which prompted the foundation of the trail including traditional musicians, school children and walkers dressed in famine costume. Members of the Tighe family, whose ancestors were evicted, read the names of the 1,490 tenants forced to leave their homes in Strokestown, march to Dublin and emigrate to Canada on the worst of the infamous coffin ships. Only half of the emigrants survived. Their names are etched on a commemorative glass wall outside the National Famine Museum.

The conclusion in the Dublin Docklands saw barefoot, famine costumed walkers re-enacting the sorrowful farewell scenes while walking through the National Famine Monument and onto the Jeannie Johnson Famine Ship.

The symbol of the National Famine Way™ is a pair of children’s shoes displayed at the National Famine Museum. The trail is waymarked by bronze replicas as a poignant reminder of the journey the 1,490 souls made. Ambassador McKee and the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail walkers carried a symbolic pair as they made this evocative pilgrimage.

Launch of The Global Irish Famine Way
The official launch of the Global Irish Famine Way took place at EPIC, The Irish Emigration Museum when the walkers arrived on Saturday 25th May. It is an extension of the National Famine Way and will be the largest heritage trail in the world.  It will eventually follow the journeys of all the Irish Famine emigrants around the world, including the UK, Canada, the United States, South Africa, and Australia. The Bronze Shoes that mark the National Famine Way will also mark each significant location on the Global Irish Famine Way. It begins in 2024 with Canada and the UK (Liverpool). Representatives from each are taking in the commemorative walk.

Fifteen locations have already been secured in Canada including Grosse Île, St John’s Newfoundland, Quebec City, Montreal, Ottawa. Toronto, Niagara, Saint John Partridge Island, Saint Colomban and Hamilton. Evoking the initial journey, these bronze shoes travelled by sea from Galway to Newfoundland on the Marine Institute vessel the RV Celtic Explorer. A series of commemorative events will mark their arrival.

The National Famine Way™ is open to walkers at any time and the route and associated stories can be followed through a free app. Walkers can also purchase an official passport to get stamped along the route.

Walking through Famine History with Enchanted Croí Theatre

“Pass the Shoes”

Walking through Famine History with Enchanted Croí Theatre

In partnership with the National Famine Way, Enchanted Croi Theatre is set to illuminate the shadows of Ireland’s poignant history in the upcoming Spring/Summer of 2024. Through a series of captivating initiatives, Enchanted Croi Theatre will spearhead educational theatre workshops centred around the poignant ‘Shoe Stories’ curated by the National Famine Way.

One of the most compelling endeavours is the “Pass the Shoes” journey, where students from the seven council areas along the National Famine Way will participate in a poignant relay. This relay not only connects neighbouring counties but also forms part of a larger commemorative experience, honouring the memory of the Famine.

Functioning as storytelling engineers, our aim at Enchanted Croi is to craft educational workshops that delve deep into local history, fostering a unique and vocational connection for students with their environment. Our approach breathes life into the rich narratives interwoven within Marita Conlon-McKenna’s historical “Shoe Story Vignettes.”

Through these workshops and initiatives, we endeavour to not only educate but also inspire a sense of empathy and understanding for the harrowing past that shapes Ireland’s collective memory. Join us on this journey of remembrance and enlightenment along the National Famine Way.

Commemorative Walk 2024 – 20th to 25th May

Schools taking part in the workshops, kindly funded by Arts council in each county will join our walkers and pass the shoes in remembrance of the men, women and children who walked the canal in 1847 in search of a better life but who for over 50% perished on coffin ships or shortly afterwards from disease. The walkers became known as Missing 1490.

Enchanted Croi Theatre and the National Famine Way

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