Connemara After the Famine: Journal of a Survey of the Martin Estate by Thomas Colville Scott, 1853

by Thomas Colville Scott, Tim Robinson (Editor/Introduction)

In the aftermath of the Great Famine of 1845-52, the Martin Estate in the West of Ireland, 200,000-acres of bog and mountain, was put up for sale. Its mortgagees, the London Law Life Insurance Society, evicted many of the tenants, and in February 1853 sent Thomas Colville Scott to conduct a survey of their property. This is his journal, recently discovered at an auction-house in England. Colville Scott records many an extraordinary encounter with individual survivors of the famine, some traumatized into idiocy, others mysteriously bettering themselves on well-nigh invisible means. The descriptions of squalid hostelries, rent-evading tenants, thieving beggars and the works of ‘Papistry’ are those of a cocksure Scots metropolitan – and his account of a meeting of the Clifden Workhouse Guardians is as brutally comic as Thackeray – but his dealings with human flotsam such as the tiny chimneysweep running naked through the snow shows a warm-heartedness that makes this journal as moving as it is richly informative. Drawings by the author and sketches from contemporary guidebooks illustrate the text. Tim Robinson’s introductory essay locates Colville Scott’s responses within the frame of Connemara history and the nineteenth century. His annotations and map detailing the Martin Estate enable the reader to follow, day by day, the young surveyor on his exploration of ‘this inhabited desolation, Connemara after the Famine’.

126 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1997

Reviews

[Fiona · Rating 4 out of 5]

In 1853, a young Scots surveyor was sent to the Martin Estate in Galway, which covered most of Connemara, to value the land and property. His visit was 6 years after the famine of 1847 and so he witnessed the devastation it had caused, the common graves left behind and hovels still lived in. It's an interesting account and his shock at some of the conditions he witnesses is very apparent. The general remarks at the end however, written a considerable time afterwards, are quite shocking in many ways although they probably reflect the views of his contemporaries. The problems of the Irish are down to the religion of the majority, ie Roman Catholicism, which keeps them impoverished and lacking in ambition, in combination with their own indolent natures. He cites the Scottish Lowlanders as an example of a people who shrugged off Roman Catholicism, embraced Protestantism and its work ethic thereby flourishing through their own industry and ambition. The Highlanders and Islanders are cast in the same mould as the Irish due to their continuing Catholicism. The naive candour with which this journal and later reflections is written make it all the more interesting, if cringe-making at times.

[Sophia Moore · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don’t even know what I was reading I had to skim through the last 30 pages to even try to finish this idk why da picked it out for me but god bless him so I read it anyways 🙏🏻

[Carrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This slim book is well worth the read for Robinson’s beautiful introduction and the excellent descriptions of history and place around Connemara.