The Way They Went - How the Irish 'got about' in 1850!

The Irish, while extremely fond of their horses, tended to walk everywhere, most of them not having the means nor the land to support a horse. Public Transport was inefficient, to say the least. The Railways had only just arrived in Ireland but were confined to short lines in Dublin. River boats and canals carried goods and passengers, though very, very slowly. The Mail Coach from Galway to Dublin took 2 to 3 days, stopping frequently to change horses and rest. 

Charles Bianconi changed all that. He was the Michael O'Leary of his day. Having arrived here in 1800 as a door-to-door salesman of Italian engravings, he soon saw the need for faster coach transport. His Bianconi Coach business had humble beginnings. in 1815 he started with just two coaches (called Bians), each carrying 8 passengers, sitting back to back, face out to the roadside, in 2 rows of 4 longitudinally on a hard bench, plying between Clonmel and Cahir. 

By 1850 he had revolutionised public transport around Ireland, managing some 100 vehicles, which traveled an astonishing 3,800 miles daily, calling at 120 towns, and 140 stations for changing horses. Each of these 'stations', many of which were hotels, inns or public houses, employed several grooms and a farrier, not to mention the catering and other people involved. With over 500 drivers on the payroll and 200 'Bians' in the fleet, they kept over 1,300 horses to pull the cars, that ate around 3,500 tons of hay a year, plus 35,000 barrels of oats. Bianconi also owned a coach-builders company in Clonmel where they made and repaired their own fleet of coaches, and also contracted to dozens of tradesmen and harness-makers, as well as establishing a network of over a thousand ticket-vendors all over the country. 

Blacks Hotel in Eyre Square Galway, Ireland was the Bianconi station in the city (now the Imperial Hotel). The Central Hotel In Loughrea, owned by J. Salmon was the Marconi depot there. A laden Bianconi Royal Mail Day Car or Coach covered about 8 miles per hour and passengers were charged one penny and a farthing per mile (about a 1/2 cent nowadays). 

The fare from Galway to Clifden was 7 shillings and six pence (about 30 cents today) and took 11 to 12 hours to cover the fifty-odd miles! And you sat outside, in all weather! Coaches to Dublin took 2 days, with passengers staying overnight in places like Athlone or Kilbeggan. 

 

They carried mail, passengers and trade-goods. Bianconi's coaches helped the revive the fishing industry by allowing fish caught today in Galway or Cork, to be sold in Dublin within 24 hours, by driving 24 hours straight with perishable cargo.

The mass migration of the Irish people ignited by The Great Famine brought huge increases in passengers, who used Bianconi's services to reach the ports from which they emigrated to England, Canada, America and Australia. The departing emigrants would have passed harrowing scenes of poverty, beggars, evicted families, demolished or uninhabitable homes and lean-to's on the sides of the roads, no doubt reinforcing their decision to leave their native land. 

The Railways finally put the Coaches out of business in the final years of the 19th century, though these new rail-lines, while they provided huge employment in their building, only helped spur and enable more emigration from Ireland..
Today you can still see some Bianconi Coaches in use as jaunting cars on Killarney. 

Charles 'Carlo' Bianconi, who brought cheap public transport to Ireland, died in 1875 and left his company to his employees. A truly modern, innovative and patriotic Irishman, though he was born 130 years ago in a little village called Tregolo, in northern Italy, in 1785.

Hope you enjoyed this post. If you'd like to hear more Galway stories, check out my website www.galwaywalks.com or my Facebook page www.facebook.com/galwaywalks or follow me on Twitter @galwaywalks 
Regards
Brian Nolan
Galway Walks 
Galwaywalks@gmail.com

To Hell or to Connacht

'To Hell or to Connacht! Connacht, where there is not enough trees to hang a man, water to drown him, nor soil to bury him'.

Such was Oliver Cromwell's dire dictate to Catholic landowners during the Cromwellian wars in Ireland 1641-1653, after which 90% of all land-ownership was transferred, at the point of a sword, on pain of death, from Irish and Anglo-Norman, mainly Catholic ownership, to English Soldier/Dissenter/Opportunist, mainly Protestant ownership. Dispossessed families from all over conquered Ireland, many previously wealthy and important, found themselves forced as ethniclly-cleansed refugees, into the margins of Connacht, mainly Clare, Galway and Mayo, onto land that was at best marginal, hillsides and bogs. And so began the enforced impoverishment of the last great civilisation of Europe, an impoverishment that peaked with the deliberate dispossession of the Catholic landed class after the Treaty of Limerick in 1692, proscription against the practice of the Catholic religion, the outlawing of the Irish Language and Culture and the emasculation of the Irish as a people.

However, even after a further 200 years of enslavement and colonisation, the subjugation of the once proud Irish people was still incomplete.Despite all their hardships, failed rebellions, evictions, deportations, forced emigration, discrimination and racism, despite all that, the Irish continued to thrive, so that by 1839, there were 8 million of us,  impoverished and demeaned,  yes, but proud and stoic too. The deliberate anti-Irish policies of successive English regimes culminated with the willful genocide that was 'The Great Hunger'. A heretofore unknown potato blight devastated the potato crop for over a decade, depriving this large population of their staple food. Sky-rocketing corn prices, mass evictions and ten years of famine in Ireland in the 1840's and 1850's, resulted in 1.5 million people dead and 2.5 million emigrated, in particular from the over-crowded, western wetlands of Connacht. Picturesque the land here is, but arable it is not.

Most families subsisted on holdings of less than 5 acres in County Galway, with an artificially crowded density of over 500 people per square mile in some areas, totally unsustainable when one considers that they could only grow potatoes on the land, no cereal and had few animals. What animals they had, a pig and maybe a few sheep and rough cattle were kept to pay the rents on their small-holdings. Rack-rents were exorbitant and if the tenant farmer made any improvements he was punished for his industry by having to pay a higher rent the following year. It was a dire, precarious lifestyle, one that came crashing down when the potato crop failed.

Yet life continued. People continued to live on the land, get married, have children, many still emigrated. There was a pride in being a Connacht person. That pride is always stirring just below the surface, a kind of spartan and indomitable spirit. Today Connacht still has the largest rural population and the poorest land in ireland but industry is thriving and tourism is particularly healthy, mainly because of the stark and beautiful landscape. Perhaps Cromwell did us a favour after all. But it was a high price to pay, no doubt about that.

For more stories like this, check out http://www.galwaywalks.com, or on Facebook see 'Walking Tours of Galway', or come along on one of my daily 'Galway Walks', 'Galway's Horrible History Tours', or 'The Fireside Tour of Galway'. Delighted to show you around!
Brian

To Hell or to Connacht

To Hell or to Connacht!

Such was Oliver Cromwell's dire dictate to Catholic landowners during the Cromwellian wars in Ireland 1641-1653, after which 90% of all land-ownership was transferred, at the point of a sword, on pain of death, from Irish and Anglo-Norman, mainly Catholic ownership, to English Soldier/Dissenter/Opportunist Protestant ownership. Dispossessed families, many previously wealthy and important, in a refugee state, found themselves forced into the margins of Connacht, mainly Clare, Galway and Mayo, onto land that was at best marginal, hillsides and bogs, and so began the enforced impoverishment of the last great civilisation of Europe, an impoverishment that peaked with the willful genocide that was The Great Hunger, the 10 years of famine in Ireland in the 1840's and 1850's, when 1.5 million people died and 2.5 million emigrated from Ireland, mainly from the western wetlands of Connacht. Picturesque it is but arable it is not.

Most families subsisted on holdings of less than 5 acres in County Galway, with an artificially crowded density of over 500 people per square mile in some areas, totally unsustainable when one considers that they could only grow potatoes on the land, no cereal and had few animals. What animals they had, a pig and maybe a few sheep and rough cattle were kept to pay the rents on their small-holdings. Rack-rents were exorbitant and if the tenant farmer made any improvements he was punished for his industry by having to pay a higher rent the following year. It was a dire lifestyle, one that came crashing down when the potato crop failed.

Yet life continued and a pride in being a Connacht person was always stirring below the surface, a kind of stoic and indomitable spirit. Today Connacht still has poor land but industry is thriving and tourism is particularly healthy, mainly because of the stark and beautiful landscape. Perhaps Cromwell did us a favour after all. But it was a high price to pay, no doubt about that.

Tonight, the Connacht Rugby team who are based in Galway city, play Edinburgh in Murrayfield stadium, in Edinburgh, Scotland, within sight of Balmoral Castle, summer home to the British Royals, who played no small part in Ireland's subjugation and annexation as a British colony, for 700 years. Something to dwell on when the two teams meet tonight. Sport is just another form of war, thankfully with none of the associated devastation.

The West's Awake, but we always remember our past. For more info on the history of Galway or to spend an hour on one of my walking tours 'Galway's Horrible Histories Walks' see http://www.galwaywalks.com