Westward Cork Migration by Sail 1815-1860 by John Sutton

PART II EMIGRANT PERSPECTIVE

1848-55. California Gold Rush (US). Gold was discovered at Sutter’s Mill 24 Jan 1848 just prior to the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ceding California to the US, and that discovery resulted in a huge increase of migrants on the Oregon Trail in 1849. California could also be accessed from Atlantic by the long sea journey around South America or the preferred shortcuts across Central America, usually from Aspinwall (Colón) in Panama traversing the isthmus to Panama City on the Pacific, then a northbound ship for San Francisco (the traverse was dangerous in earlier years due to disease and bandits). California’s non-Indian population was about 8,000 prior to 1848 when ceded to the US but saw such explosive growth that the 60,000 minimum for statehood was rapidly attained and California became the 31 s t state on September 9th, 1850. 1848. Illinois and Michigan Canal Completed (US). Chicago exemplified preparation and opportunity in settlement and economic development when speculators invested in this town of 350 inhabitants in 1833. The canal connecting Lake Michigan to the Mississippi, delayed due to a downturn in the economy, was completed in 1848, transforming Chicago into a major center of trade. On April 24, 1848 , the first cargo boat to arrive in Chicago by canal, General Thornton , hauled sugar from New Orleans through the city on its way to Buffalo. In its first decade of operation, the canal carried a staggering amount of freight: 5.5 million bushels of wheat; 26 million bushels of corn; 27 million pounds of pork; 563 million board feet of lumber. With the canal—and later the railroads— Chicago became an increasingly attractive location for manufacturers (Salzmann, 2018). The city grew to 90,000 in 1858, and the 1860 Census documented 109,260 residents with 49.99% foreign-born including 19,899 (18.2%) from Ireland and 22,230 (20.35%) from Germany. (Fig. 23) 1849. Cholera Epidemic (US BNA). Another deadly cholera epidemic struck in England and Ireland with many deaths, and it was believed to have spread on Irish immigrant ships from England to New York and to the Mississippi River Valley with further loss of life. The John Drew carried cholera and death from New Orleans to Chicago. More died in BNA. 1849. Montreal – Enactment of the Rebellion Losses Bill (BNA). This enactment caused riots by Tories in Montreal and the burning of Parliament House on 25 April 1849 , terminating Montreal’s five-year term as Capital of the Province of Canada. This bill offered compensation to French Canada East residents who had experienced losses during the rebellions of 1837 and 1838 in Lower Canada (a similar Bill had been previously passed in Anglophile Canada West). Although much of the destruction had been committed by the ‘loyal’ army against ‘rebel’ sympathizers a decade earlier, the conservative Tories objected to any compensation of ‘rebels’, whom they judged ‘disloyal’ to the Crown. This news of self-righteous Protestant Canadian citizenry claiming a monopoly on loyalty and causing riot and destruction in Canada doubtless stirred empathy among Canadian Irish Catholics for their fellow Canadian French Catholic citizens. Canada West’s Irish Orange Order was already active in denigration of their Irish Catholic counterparts. Emigration to BNA was to falter yet again in 1850 . 1850. Population Growth in BNA and the US in the First Half of the Century (BNA US). Population changes in the two North American territories were immense: BNA population grew from 430,394 in 1806 to 2,289,095 in 1850 – an increase x 5.3. US population grew from 5,308,485 in 1800 to 23,191,876 in 1850 – an increase x 4.37. The USA had a tenfold greater population in 1850, explaining how fewer emigration arrivals in BNA could produce the disproportionately greater growth in BNA. A comparison: the non-indigenous population of Australia was 332,328 in 1848 1850. Review of Emigration Patterns (BNA, US). Emigration to North America and Australia from the UK was huge during the second half of the 1840s, and Cork became the busiest emigrant port in Ireland.

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