The failure of the potato crop in 1845 resulted in increasing numbers of people seeking shelters in the workhouses, originally built to accommodate 100,000 paupers, but by June 1851 had over 256,000 inmates. Women and children constituted the largest groups leading to increasing concerns about their long-term future. Some were deserted, others abandoned, but there were fears they would remain a permanent financial burden on the poor law. In January 1850, 1,070 of the inmates in Tuam workhouse were children under fifteen years, while there were 720 girls aged between nine and fifteen years in Galway workhouse by late February 1850. The principle concern was what to do with the young girls. At the same time there was a major gender imbalance in many of the colonies: in Australia there was only one female for every eight males in the early 1840s. To redress this problem, the Australian authorities attempted to encourage girls from the workhouses in England and Wales to the colony, offering free passage, but this was largely unsuccessful as the girls were reluctant to go to a country which was regarded as a penal colony. Under pressure from the British government, the Australian authorities reluctantly agreed to extend the offer to Irish workhouse orphans and in February 1848 the poor law unions were asked to provide the names of suitable girls for consideration. Lieutenant Henry, the representative of the colonial authorities, then visited the workhouses, interviewed the girls and selected those he considered suitable to be sent to Australia. Certain guidelines were put in place: the girls were to be between fourteen and eighteen years, preferably over sixteen; be of good moral character and be resident in the workhouses for at least two years. Demand for places was exceptionally high and in most unions the number of applicants was greater than the number of places available. By March 1848, sixty-eight unions had provided the names of 2,052 female orphans for consideration and some unions had not even begun the process. It was decided that the number would be capped at 2,500 and they would be sent on twelve ships. A variety of criteria were used by the poor law unions in the selection process: some chose those who were resident in the workhouses the longest, others selected girls who were most likely to get marriage partners, while in some cases it was the most industrious and hard-working who were sent. The final decision rested with Lieutenant Henry and the colonial authorities as they were funding the travel costs of the emigrants.
The Irish poor law unions were enthusiastic participants as their only expenditure was the cost of providing the girls with clothing and their travel to the port of embarkation at Plymouth. The first group of 185 orphans left on 4 June 1848 from ten unions in Ulster, on the Earl Grey, bound for Adelaide. There was much criticism of the scheme in Australia because of a prejudice towards paupers and Catholics, and the emigration was temporarily withdrawn in late 1848. However, pressure from the poor law unions and an investigation in Australia, which found that the allegation regarding those sent out in 1848 were false, resulted in the schemes being reopened and another 1,600 workhouse girls were sent to Australia over the following two years. Between 1848 and 1850, a total of 4,114 girls from 118 workhouses were sent to Australia under the Female Orphan Scheme.
Five of the six Galway poor law unions availed of the opportunity to send 250 girls to Australia, with Loughrea sending the largest group, seventy-three girls, followed by Tuam and Ballinasloe, both sent fifty-seven, Galway sent forty-seven and Gort sixteen. The failure of the Clifden guardians to become involved is surprising, but may be explained in that the workhouse only opened on 8 March 1847, the last workhouse in the country to open, and structures had not been established, plus most girls would not have met the residency requirement of two years. Ballinasloe was the first of the Galway workhouses to avail of the opportunity and a group left Plymouth on the Lady Kennaway. The Ballinasloe guardians were constantly looking for ways of offloading the juvenile section of the inmate population: sending young males to join the British army and in 1852 paying for ten boys to go to Bristol where positions had been secured as apprentices in a cotton factory. Among those who left on the Lady Kennaway was Margaret Boland, a Roman Catholic who was seventeen years, but there is no evidence whether her parents were dead or alive. After her arrival in Melbourne, she secured a three-month contract with a salary of £10 as a domestic servant in the home of William Thompson. Ballinasloe did not engage with the emigration schemes after 1848, probably because of a major cholera outbreak in 1849.
The orphan girls from Galway left on four ships: the Lady Kennaway, the Inchinnan, the Derwent, and the Thomas Arbuthnot, and they disembarked in Melbourne and Sydney. As the Australian authorities paid the passage fares of the girls they kept excellent record and this information is available of the internet site, www.irishfaminememorial.org, which allows the researcher chart the progress of the emigrants. Winifred Roach was fourteen years when she left Tuam workhouse and travelled to Melbourne on the Lady Kennaway in 1848. She was able to read and after her arrival in Australia was employed as a nurse maid by Dr Murray in Melbourne, earning £8 a year. Afterwards, she worked as a house servant for Mrs Glaston in the city. She was married three times and over a twenty year period had thirteen child. On the death of her second husband, John Thompson, in 1874, her four youngest children were sent to an orphanage. During her time in Australia, she resided in Melbourne, Brisbane and Wilcannia.
The group of orphans where there is the most information is that of the Thomas Arbuthnot which arrived in Sydney on 3 February 1850 carrying sixty five orphans from Gort, Loughrea, Tuam and Galway workhouses, as well as girls from unions in Clare and Kerry. A record was kept by the ship’s physician, Charles Strutt, documenting not only the journey, but also the placement of the girls after their arrival in the colony. Mary Crehan was eighteen years when she disembarked, a Catholic whose mother, Catherine Crehan (nee Cahill), still resided in Gort. Initially she secured a position as a house servant with a salary of £8 a year with Mr Gallon in South Brisbane. In 1856 she married a German emigrant, Johannes Schott (Scott). They had eight children and she died in Sydney in 1896.
The Female Orphan Scheme to Australia must be seen as an opportunity for Galway workhouse orphan girls to better themselves in a foreign destination. While their lives in Australia varied, many encountering hardship and difficulties, others did have a good life. Success or failure was not a consideration, but rather a life far away from the workhouse.
Further Reading:
Richard Reid, Farewell My Children: Irish Assisted Emigration to Australia, 1848-1870 (Anchor Books, Spit Junction, NSW, 2011).
Richard Reid and Cheryl Morgan, ‘A Decent Set of Girls: The Irish Famine Orphans of the Thomas Arbuthnot, 1849-1850 (Yass Heritage Project, Yass; 1996).
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