The New York Times is celebrating the 175th anniversary of its first issue on Sept. 18, 1851. Here’s a quick look at the paper’s earliest coverage of Ireland from that first month. Note how the New York daily reported news already published in Irish and London papers.
Sept. 19, 1851: “Irish papers contain statements that English capital and industry are seeking investment in the western counties of Ireland,” the Times reported under “Items of Foreign News.” In particular was the stocking of “newly purchased farms in the mountains of the west” with some 3,000 head of sheep shipped from England, and the construction of sheep sheds “to protect them against the severity of the coming winter.”
The second item in the roundup declared: “The potato disease has made its appearance generally in Ireland, but in such a form that it is believed its ravages will not be serious. Although the stalks have been affected by it, the tubers are untouched.”[1]”Items of Foreign News,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 19, 1851, 3. Italics of stalks in the original.
These later statements, as seen below, refer only to the latest troubles with the potato crop, not what occurred in the previous years. Other news about the potato blight, what we know today as the Great Famine, appeared in the Times through September 1851. Some examples:
Sept. 24, 1851: The New York Times quoted a passage from the The Times of London about a 20 percent population decline in Ireland since 1841, from 8.1 million to 6.5 million. The loss is described as “a catastrophe, so humbling to our national pride … What a mass of complicating and afflicting causes have combined so to produce this simple and appaling result!”[2]”Four Days Later From Europe,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 24, 1851; 1.
Sept. 25, 1851: “The Belfast papers bring accounts of the rapid spread of the potato blight in several districts of the northern province. … In and about Belfast everything indicates an increasing decay of the crop. … These statement are supplied by a journal (left unnamed) which can be relied upon as not belonging to the alarmist class of agriculturists.”[3]”Three Days Later From Europe,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 25, 1851, 4.
Sept. 29, 1851: (The story from Dublin–seen above–is dated Sept. 12, 1851, a week before the Times‘ first issue.) “Still the human tide rolls outward, and the mania for emigration seems to pervade the entire rural population. The large remittances from Irish settlers in America, accompanied by glowing accounts of the prospects of the farmer, the artisan, and the laborer in that ‘land of promise,’ have spread among all classes all eager desire to make their way across the Atlantic. All even household servants, are hoarding their small savings to enable them to emigrate. …
“The accounts and yields of the grain crops are of the most encouraging nature. There are still complaints of potato disease, but the blight is partial, and the market prices is advancing in some places, owing to the subsidance of alarm.”[4]”Ireland,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 29, 1851, 1.
References
| ↑1 | ”Items of Foreign News,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 19, 1851, 3. Italics of stalks in the original. |
|---|---|
| ↑2 | ”Four Days Later From Europe,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 24, 1851; 1. |
| ↑3 | ”Three Days Later From Europe,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 25, 1851, 4. |
| ↑4 | ”Ireland,” New York Daily Times, Sept. 29, 1851, 1. |
