Probably the most successful Government intervention over the years of the Great Famine was the introduction of the soup kitchens in the spring of 1847.

The government paid poor people wages to do work such as building roads or piers. The wages did not allow the workers to buy much food for themselves and their families. However, it did help to feed many people and during 1845 no one died of famine.

One of the first acts of the new government was to oversee the introduction of an amended Poor Law, which made the much-detested workhouse system the main provider of relief, and meant that the Famine poor were now to be classified as “paupers.” More significantly, responsibility for financing relief was to pass to …

souper (plural soupers) (Ireland, historical) Someone who, during the Irish famine, supplied food such as soup to Catholics who converted to Protestantism. (Ireland, historical) A (former) Catholic who converted to Protestantism in order to gain such food.

This was caused by potato blight. All the potatoes grown in Ireland were of the same variety, a variety susceptible to blight. It devastated the potato farming industry. The Irish people, who worked on the farms, lost their jobs and were starving.

Most of Ireland gained independence from Britain following the Anglo-Irish War and became a fully independent republic following the passage of the Republic of Ireland Act in 1949. Northern Ireland still remains part of the United Kingdom.

Although some believed the myth that Queen Victoria (known in Ireland in later decades as the “Famine Queen”) had only donated a miserly £5 to famine relief, in fact the sum was £2,000, the equivalent of £61,000 today, from her personal resources. She also was patron of a charity that fundraised.

The monarch of England held the crowns of England and Ireland in a personal union. Since April 1949, the only part of the island of Ireland that has retained a monarchical system is Northern Ireland (as part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland).

Sláine mac Dela

Rory O’Neill

Irish royal families refers to the dynasties that once ruled large “overkingdoms” and smaller petty kingdoms on the island of Ireland. Members of some of these families still own land and live in the same broad locations.

Edward Bruce

Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. There have been no native queens of Ireland since the late 12th century, following the complex sequence of the Norman invasion of Ireland, Treaty of Windsor (1175), and death of the last true High King of Ireland, Rory O’Connor, in 1198.

Roderic O’Connor, also called Rory O’Connor, or O’Conor, Old Irish Ruaidhri Ua Conchubair, (died 1198, near Lough Corrib, County Galway, Ire.), king of Connaught and the last high king of Ireland; he failed to turn back the Anglo-Norman invasion that led to the conquest of Ireland by England.

Michael D. Higgins

Presidents of Ireland (1938–present)

The President of Ireland is elected through proportional representation – single transferable vote. All Irish citizens entered on the current electoral register are eligible to vote. Under the Electoral (Amendment) Act 2011, there is a spending limit by each candidate of €750,000.

Michael Daniel Higgins (Irish: Mícheál Dónal Ó hUigínn; born 18 April 1941) is an Irish politician, poet, sociologist, and broadcaster, who has served as the ninth president of Ireland since November 2011. He served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Galway West constituency from 1981 to 1982 and 1987 to 2011.