The Letter
Epilogue
Return to Back When...
The Clohossey Letter
Dear Patrick and Catherine... A Letter from the Great Famine
Transcribed from 'The Island Magazine'. Fall/Winter 1985:18
Edited by John Cousins
Of all the dark periods if Irish history, the potato famine of the 1840's was the blackest. Between 1845 and 1852, a million people died of starvation and related causes. Over a million and a half more emigrated, disappearing without a trace from their stricken country.
Occasionally, the stories of these pioneers come to light. One account, concerning the Clohossey family of Nail Pond, Prince Edward Island, has recently been discovered in the form of a letter, which was lost for over a century. That letter, reproduced here, tells a story of the origin of the Clohossey family and the stricken Irish community they left.
The story begins in the tiny farming community of Ballydoole, near the town of Freshford in northern Kilkenny, Ireland. This was the home of Edmund Clohossey and his wife Honora (Butler) Clohossey. They had a family of eight children (that we know of): Joseph, Catherine, Patrick, Anty, Honny (probably Honora), Mary, John and Edmund.
Like the rest of the country, Kilkenny was an area of desolation by the late 1840's. The potato crop in 1848 was a complete failure; compounding that disaster, the wheat crop failed at the same time.
It seems only logical the Edmund Clohossey should decide at that time to send at least some of his family to a place where the future looked brighter. Late in 1848, two family members, Patrick and Catherine, boarded a ship (likely at nearby Waterford) and sailed for Prince Edward Island. They were to live with Edmunds sister and husband, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Roberts, who had settled on a farm in Nail pond in 1820. According to family tradition, the Roberts had written, asking Patrick and Catherine to come and live with them.
The two young people landed at Port hill and made their way to Nail Pond. They arrived to find that their uncle, Thomas had died shortly before. Patrick had to take over the farm.
Shortly after there arrival, Patrick and Catherine received a letter from their father. It had been posted in Freshport, near Ballydoole, and address to Father Peter Macintyre, the parish priest at Tignish, who delivered it to them. Roy Clohossey, Patrick's grandson, 1968, when he was renovating the house, which his grandfather had built, discovered that letter. The letter had lain in the wall of the kitchen for over a century.