Why were the Irish so dependent on potatoes as a staple food at the time of the Great Famine? Why couldn’t they just have turned to other grains as an alternative to stop more deaths from happening?
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I see a number of people here think that only potatoes were grown in Ireland. The reality was that Ireland produced large amounts of grain and animal products like pork, beef and dairy. However *everything* other than potatoes was sold to pay rent on their “farms” which had been made tiny by the enforced division among children – the traditional Irish way was the oldest inherited the land but the British imposed their ideas instead, reducing the population to devastating poverty. While all these goodies were being exported, the Irish actually did quite well on potatoes and milk, probably better than their equivalents in other countries who subsisted on bread and cheese.
However once the potato blight hit, their food source was wiped out. The US sent some grain ships to try to help but, because of the English Corn Laws, they were not allowed to land their cargo in case they depressed the prices in the markets. [Turkey did send some grain](https://archive.aramcoworld.com/issue/201501/an.irish.tale.of.hunger.and.the.sultan.htm) and snuck it into Drogheda with the legacy that the Star and Crescent is now a common motif in the town, even appearing on the [local football team’s logo](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FDrogheda_United_F.C.&psig=AOvVaw2r2Ipj6h_oKePOKgCVYn2i&ust=1675891431403000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CBAQjRxqFwoTCIDEw52shP0CFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE). Probably the most notable contribution was the few dollars sent by the [Choctaw Nation](https://xyuandbeyond.com/irish-famine-and-the-choctaw-nation/) even though they had almost nothing after the Trail of Tears.
The tiny amount of relief provided by the British was to set up soup kitchens where the starving could get food if they changed their religion to Protestantism, and support for road building where the work was stretched out by the creation of winding roads.
TL;DR: The other foodstuffs they had to hand were sent to England to make money for their landlords, so the potato crop’s failure meant starvation.
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