The Killing Snows

by Charles Egan

  ‘I don’t have to ask why you’re here,’ Voisey said as he waved Luke to a seat.

  ‘No, I suppose not,’ Luke said. ‘It’s just that Ian said to me that we should hear from you within a day or two. It’s two weeks now. No Works, no Kitchens. Everybody keeps asking me, and I don’t know what to tell them.’

  ‘I don’t know either,’ Voisey said. ‘I know there’s Government corn coming through Ballina and Westport. Little enough, mind you, and it’s all accounted for. There’s only a few places have supplies.’

  ‘But if there’s no corn for Brockagh, why did they insist on closing the Works.’

  ‘I don’t know the answer to that either. All I know is Morton wanted it.’

  ‘Morton, Morton,’ Luke said. ‘Always bloody Morton.’

  Afterwards he went down the corridor to Pat’s office. Sarah was sitting alongside him. Pat looked up in surprise. ‘We weren’t expecting you.’

  ‘And I shouldn’t be here either,’ Luke said. ‘Just give me something to work on.’

  Pat and Sarah looked at each other. Pat handed him a sheet.

  ‘Here, add these.’

  They worked silently for an hour. Sarah was the first to notice the heavy creaking sound. She went to the window.

  ‘Pat! Luke!’ They both rushed to the window.

  ‘Corn,’ Luke exclaimed. ‘Corn at last.’

  It was carried by six large freight wagons, each drawn by two horses. The consignment was accompanied by military, twelve soldiers in all, one sitting on each of the carts with guns; six more with sabres, riding along the flanks, lashing at the hungry crowd around them with their whips and boots, sometimes threatening them with their sabres.

  All three left the office and walked out into the street. Voisey and Yardley were there already. The convoy had stopped.

  An officer dismounted. ‘I’m looking for Mr. Edward Yardley.’

  Yardley stood forward.

  ‘You’re Edward Yardley?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘You’re the Quaker representative in Knockanure, are you?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Six wagons of Indian corn for you. Eighty sacks in each, four hundred and eighty in total. I want you to sign here and here. You may, of course, want to check them first.’

  Yardley shook his head in disbelief.

  ‘I wasn’t expecting the military!’

  ‘You’re all the same, you Quaker fellows. You think it all turns up by magic. Let me tell you, Mr. Yardley, if we had not come, it would never have got out of Westport.’

  Yardley went to start counting the sacks, as the soldiers started to unload.

  ‘We’ll help you,’ Sarah said.

  A few minutes later, they had found that the officer’s count was precise.

  ‘One thing I didn’t mention,’ the officer said, ‘You’ve more coming – should be here in a few hours. Six Workhouse type pots. There’s no escort on those – they won’t be stolen. Now, if you could just sign here.’

  Yardley signed as instructed.

  ‘I wasn’t expecting this amount of protection,’ he said to Voisey.

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ Voisey replied. ‘I understand it’s becoming normal. It used be that the RIC would accompany the carts, but the people are becoming desperate.’

  ‘So how do we protect the corn now.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ the officer said. ‘I would suggest that six of my men should stay here with you. They’ll be needed here next week in any case when the corn arrives for the Workhouse.’

  ‘Thank you, lieutenant. Most kind.’

  The pots arrived. The Union had already been buying turnips in from the merchants, and cabbage and turnips from some of the surrounding demesne farms. A few hours later, using labour rounded up by Voisey, Yardley had all six pots in operation. Sarah, Luke and Pat each stood over one of the pots, ladling out the contents as fast as bowls or rough plates were presented to them. The soldiers and the local police kept the six long lines in order.

  The system here was different from the Relief Works – there was no system. No announcement had been made. No Selection was necessary – all were fed. But it was very little.

  Sarah’s mother stayed working in the fever sheds.

  That evening Luke stayed in Knockanure. He joined the others for dinner in the administration block. The fare was not very different to what they had been ladling out. The Workhouse had not seen meat in weeks. There were eight at dinner – Luke and Pat; Sarah and her mother; Voisey and Yardley; the local RIC sergeant and the young corporal commanding the troops who remained.

  ‘Up from Claremorris, Corporal?’ the sergeant asked.

  ‘Yes sir. Though I haven’t been there since two weeks back.’

  ‘What’s it like down there?’

  ‘Terrible, sir. They had to close the Workhouse for a few days, but I hear they managed to open it again. What’s worst though is the fever. They’re dying everywhere. It’s the same in Westport and Castlebar and Foxford. You just can’t get away from it.’

  Yes, thought Luke, he’s right. All you have to do is look at the Workhouse. They die from hunger in the first week. If they live that long, it’s fever. Will it never end?

  Yardley was talking. ‘What do you think?’ he asked Voisey. ‘How many did we feed today?’

  ‘I was trying to reckon that. Two thousand is my guess.’

  ‘I was reckoning even more,’ the sergeant said.

  ‘One way or another, we’re going to have a bigger number tomorrow,’ Yardley said. ‘If this is what we get without even telling anyone, we’ll have an awful lot more when word gets around.’

  ‘I wonder how long your supplies will last?’ asked Voisey.

  ‘God only knows.’

  Early the next morning, Luke left the Union in Knockanure and rode back along the frozen road to Brockagh. As he passed through Lisnadee, he could see the slopes of Croghancoe. Again he felt the terror. He shook his head, and rode on.

  Sarah spent the next day at the Soup Kitchen. For security, Voisey had it taken inside the walls of the Union. A crowd of thousands formed outside the gates, but the militia kept order, and only a hundred were admitted at a time. Behind them, the Workhouse was still operating in its own way; a different world again. Sarah worked on, not even stopping when it started to rain. Rain at last. The last of the snow was melting.

  For hours, she ladled the soup into the bowls held up to her. The rain got heavier, but no one left the lines, they just kept shuffling on through the slush towards the soup. Her only rest came as they finished feeding each group, and they were hustled out through the gates again, before the next group were admitted. On one occasion, she saw a woman lying on the ground, an infant crying alongside. She walked over, but two militiamen came through the gates and pulled the woman standing, an arm over each shoulder. One of the militiamen grasped the baby’s hand, and they dragged mother and child towards the fever sheds.

  As darkness fell, she walked back to the administration block. There were still hundreds of people outside the gate, but she was far too tired to continue, and drenched through. She went to her own room, stripped and rubbed herself down before dressing in dry clothes. As she went back past the offices, she saw a door ajar at the end of the corridor. There was still a single candle burning. She went in.

  ‘Pat,’ she said, ‘you’ll ruin your eyes doing that. You’ve been working far too long already.’

  ‘You’re right. I’m just finishing for the night – a few last columns to add.’

  When he had finished one, he turned to her. ‘Things are getting worse here. Even with the Quaker corn.’

  ‘They sound worse in Brockagh, from all Luke says.’

  ‘I know. He’s told me so often. There’s times I wish to God he wouldn’t.’

  ‘All the
men and women freezing to death on the Works. It must have been terrible for him. ‘

  ‘Yes. But Luke’s tough. A lot tougher than I am.’

  ‘I don’t believe that,’ she said.

  ‘It’s true though. And he needs to be tough. I’m only helping out with the accounts here. Luke, he’s the one who has to deal with the people. They were in a dreadful state when they heard about the Works being ended.’

  ‘I’m sure they were.’

  He checked what he had added. ‘I know it all makes sense. I know there’s no point having sick and starving people working on the roads. Brockagh showed us that. It’s much better to feed the people and let them work on their own plots to grow next year’s crop. God knows, I never thought they’d allow Outdoor Relief.’

  ‘Remember Morton?’ asked Sarah. ‘I wonder what he’d have thought.’

  ‘That bastard! Who cares?’

  ‘Well, he doesn’t anymore.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘Not much. He’s dead.’

  ‘What! Who told you that?’

  ‘That corporal fellow. He told me.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Got the fever in Castlebar. Died screaming, that’s what he said.’

  ‘Good enough for him,’ Pat said.

  ‘Now isn’t that a terrible thing to say?’

  ‘Sorry so. But he was a right bas…I’m sorry.’

  ‘You don’t have to be sorry.’

  ‘Sorry – I’ll stop it now. Still, I’ll tell you this. Things could have been better handled at Brockagh. Morton – he had this thing against Luke – thought he was trying to get above his station. The Works were closed – Morton insisted on it, and they still haven’t opened the Kitchens. There was damned little Luke could do about it, but the people blamed him anyhow.’

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Telegraph or Connaught Ranger, April 1847:

  Death from Want. On Wednesday last the body of a poor woman was found dead in a field adjoining this town. A child belonging to the deceased had piled some stones around the body to protect it from the dogs and the pigs.

  When Luke returned to Brockagh, the situation was worsening. The Works had closed, the people had no money, and there were no Soup Kitchens. Starvation was etched deeper on every face. There was still no outright hunger in Gallaghers’ though. Luke was still being paid, and he could afford to buy corn for the family, though it was very little. He was sending little money back to Carrigard, but he knew Pat was doing so.

  Any time he went out, gaunt, starving people followed him everywhere, begging for food that he could not give them. Now he no longer went out unless it was essential, and neither did anyone else except Gallagher. The murmuring continued outside their house.

  ‘Food, food, food.’

  He became more desperate. He thought of the Quaker supplies arriving in Knockanure, but he reckoned there was little chance of that in Brockagh. He would just have to wait out until the Government supplies arrived. As at Durcans at Christmas, he tried to stop eating, but Winnie would not allow it. He no longer felt hungry, but he knew she was right.

  In the mornings, he still rose early. He would go out to the other room, and lie on the bed beside Winnie, though they said little.

  Late one evening, they were sitting around the table, the younger boys already asleep in the back room.

  There was a knock at the door. A young boy stood outside.

  ‘Message for Luke Ryan. Father Nugent wants him up at the priest-house.’

  Luke took his jacket, and walked out.

  ‘What’s this about?’ he asked.

  ‘Don’t know. There’s some other fellow there. He looks like Quality.’

  Luke walked over, and entered the priest-house without knocking. The room was dark, the two men sitting around the table in the light of a single candle. The flame threw light and shadow across the priest’s face, more hollowed than before. Luke sat.

  ‘This is Edward Yardley, ‘ the priest said. ‘I believe you’ve already met?’

  ‘Yes. Down at Knockanure.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Yardley said. ‘Good to meet you again, Luke.’

  ‘I don’t know if you are aware,’ the priest went on, ‘but Edward is one of the Quakers.’

  ‘Yes, I remember that.’

  ‘But you go on Edward. You tell him.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Yardley said. ‘As you know from Knockanure, we’ve been organising our own relief efforts independently of the Union and the Government. We’re going to open our own Soup Kitchen right here in Brockagh…’

  ‘WHEN?’ The question was loud and abrupt.

  Yardley looked at him in surprise. ‘The day after tomorrow,’ he said.

  Luke put his head in his hands. ‘Thank God…,’ he said. ‘Thank God…Thank God for that.’

  He worked frantically over the next few days. Winnie felt concerned, until she realised that he was only working out the frustration and hurt of the days since the Works had closed. She began to realise how tense she had been herself. She decided then that she would have to work outside the home. There was little enough work cooking and cleaning, where Mrs. Gallagher already did it all.

  As soon as the Quaker supplies arrived from Westport, she threw herself into hectic activity, cooking corn and cabbage and organising other women to do the same. This time only three soldiers were left to guard the supplies, which were stored in another derelict cottage just beside the Gallaghers. Brockagh was tiny compared to Knockanure, though the population of the surrounding parishes was considerable.

  At first they operated three pots in the centre of Brockagh. Luke recognised that while these might be enough for the area around Ardnagrena and Brockagh, it would be impossible to expect people from the mountains to come in every day. He suggested an alternative to Yardley. They organised two carts, which were despatched to the mountains, carrying one of the large pots with sacks of corn and loose cabbage. The travelling Kitchen spent a day each in Knocklenagh and Lisnadee, always accompanied by Timothy Durcan and one soldier. Each person was given one hot ration every third day, together with two cooked rations for reheating. Durcan kept a watchful eye out for desperate people trying to double-claim. Often he stood on the side, watching the lines of ragged people with the dull expressions in their eyes. No-one looked at him.

  The crowds outside Gallaghers and the church dwindled away. Luke and Winnie stayed with her parents. There were other abandoned cottages nearby, but Winnie could not face the isolation during the day.

  The turn of events had surprised him. As the old man in Ardnagrena had said, he had fought for food. He had tried everything to get food from the Union. In the end, it had arrived from the Quakers.

  It also struck him as odd that Yardley was a Quaker. As he came to know Yardley better, he realised that he was a religious man, and he began to understand the deeper sources of his charity. Yardley was no missionary. Through all the time he was in Brockagh, Luke never heard him referring to his own faith. He worked closely too with Father Nugent, who had never objected to his presence.

  One day, Luke stood with Yardley, watching the lines.

  ‘You know,’ Yardley said, ‘James Voisey told me that we could only do our best, and that men could not perform miracles.’

  ‘Yes, he once said that to me too.’

  ‘We’re feeding as many as we can and giving them as much as we can. God knows, it’s little enough.’

  ‘Can you go on with this, though?’

  ‘That’s the question, isn’t it! When do you think the Government’s supplies will arrive?’

  ‘Soon, I hope,’ Luke answered without conviction.

  ‘I hope so. But you know, I think fever is going to be worse than hunger. An awful lot worse. And we’ve no fever hospital in Brockagh.’

  ‘I doubt the Union
would have the money to build one.’

  ‘We’ll have to do it ourselves.’

  ‘How could we do that?’ Luke asked. ‘Just how in hell could we do that?’

  ‘There’s a lot of empty cottages around. Maybe we could use some of those.’

  ‘I think most of them carry fever though. I wouldn’t like to stay in a house where anyone has died of fever.’

  ‘No. But it mightn’t matter much to a man who already has fever.’

  ‘I suppose not.’

  ‘You know, we’ve lost Doctor Short to fever now. Doctor Connolly and Mr. Cronin before that – same thing. And Mr. Morton – I hear he’s dead too.’

  Luke stopped still. Morton’s dead, he thought. Perhaps there’s some justice in the world after all.

  He helped Yardley with the fever cottages. There was little they could do for the patients, but there were other reasons.

  One was quarantine. This was a word Luke had never heard before Yardley mentioned it. It was essential to isolate the patients to stop them infecting their own families. Having seen many who had been abandoned by their own families, Luke understood.

  A second reason was to feed the patients. At the Soup Kitchens, it was necessary to be strict about the limited rations given out. No one was given rations for anyone else – only those who could walk were fed. But now they arranged food deliveries to the fever cottages. Luke knew though that after a few days of fever this no longer mattered, since the patients could not eat.

  A third reason was heat. Many times they went up and down the lines of patients, mopping their faces and bodies with cooling water.

  The last reason was hygiene. Every day, they had to clean the patients. Luke found this duty the most nauseating of all. They had no beds, they used straw as bedding, taken from the roofs of derelict cabins. Every morning they washed the patients, and then pitched out the foul straw, stinking with rice water diarrhoea, faeces and urine. Then all the floors were scrubbed, and fresh straw brought in. Fresh corpses were buried within an hour of death. To Luke’s horror, a common pit was opened in the little graveyard beside Brockagh Church, and back-filled in the same way as in Knockanure Union, as the rats gnawed at the dead bodies.