Orphan Emigration Scheme

Athy’s workhouse was opened on 9 January 1844. It was designed and built to accommodate 360 adult inmates and 240 children. The Great Famine which commenced with the failure of the potato crop in 1845 and continued during the following three years resulted in a huge intake of poor families into the workhouses throughout Ireland. Here in South Kildare, where lies the best farmland in the entire Irish countryside, the local workhouse was soon full to capacity. So much so that two auxiliary workhouses were opened in the town of Athy to cater for the 1,399 poverty stricken inmates recorded in the first week of February 1849.

A large number of those workhouse inmates were children. Many were orphans, or alternatively had been abandoned by fathers and mothers no longer able to feed them. While they remained in the local workhouse they were a charge on the landowners of the area where they previously resided. No wonder then that Earl Grey, the British Secretary of State for the Colonies received much support from Irish landlords for his Orphan Emigration Scheme under which young girls from the Irish workhouses were to be sent to Australia. The scheme was designed to fulfill the two-fold purpose of helping to resolve Australia’s chronic shortage of female labour, while at the same time reducing the serious overcrowding in Irish workhouses. Not only that but the Irish landlords who financed the workhouse system also hoped to reduce their own financial burden by transferring as many orphan girls as possible out of the workhouse system.

The Orphan Emigration Scheme commenced in October 1848 and when it was wound up due to opposition from the Australian colonists in August 1850, 4,175 young girls had been sent from Irish workhouses to Australia. Many of the Irish workhouses participated in the scheme, and the following table records the number of girls sent from workhouses in this area.
Athy 37 girls
Carlow 52 girls
Baltinglass 16 girls
Naas 15 girls
Mountmellick 37 girls
Edenderry 18 girls

The first group of girls from Athy Workhouse travelled on the ship “Lady Peel” which sailed from Plymouth England and arrived in Sydney Harbour Australia on 3rd July 1849. The names of these girls and their personal details are :-

NAME ADDRESS AGE PARENTS CIRCUMSTANCES

Ann Carroll Athy 17 Martin & Biddy Carroll Martin Carroll living in America

Ann Clare Athy 17 Patrick and Ann Clare Her mother was living in Athy

Lucy Connor Athy 19 James & Elizabeth Connor Both dead

Bridget Croak Stradbally 19 John and Ann Croak Her mother was living at Hyde, Kildare

Margaret Dobson Athy 17 Joseph & Julia Dobson Both dead

Bridget Egan Athy 18 John & Jane Egan Mother living in Athy

Elizabeth Fitzpatrick Monasterevin 19 Stephen & Elizabeth Fitzpatrick Both dead

Catherine Fleming Athy 18 Barney and Catherine Fleming Mother living in Athy

Rose Fleming Ballyadams 19 Patrick & Mary Fleming Mother living in
Ballyadams

Mary Green Athy 18 John & Catherine Green Both dead

Mary Hayes Athy 18 John & Mary Hayes Both dead

Elizabeth Hayes Athy 18 John & Mary Hayes Both dead

Bridget Ivory Athy 17 James & Margaret Ivory Both dead

Bridget Moore Athy 18 James & Mary Moore James in America
Mary in Athy

Ellen Murray Athy 18 Hugh & Jane Murray Mother living in Athy

Margaret Neill Athy 18 Michael & Catherine Neill Both dead

Ann Sinclair Athy 17 Patrick & Mary Sinclair Both living in Athy

Ellen Sullivan Athy 18 John & Ellen Sullivan Mother living in Athy


The second and last group sent from Athy Workhouse sailed from Plymouth on the ship “Maria” and landed in Sydney Harbour on 1st August 1850. They included :-


NAME ADDRESS AGE PARENTS CIRCUMSTANCES

Julia Byrne Athy 16 Thomas & Elizabeth Byrne Both dead

Margaret Byrne Athy 18 Michael & Margaret Byrne Both dead

Judith Cullen Timahoe 17 Richard and Mary Cullen Both dead

Catherine Cullen Athy 16 Maurice and Betty Cullen Both dead

Mary Dunne Barrowhouse 15 Michael & Mary Dunne Both dead

Ann Kehoe Narraghmore 15 Patrick & Ellen Dunne Father living at Bolton Hill

Ann Kehoe Narraghmore 15 Martin & Bridget Kehoe Both dead

Catherine Kenny Stradbally 18 James & Ann Kenny Mother living in Athy

Mary Lapsley Timahoe 18 John & Bridget Lapsley Both dead

Catherine Lowry Stradbally 18 William & Betty Lowry Both dead

Mary Maher Athy 16 Patrick & Mary Maher Mother living in Athy

Mary Moore Athy 18 Patrick & Bridget Moore Mother living in Athy

Mary Moylan Aghaboe 18 James & Sara Moylan Both dead

Ellen Moylan Aghaboe 16 James & Sara Moylan Both dead

Mary Murphy Monasterevan 18 Joseph and Ann Murphy No information

Jane Rooney Athy 16 Andrew & Jane Rooney Both dead

Ann Scully Ballynagar, Ballyadams 15 Patrick & Ann Scully Both dead

Ellen Terret Monasterevin 15 James & Ellen Terret Both dead

Margaret Toole Athy 17 John & Martin Toole Both dead


I have been unable to find out what happened to these young girls when they arrived on the other side of the world over 150 years ago. No doubt somewhere in Australia their descendants are going about their daily business, many of them oblivious to the links which their great great grandmothers had with Athy and District in the years immediately following the Great Famine.