Captain Kennedy to the Commissioners - August 13, 1848
I REGRET to say that these monster evictions still continue.
During the last week 44 families were evicted, and the houses levelled, on one property.
I am not yet in a position to report with any degree of accuracy, but I will do so during
the week. A band of paupers taken from some distant stone-breaking depôts, and armed with
spades, crow-bars, and pickaxes, completed this work of destruction.
The results and consequences of this system are matters for the most serious and painful
consideration, to those intrusted with the administration of the poor law. These helpless
creatures, not only unhoused but driven off the lands, no one remaining on
the lands being allowed to lodge or harbour them. It is obvious they must go somewhere
till disease and privation thin their numbers; and wherever they acquire a residence the
proprietor must eventually suffer, both in purse and character for the neglect or cupidity
of others.
Without means of energy they cannot emigrate, and without employment they cannot exist but
on the rates.
When winter sets in these evicted destitute will be in awful plight, as their temporary
sheds, behind ditches or old fences, are quite unfit for human habitation, and if they
attempted to build anything permanent they would be immediately demolished.
If the records of the Sheriff’s Office connected with this Union for the last nine
months were produced, they would account for much of the death and destitution of the
Union. The owners of villages or town properties will be swamped by this system. The
fugitives naturally congregate in them. This has occurred to such an extent in one
village, that I understand it is the intention to demolish it altogether.
I am given to understand that the rental of some proprietors will not pay the mortgages,
so that the agents and managers must take some unusual means of meeting the demands upon
them.
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