In November, 1741, the
prisoners in Cork jail sent a petition to Parliament, in which they say,
that "above seven hundred persons died there during the late severe
seasons, and that the jail is now so full that there is scarce room for
their lying on the floors." The fever was so general in Limerick that
there was hardly one family in the whole city who had not some member
ill of it. Galway was cruelly scourged by the Famine, to meet which
little or nothing seems to have been done by those whose bounden duty it
was to come to the relief of their starving brethren. When fever
appeared on the terrible scene, the town became one great lazaretto.
Under date of July the 8th, the following intelligence comes from that
unhappy place: "The fever so rages here that the physicians say it is
more like a plague than a fever, and refuse to visit patients for any
fee whatever."[28] "The gentlemen of the county" met, in a way peculiar
to themselves, this twofold calamity which threatened utter
annihilation to their historic capital. To counteract the inevitable
results of famine, they announced that they would give the reward of L30
for the first, and L10 for every other robber that would be prosecuted
to conviction, and this in addition to whatever the Government would
allow.
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