June 30th, 1846: Lord John Russell becomes Whig prime minister. Charles Trevelyan writes to Sir Randolph Routh, of the Relief Commission. "I think we shall have much reason to be satisfied with our new masters." The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Charles Wood, is a firm believer in laissez laire. Routh comments. "You cannot answer the cry of want by a quotation from political economy."
In Cong, landlords cannot provide relief because their properties are in the hands of creditors. The parish priest, Father Michael Waldron, says the poor are eating their winter cabbage to survive. He appeals for public works on behalf of "a most peaceable people".
Father Michael McDermott writes from Strokestown, Co Roscommon. "I cannot describe the alarm which is felt in this town in consequence of the high price to which provisions have risen this day. The people wear a sullen aspect and are giving expression to their discontent in a very menacing tone. Nothing is heard in the market but threats and murmurs. Potatoes lumpers are four shillings per hundred [weight] oatmeal 17 shillings. In this state of things there is no employment nor relief fund. So in the name of God do something for us ...
In an initialled note, Routh asks. "Why is there no committee in this town, and why is there no subscription even of shillings and sixpences or of some collection at church? Something to prove the disposition of the people to make an effort in their own behalf, to which the government will so readily contribute." There are depots in Carrick on Shannon, Roscommon and Longford, where Indian corn meal can he procured at £10 a ton.
The chairman of the local relief committee is Maj Denis Mahon, of Strokestown House. July 1st. Father Patrick O'Gorman, PP Clarecastle, Co Clare, says the villagers of Clareabbey and Killone are starving because of bureaucratic delays to public works.
In Roundstone, Co Galway, two supplies of Indian meal are exhausted. A meeting chaired by Dr Kiernan reflects anxiously on "the display of destitution and apparent starvation exhibited on the two last days' sale of the Indian corn meal the desperate energy with which the unfortunate poor exerted themselves to obtain a supply and when they were told that all was sold, the mixed emotions of gloom, silence and noisy clam our with which they retired to their cheerless homes, without food to eat, although they pawned their clothing and sold their little livestock to purchase this Indian meal."
The meeting concludes there is no likelihood of obtaining subscriptions in Roundstone because of its remoteness "and the very few persons of respectability [property] residing in it". Considering the destitution of the people, an application should be made to the government to reduce the price of meal to a minimum and distribute it free of charge to the "extreme poor".