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History of the original Jeanie Johnston, including Canadian background, and descriptions of conditions on the original ship.
The story of the Jeanie Johnston is the story of one of the most momentous periods in Irish history - the era of the Great Famine that swept Ireland in the middle of the 19th century.
It is also a tale of great humanity, remarkable courage and pioneering spirit on the part of Irish people fleeing the dreaded famine, which decimated the population of Ireland in a few short years. It can truly be said that the Jeanie Johnston - and the many similar emigrant ships of the 19th century - paved the way for Irish people to play a leading and distinguished role all over the world in the intervening years.
When disease hit the potato crop - the staple diet of Irish people - during consecutive seasons from 1845 to 1848, disaster struck. Every family in the country was touched in one way or another. For many people, it came down to a stark choice between risking the fearful transatlantic voyage on an emigrant ship or remaining in Ireland to starve. This is where the famed Jeanie Johnston entered the picture to dramatic effect. A square-sterned, three masted barque, constructed of Quebec oak and pine, the 408 tonne ship was built in Quebec, Canada by noted Scottish-born shipbuilder, John Munn in 1847. A year later, the prominent Tralee, County Kerry hardware merchant, Nicholas Donovan, purchased the ship in Liverpool and originally intended to use it on the North Atlantic route as a cargo vessel. |
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The dire circumstances of the starving Irish soon altered his plans and the ship made its maiden voyage to Quebec on April 24, 1848, with 193 emigrants on board who were searching for a new life as the effects of the Famine ravaged the island of Ireland. Over the next seven years, the sturdy wooden sailing vessel made 16 heroic voyages in all to North America, sailing to Quebec, Baltimore and New York. From 1848 to 1855, the ship carried over 2,500 Irish people across the Atlantic on the first step to a brave new adventure.
In the process, the Jeanie Johnston accomplished a remarkable feat. Under the direction of its kind-hearted owner, Nicholas Donovan, its caring Captain, Captain James Attridge and highly experienced resident medical doctor, Dr. Richard Blennerhassett, no lives were lost on board.
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The Jeanie Johnston boasted just a single main deck and a poop deck, housing its travellers in very cramped bunks. It offered few comforts on the hazardous journey, which usually lasted about two months, but it was also far removed from the infamous “coffin ships” most notably associated with the thousands of emigrants who perished on the transatlantic voyages in 1847. The emigrants on the Jeanie Johnston were berthed below deck in the steerage area, where temporary accommodation was rigged up for them, and they were expected to provide their own bedding. They were pressed tightly together in tiny spaces - four to a six foot-square bunk, with two children counting as one adult! It is difficult to visualise that, on one trip, the stalwart ship carried a total of 254 passengers. These brave Irish souls paid the fare of £3.10 shillings to make the heroic journey to the “New World”. |
 Passengers waiting to embark on the trans-Atlantic voyage |
The makeshift quarters used by the emigrants were removed when they disembarked in North America, enabling the ship to perform its secondary role of transporting vital supplies of food and timber back to Ireland on its return journey.
The passengers onboard the Jeanie Johnston has to make do with very limited food provisions during their treacherous journey. They were expected to bring some food on board with them, and also required to provide their own cooking utensils and to cook for themselves. This meant queuing up for a turn on the only stove, located on the main deck, and if the weather was bad, the family would go hungry that day or be reduced to eating raw flour or meal.
The shipping legislation of the times shows how meagre were the weekly provisions allocated to the emigrants onboard:
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Despite the extremely cramped and primitive conditions by today's standards, the Jeanie Johnston was a well run and humanely operated ship which cared as best it could, in the most difficult circumstances, for the fleeing emigrants. Its enviable record (in the context of 19th century transatlantic voyages) of not having lost a single life to either disease or illness at sea was largely due to the great efforts of Dr. Richard Blennerhassett, supported by the humanitarian attitude of the ship's master, Captain James Attridge. The doctor would ensure that hatches were open every day when possible, that the bedding was aired, the accommodation below deck was kept as clean as possible and that everyone would be encouraged to take a walk on deck each day unless the weather was too rough. |
 Nicholas Donovan, owner of the good ship Jeanie Johnston |
It is also noteworthy that, even when the ship met its final end, no lives were lost. In 1856, she was sold as a cargo ship to William Johnson of North Shields in England, and two years later when en route from Quebec to Hull with timber, she ran into trouble in mid-Atlantic. Overloaded and waterlogged she sank, but not before all aboard were rescued by a passing Dutch ship, the Sophie Elizabeth - preserving her unblemished safety record.
The Jeanie Johnston opened up a new world for the Irish emigrants, in the midst of despair and poverty - and Irish people have followed in their pioneering footsteps with distinction and glory all over the world ever since. The recreation of the replica ship in the 21st century is indeed a fitting tribute to the strength and courage of Irish people.
Background to the shipyards in Quebec.
Most of the shipyards on the Saint Charles River in Quebec City where the Jeanie Johnston was conceived and built in 1847 have disappeared under the various projects ot reclaim land in the Lower Town of the old city. Upon the land that pushed the river far from its original bed stands a grand court house today, whose glassy walls can gleam beautifully in the rising sun. The 408 ton Jeannie was one of the 44 ships launched that year in the shipyards of Quebec and one of the four launched by the John Munn yard.. England, Cromwell and Blake were the others.
Quebec City had a sizeable Irish population by 1847. Saint Patrick’s Church had been built in 1832 by Irish immigrants living in Quebec City and who numbered almost 8,000 out of a population of 32,000 – French-Canadian, Irish, English and Scots in that order comprising that population.
The shipyards were owned by Scots and English builders; the craftsmen who built the ships were the majority work force of Quebec, the French-Canadians, many of those craftsmen following in the footsteps of fathers and grandfathers who had built ships during the previous hundred year French ownership. A mural in the Jeanie Johnston interpretation Centre at Blennerville portrays a scene from the French Regime. Among the charley-men, the riggers who threaded the miles of ropes on the ships, there were hundreds of Irishmen. Their names can be found in the marriage and baptism registers of the Notre Dame de Quebec, the mother parish of the city, and later in those of Saint Patrick’s Church.
The above history is partly taken from the Jeanie Johnston project information leaflet, also from the writings of Eileen Marcil and Marianna O'Gallagher, Irish historians living in Canada.
For further in-depth information about the Jeanie Johnston project, visit the Jeanie Johnston Chronicle and the official project website.