I recently came across an exceptional story on vacation in Dublin. The Jeanie Johnston was a ship during the Irish Potato Famine with an incredible outcome.
The Great Famine was a dark stretch of European history. Ireland was ruled by Britain at the time and had about eight million people of which three million were poor potato sharecroppers. The potatoes were their primary food and how they paid the rent. When a fungus blight destroyed this harvest, things got ugly fast.
These poor farmers couldn’t pay their rent, many were kicked off their plots and starved. From 1845 to 1852 an estimated 1.2 million Irish starved to death and another 1.5 million people had to leave or starve. That is nearly 38% of the population, and a big reason Ireland is one of the few countries in Western Europe with a lower population now than in 1850.
As was explained to me, there was actually enough other food on the island to feed the people, but the powers that be chose to export it for profit instead.
Truly a dark time.
Regardless, the only option for many was to accept indentured servitude contracts in America as compensation for passage costs and try to get your family over piecemeal. This was much easier said than done. They called the ships “Coffin Ships” for good reason. Conditions for the voyage were horrible. They would cram three hundred people down on the floor, in a cramped, dark, ship’s hold with poor food, no sanitation, or access to fresh air, for six to eight weeks.
It's no surprise on average twenty to thirty percent of a coffin ships passengers died of infection or disease en route to America.
The Jeanie Johnston was different.
She was knows as the blessed “miracle ship.”
In sixteen trips across the Atlantic not one passenger perished, in fact the ship net added a life, as a baby was born in one crossing.
This outcome was less divine intervention than a confluence of the compassion and competence of three humanitarian men.
First, the ship’s owner was a Canadian who sold lumber to Ireland. He allowed the empty hold, for the passage home, to be used for Irish emigrants. He was a businessman but also a humanitarian. He only allowed two hundred people onboard per voyage to give folks more space. He hired an experienced captain, and in an unprecedented move, he hired an excellent doctor to watch over the passengers health. Last but not least, he didn’t raise prices once the ship had success.
Second, the captain was also a highly experienced, compassionate man whose professionalism resulted in safe passages.
The hero however, was Dr. Blennerhassett, a talented physician who took less money to serve on the Jeanie Johnston. The doctor had seen shipborne disease firsthand in India and rejected the backward science of the time. He correctly believed that diseases such as cholera were spread, not through the air, but through contaminated water, waste contact, and lack of hygiene.
The doctor implemented three strict rules. First, no one with signs of disease was accepted onboard. Second, the passengers were made to clean out their living area and waste buckets daily. Finally, everyone had to spend at least thirty minutes a day on deck for fresh air.
Seen through a modern lens, these rules seem common sense, but they were revolutionary science at the time. The result was sixteen crossings without a single death.
So many stories come from the Jeanie Johnston, some wonderful and some sad. The baby born at sea went on to become a successful tavern owner in Minnesota. His mother, without a penny to her name, gave him nineteen names to honor the passengers who shared their food with her on the voyage. The wonderful doctor ironically succumbed to disease as a passenger on another ship sailing to see his mother. As for the Jeanie Johnston she eventually sank, with a cargo full of lumber, in an Atlantic storm but kept her perfect record. All of her crew were rescued. The ship pictured is an exact replica which serves as a floating museum.
If you read history sometimes it’s dark. The Jeanie Johnston was an exceptional example of what’s possible when compassionate and competent people do the right thing in dark times.