The connection to poteen, (I'm not sure of the Gaelic spelling) was the fact that, like most of the linen workers, hacklers and roughers (who also separated out the fibres, but were not as skilled as the hacklers) worked in a very dusty atmosphere, as a previous contributor said, which meant that they were always thirsty. The fact that the dust caused lung problems also tended to drive these workers to drink heavily, and several songs and poems recall the drunken antics of these workers, e.g."The Drunken Scutcher;s Son", by WF Marshall.
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