Reviving a bit of a zombie thread; it might be of interest to some here...
I was recently in the west of Ireland, and on the road between Recess and Clifden visited the original homestead of the family of Dan O'Hara. The proprietor of the restaurant and guesthouse at the foot of the hill where the farm was told me that O'Hara had been a prosperous farmer before the Famine, to the extent that he built a very nice small farmhouse with good-sized glass windows. (This in a time when mud walls with either no windows or a hole in the wall covered by a flap of old sheepksin was the norm.)
Things went well and the O'Hara family prospered, until the potato blight wiped out successive crops, when O'Hara's poor rates and rent were raised because of the glass windows, and the family could not pay. The house was taken in lieu of tax, and the O'Haras took ship for the United States.
On the ship, his wife and two of his children died and were 'buried at sea' (code for their bodies were thrown into the sea from the deck). Arriving in New York penniless and without a word of English, O'Hara was forced to foster out the remaining two children and to attempt to get a new start by doing the only work he could get, selling matches on the street to passing smokers.
He died of hunger, cold, exposure and possibly a broken heart within two years of arriving.
The farmhouse itself is lovely - a beautifully built cottage in local stone, with a half-door and nice windows; there is a well at the back of the house, and there are outbuildings that would have made a sty for a pig, housing for sheep and a henhouse; the surrounding fields are nicely laid out and you can still see the track of the inaccurately named lazy-beds where potatoes were grown. There is a stunning view across the mountains towards the sea. A cock and friendly hens followed me hopefully down to the stile when I admired them, but unfortunately I'd brought no treats, not knowing they'd be up there, and hadn't a crumb to give them.