The Night of the Big Wind
On 6 January 1839, most of Ireland was getting ready for the feast of Epiphany and enjoying the light snowfall from the previous day. The 6th of January was also known as Nollaig na mBan, ‘women’s Christmas’, the day when Irishmen took on the household duties and women had the day off. This meant women could visit friends, rest and socialise, a chance to celebrate in the last social event of the festive season.
However, by the afternoon, the temperature had been rising steadily, melting all the snow. In Phoenix Park in Dublin the temperature rose by 10 degrees Fahrenheit over 4 hours. The rain started at 3pm, getting heavier around 6pm. As the evening wore on, people became aware of an approaching storm. In Westmeath:
“There was at first a rumbling noise, like thunder, heard, which was followed by a rushing blast of wind, which swept across the town like a tornado, and shook the houses so much that the glass and delft were…thrown from the shelves.”
By 10pm Ireland was hit with the full force of a hurricane that would last for at least 8 hours. As it travelled over the Atlantic ocean, gathering momentum, the storm hit the west coast with such force, waves broke over the top of the Cliffs of Moher. The noise of the sea could be heard for miles inland. Windows shattered. Brick walls rattled. Thatched roofs simply blew away.
Ireland was in darkness. Firelight unable to withstand the intense winds. People could only see in the flickers of lightning and the aurora borealis.
It is hard to calculate the lives lost that night. Many people were killed by falling masonry. Lord Castlemaine was fastening his bedroom window at Moydrum Castle when the storm blew them open, hurling him across the room and killing him instantly. Estimates put the death toll around 300. However, those who died in the aftermath, from injuries, pneumonia, frostbite, etc, have never been counted.
Moydrum Castle, Athlone
Fires started in the streets of Dublin, Athlone and Castelbar. Along the Tyrone-Monaghan border there was a fire in almost every townland. In Dublin, the Bethesda Chapel caught on fire, burning the church, attached school, six town houses and the ‘House of Refuge for reclaimed females’.
All the water was blown out of a canal near Tuam. There were flash floods in Strabane. A pinnacle was ripped off Carlow Cathedral. The earth was stripped alongside the river Boyne, exposing the bones of soldiers killed in battle 150 years earlier. Two coffins were ripped up at Ballylesson, near Belfast.
The homes of the poor suffered more extreme damage, leaving many homeless. Stores of food were destroyed. Fences and walls collapsed, allowing animals to flee. The back wall of the Guinness brewery in Dublin collapsed, killing 9 horses. In Monaghan the ground looked black with the hundreds of crows who had been killed in the storm. Crows almost vanished from Irish skies for several years. All along the west coast, herrings were found up to six miles inland. Sheep and cattle were reportedly swept up and deposited miles from their homes. People reported vegetables tasting like salt, at a distance of 40 miles from the sea.
In Portadown:
“We have to thank God for out-living the horrors of last night. The houses groaned like a vessel at sea. The roar of the wind was like an uninterrupted cannonade, and every person in this neighbourhood thought that this terrible night would have been their last.”
In the aftermath, people sought to make sense of what had happened. The timing of the storm, on the feast of Epiphany, seemed like it was a warning from God that the Day of Judgement would soon arrive. Others saw the devil at work. Folk beliefs in faeries convinced many that the Little People had either summoned a whirlwind to leave the country altogether or to battle English fairies and blow them back to England.
It had various names throughout Ireland - in Tyrone, Montgomery’s Wind; The Ballinagare Wind in Roscommon; on the Ards peninsula in County Down it was named McCance’s Night after a man who swore he would raise a storm on the night he died. By the end of the century, it was known as the The Big Wind, which had been the name used by the poor.
The Night of the Big Wind became very important in the early 20th century when the Old Age Pensions Act was introduced in 1908. Many in Ireland, particularly Catholics, had no birth registration (which hadn’t been introduced until 1863) and thus had no way to prove that they were over the age of 70. The government, in their wisdom, instead asked applicants to give their memories of the Night of the Big Wind in order to establish they were old enough.
By March 1909, 80,000 had applied for the pension. 70,000 were Irish.
One such pensioner was Tim Joyce of Co Limerick, who said
“I always thought I was 60. But my friends came to me and told me they were certain sure I was 70 and as there were three or four of them against me, the evidence was too strong for me. I put in for the pension and got it.”
Further Reading:
Peter Carr, The Night of the Big Wind (1993)
Oíche na Gaoithe Móire, RTE (2015) BBC Two - Oíche na Gaoithe Móire - Night of the Big Wind, Oíche na Gaoithe Móire
