Migration and Settlement
The population of Ireland reached just over 8 million in 1841, after which ensued a relentless decline. The population had contracted to 6.5 million by 1851 after the Great Famine, and 130 years later in 1981 the population of the whole island was only 4.9 million. This was primarily due to emigration, between 1801 and 1921, when 8 million Irish men, women and children emigrated.

During the 1950s there was a decline in traditional labour, such as agriculture, and a lack of much needed state investment in the development of new industries. This saw limited job opportunities for a new generation of young workers. Consequently, many travelled across the Irish Sea to find steady employment in cities such as Liverpool, Birmingham and London. 

Image: A young Irish group at the London Irish Centre, c1960s

Other west European countries have experienced substantial migration, for example, Greece, Portugal, Spain, Norway and Scotland. However, nowhere else in western Europe has a demographic profile to match this decline or experienced such long-term systemic migration. 

The Archive of the Irish in Britain
The Archive of the Irish in Britain was originally donated to the Irish Studies Centre at the Polytechnic of North London (a predecessor institution to London Metropolitan University),  by the Irish in Britain History Group (IBHG) in 1989. The IBHG which was set up in the early 1980s began to collect documentation and oral interviews on the Irish in Britain as no other such collection existed at the time. 

This unique collection of documents, audio and video recordings, books, photographs and ephemera catalogues the history of the Irish in Britain from the late 19th century to the present day, and has expanded in the wake of subsequent funding, exhibitions and other outreach initiatives.

Featured collections include the London Irish Women's Centre, the Archive of Irish in Britain Poster collection and the Healing the Wounds Oral History project. 

Research topics

To highlight some of the many themes and subject areas covered by the The Archive of the Irish in Britain, below is a selection of introductory pages to help your research:

Irish Travellers
An Introduction to LGBTQIA+ histories

Further reading

'Writing Irish nurses in Britain. In: A History of Irish Working-Class Writing' Murray, Tony (2017)

'The fiction of the Irish in England. In: The Oxford Handbook of Modern Irish Fiction' Murray, Tony (2020)

‘Irish fever’ in Britain during the Great Famine: immigration, disease and the legacy of ‘Black ‘47’ MacRaild, Donald, Darwen, Lewis, Gurrin, Brian and Kennedy, Liam (2020)

'Unhappy and wretched creatures': charity, poor relief and pauper removal in Britain and Ireland during the Great Famine, 1847-50' MacRaild, Donald, Darwen, Lewis, Gurrin, Brian and Kennedy, Liam (2019)

'British and Irish Diasporas: Societies, cultures and ideologies' MacRaild, Donald (2018)

'Irishness and the culture of the Irish abroad' McWilliams, Ellen and Murray, Tony (2017)

'Troubled tales: short stories about the Irish in 1970s London' Murray, Tony (2012)