Glasgow has deep Irish roots because of large-scale migration from Ireland in the nineteenth century, and above all during the Great Famine of 1845 to 1852. Ireland lies only a short sea crossing away, and Glasgow’s booming industries were hungry for labour, so tens of thousands of Irish people settled in the city. Their descendants helped shape Glasgow’s religion, culture and character.

Migration before the Famine

Irish people had been coming to Glasgow long before the Famine, as seasonal farm workers and as weavers, many of them Protestants from Ulster. By 1841, a large share of the city’s people were already Irish-born or of Irish descent. The Catholic community grew especially fast, from only a few hundred people around 1800 to tens of thousands within four decades. You can read the fuller account on our page about Irish migration to Glasgow.

The Great Famine

Everything changed with the Famine. From 1846 desperate refugees crossed to Scotland to escape starvation, and the fare on a crowded deck cost only a few pence, less than the passage to America. In 1847 alone, more than fifty thousand Irish people arrived in Glasgow. By 1851 the Irish-born made up over eighteen per cent of the city’s population, and unlike the earlier arrivals they were overwhelmingly Catholic.

Building the city

The Irish provided much of the muscle that powered Glasgow’s rise. They dug the canals, laid the railways and built the roads; they worked the coal mines, the textile mills and later the shipyards. It was often said that Glasgow’s growth into the workshop of the Empire owed a great deal to the vast reservoir of labour that arrived from Ireland.

A lasting legacy

The migration reshaped the city’s religious and social life. Catholic churches and schools were founded across Glasgow, and communities took root in the East End and the Gorbals. In 1887 a Marist teacher, Brother Walfrid, founded Celtic Football Club at a church hall in the East End, its first purpose to raise money to feed poor Irish children. The arrival of so many people, Catholic and Protestant alike, was not without friction, and old tensions were carried across the water too. But the Irish contribution is now woven so deeply into Glasgow that the city is hard to imagine without it.

How many Irish people came to Glasgow during the Famine?

In 1847 alone more than fifty thousand Irish people arrived in Glasgow, and by 1851 the Irish-born made up over eighteen per cent of the city’s population.

Why did Irish people come to Glasgow?

The sea crossing was short and cheap, and Glasgow’s fast-growing industries offered plentiful work. During the Famine, many came simply to escape starvation.

Were all the Irish migrants Catholic?

No. A significant minority, around a quarter, were Protestant, many of them from Ulster. The great Famine influx, however, was overwhelmingly Catholic.