Irish Immigration To Canada Essay

During the 19th and 20th century immigration was vastly popular among the Irish and Chinese people. They faced rough travels across the oceans, dangerous disease causing many to die while on ships and navigated through harsh landscapes. Finding ships to take them was difficult along with the ride across the oceans which resulted in many fatalities for the Irish. Once they arrived both of them were discriminated against due to their ethnicity, culture and religion. Many of these people were used because they had no income to provide to themselves and their families resulting in them to take whatever means possible to survive. Even though years of discrimination and hardship the Chinese and Irish people still remain the Canada today in our society.

Many Irish settlers left because of the Great Irish Potato Famine of 1847 causing many to die from starvation. Those who survived sought after passage to North America but only few could afford ships to America because it was more expensive leaving the poorest immigrants with Canada as their only refuge. The ships travelling to North America were commonly known as “Coffin Ships” because people were crammed into ships causing many people to spread disease and viruses killing thousand of people before they ever arrived in Canada. These voyages took six weeks to travel three thousand miles with the bare minimum of food, water and space yet many survived and today four and a half million Canadians claim to have Irish lineage. Chinese immigrants first came in 1788 as artisans and traders, then in 1858 Chinese prospectors came to Barkerville and later in 1880 workers came over to work on the Canadian Pacific Railway. Once the railway was finished the Chinese Exclusion Act was put in place in 1885 which was a head tax that charged every Chinese person $50 to enter Canada and went up to $500 in 1903 severely dropping Chinese immigration numbers. It was a difficult task for the Irish because of the lack of money from the and for the Chinese people because of the head tax but overall for the both immigrants was incredibly