“Neither do these tenants or their children emigrate”: famine and transatlantic emigration from Finland in the nineteenth century

Abstract

The Great Finnish Famine of 1868, referred to by Cormac Ó Gráda as the “last great subsistence crisis of the western world”, caused the death of nearly one-tenth of Finland's population. This article examines the patterns of post-famine emigration from Finland, and considers differences of scale and context with Irish post-famine emigration, as well as the differences in national identity which conditioned responses to the famines, and their commemoration/politicization in the respective emigrant communities. Emigration from Finland did take place during the famine period – particularly to parts of the Russian Empire – but emigration to North America was very limited, and the so-called American Fever took hold in Finland only two decades later. The contrasts were underpinned mainly by variances in the constitutional statuses of Finland and Ireland in the nineteenth century. Finland had been a Grand Duchy of Russia after passing from Swedish rule in 1809, but unlike Ireland, after 1801, it possessed a considerable amount of internal autonomy. With no apparent need to construct a narrative of oppression or resistance, Finland was able to develop a national identity based on values such as self-reliance and education. When the famine struck, it was the Finns themselves who were responsible for organizing relief, and it was inappropriate to blame the Russian imperial authorities. Emigration, likewise, was portrayed as a reaction to problems caused by general economic restructuring in Finland, directed by a home-rule government in Helsinki. When narratives of the Finnish famine appeared, in the 1890s, they contained no sense of grievance against Russia, and instead preached the importance of hard work, communality, and self-sufficiency. If the Great Irish Famine helped to crystallize anti-British feelings among emigrants in America, early Finnish-American newspapers concentrated largely on transplanting the ideals of Finnish nationhood into the New World.