Many working class Irish farmers were tenants under landlords, producing cereals, potatoes and livestock.
But only the potatoes remained as food for the farmers themselves; the other products were used for paying the rent and exported from Ireland to Great Britain.
The 300 inhabitants of the townland of Ballinlass in Galway County, in the Barony of Killian, northeast of Mountbellew, were relatively "wealthy" and able to pay their rent.
But despite this fact, they were evicted on 13 March 1846 because the landlord, a Mrs Gerrard, intended to establish a grazing farm where the village was situated.
The houses of Ballinlass were demolished by army and police; the people slept in the ruins in the following night.