Black people in Ireland, also known as Black Irish, Black and Irish or in , are a multi-ethnic group of Irish people of African descent. Black people, Africans and people of African descent have lived in Ireland in small numbers since the 18th century. Throughout the 18th century they were mainly concentrated in the major cities and towns, especially in the Limerick, Cork, Belfast, Kinsale, Waterford, and Dublin areas.
Increases in immigration have led to the growth of the community across Ireland. According to the 2022 Census of Population, 67,546 people identify as Black or Black Irish with an African background, whereas 8,699 people identify as Black or Black Irish with any other Black background.
History
Among the earliest examples of a Black presence in Ireland is from the account given that around 860CE, during the medieval Viking period when Scandinavian Dublin had an active slave market, Black prisoners were rounded up in Morocco and subsequently sold in medieval Ireland.
During the 18th century it was common and even fashionable for middle-class Anglo-Irish families to take Black servants into their households as a sign of wealth and prestige. In particular, having a young Black servant attend an Anglo-Irish lady of the house was considered a sign of exceptional wealth and high position in society. One of the most well-known Black servants in Ireland during this time was Tony Small. During the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), Small fled his owners from South Carolina, finding Lord Edward Fitzgerald in a near-death condition and assisting his recovery. Subsequently, Lord Edward returned to Ireland, where Tony Small became a dear friend to the family. Later, on a trip to London, Tony met his future wife, a French maid named Julia. The couple later had three children, Moirico, Harriet Pamela and Edward, moved to London and established a business.
Many were independent domestic workers, travelling musicians, artists, soldiers and tradesmen. Others were servants who received a salary and were considered free people. A small number of formerly enslaved Black Americans relocated to Ireland. In addition to Tony Small, the preacher John Jea and the scholar William G. Allen both resided in Ireland for several years before all three relocated to England.
Some Black people who settled in Ireland assimilated into the wider Irish population, including entering into mixed marriages and having children with white Irish people. 'Mulatto Jack' was also a child of interracial marriage. Abducted from Ireland in the early 18th century, he was subsequently sold as a slave in Antigua. After helping plot a slave rebellion, he was discovered by the colonists, and his release was negotiated for several months until agreed upon provided his instant deportation back to Ireland. The Black singer Rachael Baptist, also known as Rachael Crow, lived and worked throughout Ireland in the mid-18th century, as well as spending 10 years in England. One estimate suggests that, over the course of the 18th century, the total number of Black people in Ireland may have been between 2,000 and 3,000, though not all present at the same time. Dublin in particular is thought to have had, after London, the largest Black population of any city in the British Isles, and possibly any European city outside London.
Former slaves who visited or toured Ireland included Olaudah Equiano and Frederick Douglass.
Afro-Caribbean people descended from Irish Caribbean people, especially those on Barbados, Jamaica, and Montserrat, often have Irish surnames, speak a form of Caribbean English influenced by the Irish vernacular and, in some cases, sing Irish songs.
Since Partition Republic of Ireland Mid-20th Century In the mid-20th century, the Irish government ran schemes aimed at attracting students from African nations, with the aim of providing them with skills that would be useful in the growth of newly independent countries. In 1962, there were 1,100 African students in Ireland, comprising roughly a tenth of the student population. Many of these schemes were facilitated using links between Irish missionary organizations. This also included military training, with a military college taking on a delegation of Zambian cadets in 1967, citing Ireland's lack of a history of imperialism. Their stay was mostly temporary since many returned to their countries after graduating and gaining sufficient skills to prosper back home. However, throughout the 1960s until roughly the 1990s, the African population in Ireland, although remaining relatively small, consisted not only of students but of visitors and professionals, such as doctors.
Examples of Black African students in Ireland during this period include Jaja Wachuku, who studied at Trinity College Dublin in the 1940s and would later become a prominent statesman in his native Nigeria.
Celtic Tiger era The increase of Ireland's non-white population started with the Irish boom of 1997 to 2009 is due in part to the laws which had governed Irish citizenship since the creation of the Republic of Ireland in 1937. These laws, which granted citizenship jus soli, were, for a period, interpreted by the Department of Justice as allowing parents who were not Irish citizens to remain in the state based on the rights of their Irish-born citizen children. In 2001 the government under Taoiseach Bertie Ahern sent Tánaiste Mary Harney on a world trip to invite people to come to Ireland. Harney visited 5 countries in Africa, including Nigeria and South Africa which eventually saw many people migrating to Ireland. This automatic granting of residency ceased in 2007, following a decision of the Supreme Court. As Ireland is Anglophone, and the large amount of immigration between the United Kingdom and the Republic, the vast majority of Black people in Ireland are immigrants (or their descendants) from Commonwealth countries in the Caribbean and Africa. The Twenty-seventh Amendment of the Constitution of Ireland changed the qualifications for Irish citizenship in 2004.
The 2006 Irish census recorded 40,525 people of Black African ethnicity and 3,793 people of any other Black background resident in the Republic out of a total population of 4,172,013, meaning that 1.06 percent of the population self-identified as Black. The preliminary results of the 2011 census recorded 58,697 people of Black African ethnicity and 6,381 people of any other Black background resident in the Republic out of a total population of 4,525,281, meaning that 1.42 per cent of the population self-identified as Black.
The Celtic Tiger boom of 1992–2007 also increased immigration into Ireland from all parts of the world, including Africa, and this led to delays in processing applications at the Garda National Immigration Bureau. For non-EU persons, this led to restrictive laws and hundreds of deportations annually of those not qualifying for asylum or admission. Some failed asylum cases received considerable media attention, such as that of Pamela Izevbekhai, who claimed that her daughters were likely to be subjected to female genital mutilation following deportation, and that another daughter had died from the same procedure in 1994. Despite presenting her case to the Seanad in 2008 and as far as the Supreme Court of Ireland and European Court of Human Rights, the court found in 2011 that her use of forged documents was "inadequate".
Individual areas have been noted as having larger groups of people descended from Sub-Saharan Africa than most of the country. The town of Gort, County Galway, is home to a large Brazilian population, including Black and mixed-race individuals.
2010s and present Following the European migrant crisis of 2015, refugees from conflict zones in North, East and Central Africa, such as Eritrea, Sudan, Somalia, the Congo, and Burundi have settled in Ireland.
There are a number of challenges noted by Ireland's Black people, including casual racism, persistence of stereotypes, and inequal treatment in education.
Many refugees from African countries reside in Ireland's direct provision system, an intake system for asylum seekers that has been frequently condemned for its drawn-out processing timelines and poor quality of life.
Northern Ireland
World War II A number of African American soldiers were stationed in Northern Ireland as part of American involvement in World War II. The reaction of those in Northern Ireland was 'largely color-blind', with acceptance generally offered from both Catholic and Protestant communities, who viewed the visiting soldiers primarily as American. The Stormont government refused to enact segregation laws at the behest of the American military, though there were instances of unofficial segregation and racism, largely drawn from ignorance. It is suggested that there was, however, differing treatment of white American and black American troops by the Northern Irish population, especially in the later years of the war. The lack of a color bar, by and large, in treatment in Northern Ireland led to feelings that equality was attainable at home as it was abroad. Many women who involved themselves in relationships with American soldiers, black or white, risked ostracism by their community. Much media coverage of black American troops relied heavily on stereotypes, even when coverage was largely positive. Despite the Stormont Government not keeping records of the births of mixed-race children, official and unofficial sources note the birth of several. The equal treatment between white and black soldiers was also noted as causing significant anger among the white soldiers.
The Troubles A number of Black people from mainland Britain were stationed in Northern Ireland during The Troubles, as part of British Army deployments. A small number of the 3,000 victims of violence during The Troubles were Black, both British Army soldiers and civilians. Tim Brannigan, a Black mixed-race man convicted of storing weapons for the Provisional Irish Republican Army was held in the Maze Prison from 1990-1994.
Post-Good Friday Agreement At the time of the 2001 United Kingdom census, of the total population of Northern Ireland (1,685,267), 255 people described their ethnicity as Black Caribbean, 494 as Black African and 387 as Other Black, meaning that the total Black population was 1,136. These figures do not include individuals who described themselves as being of mixed-race.
As well as help from the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland, the EU-funded Afro-Community Support Organisation Northern Ireland (ACSONI) was formed in 2003 to represent the views of Black people. ACSONI prepared a report in 2011 on other residents' perceptions and general knowledge of Africa and Africans.ACSONI report online, May 2011; seen on 24-11-2011
Mother and Baby Homes It was noted that approximately 275 mixed-race children were born and held in Mother and Baby Homes between 1922 and 1998. Pregnancies between white Irish and Black couples rarely resulted in marriage, with resulting children often taken into these institutions, leaving them with incomplete records of family history. Mixed-race children were subject to discrimination in these institutions, with fewer being offered for adoption at the same rate as white Irish babies. Many were sent to 'reject wards' for children deemed 'unadoptable' on the basis of their skin color. A report into the Mother and Baby Homes denied there was racial discrimination within these institutions.