Soupers and Jumpers: The Protestant Missions in Connemara by Miriam Moffit (Paperback, 2008) for sale online

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The establishment of Protestant missions in Connemara during the Famine saved the lives of thousands who flocked to its schools and religious services to obtain food. The mission interpreted these vast attendances as proof of devout conversions and, within a few years, bible schools and Protestant churches sprang up throughout Connemara, staffed by hundreds of mission agents. As might be expected, the Catholic clergy viewed this as a threat to the souls of their flocks and mounted an aggressive campaign against the mission. Their most effective tactic was to order the total ostracism of converts and the district became polarised into those those who associated with the mission and those who stayed away. In reality, the peasant population of Connemara were pawns in the struggle for supremacy between the Catholic and Protestant churches. Soupers and Jumpers focuses on the experiences of Connemara's converts, detailing their experiences while they were with the mission and explaining why most returned to the Church of Rome.