hi folks, here are some useful sites. I'm sure there are more out there :-) a fascinating subject. http://www.lonympics.co.uk/famines.htm http://www.bromsgrovebmsgh.co.uk/diseases_through_history.htm http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090215063303AAMHP9Z http://attala.msghn.org/epidemics.html http://www.ayrshireroots.com/Genealogy/Reference/Plagues%20z.htm I can add that in the 1690s, when a famine hit the Highlands and Scandinavia, with back-to-back years of hunger, there had been a volcanic explosion in Iceland causing a thick yellow har to lie low over the land which burned the skin & killed crops. Folk from lowland Aberdeen were heading for the Highlands to try to escape it though they weren't a lot better off. and look at the 1840s. Though so far i haven't found anything to say the famine included England, it is hard to imagine that Scotland and much of Europe was ravaged by it and not England too. even the lists of diseases over the 1840s for UK makes no mention of English famine though poverty and hunger certainly make folk less resistant to the epidemics that were doing the rounds at the time. It'd be interesting to know if the OPRs or church minutes make any mention of it. cheers for now le durachd Fionnghal