New film traces family's story of survival on an Irish coffin ship that crashed off Gasp coast

Of the 173 people who boarded thevesselCarricks of Whitehavenbound from Ireland to Canada in 1847, 48 made it to shore alive.

"It must have been a horrific scene. Bodies were scattered along the beach for about a mile and a half according to the first eyewitnesses," saidGearid hAllmhurin, a professor at Concordia University's School of Irish Studies.

Just off the coast of theGasp Peninsula, the ship was caught up in anor'easter which froze the sails and sent the mast cracking down through the ship.

Among the survivors were married couplePatrick Kaveney and Sarah MacDonald, as well as their teenage son Martin.

Their five daughters, all between the age of two and 10, were lost.

This family and their descendants are the subject of a new documentary, calledLost Children of the Carricks: Defying the Great Irish Famine to Create a Canadian Legacy.

Filmmaker hAllmhurinfirst heard the story fromGeorges Kavanagh, a francophone historian and descendant ofKaveneyandMacDonald.

"I was truly astonished when I heard him describe their leaving Ireland, their crossing the Atlantic, the experience of being trapped in this ship which, at the time, wasn't too different from a slave ship,and then arriving on the edge of the New World," hAllmhurintold CBC Montreal's All in a Weekend.

Over the course of five generations, the story ofKavanagh's ancestorsand their was preserved through the family's oral tradition.

"This is oral storytelling at its richest, at its very best," said hAllmhurin.

Thousands of Irish people fled to North America during the potato famine, in ships that weren't built to house human cargo.

Canada alone received about 300,000 Irish immigrants, but an estimated 20,000others died at sea or on shore from disease.

hAllmhurin's film is described as a "70-minute documentary of exodus and reunion," beginning with Kavanagh (whose name was changed slightly from the original Kaveney over the years) in the Gaspsie and following his journey back to Ireland.

"We were able to bring the Kaveney the Kavanagh family back into their ancestral village," he said.

The film crew worked with local historians in County Sligo, Ireland to track down the original walls of theKaveneyhome and even some living cousins.

hAllmhurinsaid it was an emotional experience forKavanagh, now in his 80s, and his daughter.

"Hehad been waiting his whole life. He told me on the way across the Atlantic that ever since he was a teenager, he dreamed of going to Ireland. And he described it as 'Mon Irlande,' My Ireland. Which was so touching to hear."

The film,Lost Children of the Carricks: Defying the Great Irish Famine to Create a Canadian Legacy, screens Friday Jan. 24 at theJ.A. DeSve Cinema as part of the 28th edition of the Cin Gael Montral Irish Film Series. The festival runs Fridays from Jan. 24 to May 1.