Letters home reveal hopes and fears of new arrivals in America

In the wake of St Patrick's Day, Ireland's annual celebration of its diaspora, a new online archive has given voice to the human cost paid by generations of emigrants.

- Rory Carroll

More than 7,000 letters from emigrants to North America spanning four centuries have been collected and digitised, giving poignant insight into the homesickness, tribulations and occasional triumphs of those who crossed the Atlantic. They tell of Pennsylvania coalmines, Minnesota winters, Boston slums and the desperate struggle to adapt and survive - as well as the likelihood of never seeing home again.

Kerby Miller, a US historian, amassed the trove over nearly 60 years by combing archives and private collections, and making appeals for letters, memoirs and other documents in trunks, drawers and attics, yielding more than 150,000 pages spanning the late 1600s to the 20th century.

The University of Galway has placed the collection in a digital repository that is searchable and free to access, creating a new window on Irish, US and Canadian history.