A bit of light shed...

When you go on the ancestry roots search, be prepared to dig in for the long haul.

This is especially true when you are only going on slight memories from others, trying to remember dates and names not written down anywhere at hand.

 Then after hours of looking at records you are finally rewarded!

At the least its a start into finding out a bit more about my dads mothers side of the family.

So far I haven't found any birth records but I have found these copies of landing papers from their home in Belfast to Montreal...

The first to come was my grandma in 1923. She was 18 and had 3 pounds to her name.

Next came her sister, Susie in 1924. She was 18.

Then came my Great Grandma in 1924 who had a total of 6 pounds to her name.
 I found out that she was a nurse at the time. Her husband died of  influenza back in Belfast and because of religious differences, his family had never accepted their marriage and took the body from her when he died.
I suspect this would have been part of the reason why the young widow with 5 children left Belfast.
That and the turmoil in Northern Ireland at the time.
One odd thing about her papers though, is that she lists her birth place as Innisbaro. I have looked and looked for this place on the internet and can't seem to find anything with even a similar spelling in all of Ireland or the UK, so there the mystery remains...for now.

And finally her 2 sons came to join her and the rest of the family in 1926.
They landed in Halifax. They were 22 and 16 years old.
Funny thing about the older one, Wilson, his trade was labled as a golf cub maker!

So its good to have a bit more info and I will keep digging and see where the next trail leads...In the meantime, I think of them all on the streets of Belfast, Falls road where we went to get a feel of where they lived, possibly walked in the same parks as they did....Oh lovely spirits...come out and wander...

Troubled Times.

Growing up in an Canadian Irish family, you pay attention to stories from older relatives and that which is on the news to do with the so called “troubles”. During the ‘60’s and ‘70’s, being the more recent extremely bloody times in Northern Ireland, it is hard to imagine growing up in such violence. The Shankhill / Falls Road area of Belfast has known more than its fair share of turmoil and is still a fortified neighborhood in the city of Belfast. To learn more about this history, dad and I decided to take what is called a Black Cab tour…this is offered by the people who grew up and live in the said neighborhood and who obviously are well informed personally and politically about the past as well as present day goings-ons. Dads mother grew up on the Falls Road side which has become the ‘Catholic’ side. It was another intense day with the ghosts of his past…Protestants and Catholics used to live side by side, but of course because of deep rooted beliefs on both sides too much violence has since separated the two. There is a wall running between the neighborhood which runs for miles and is 25 feet tall in most places. They were originally built as temporary structures but have since become permanent. There are gates in and out of the areas that are locked at 10p.m and reopen for the working day the next morning. I was amazed and frankly a bit shocked to realize how fortified this urban, working class area is and how strange it felt to see the effort put into keeping the ‘peace’. In both areas are huge murals painted on the walls in tribute to fallen comrades and heroes of the causes. I was able to get a few pictures before my damn battery went dead(with no backup nearby) and only ones from the first part of our tour which was the Protestant area of Shankhill Road.                  

Looking for kin…

                                                                                 

Our next day in Belfast was to be spent checking out some record offices to see if we could find out anything about dads ancestors who had all left Ireland for Canada. His grandfathers side was from the south, probably around Cork, and had left during the great famine of the 1800’s. This migration to Canada and the U.S has been well documented although if you don’t have exact dates and names it can gobble up a wack of time looking at ships records. This was the info we didn’t have but dad did know something of his grandmothers family who were mostly from Belfast. After a few leads we did come across a possible name and date of birth of his great grandfather who was a linen merchant. It was incredibly emotional for dad to have this name looking back at him from the past and even more so when we walked the streets and sat in the same parks as his relatives had done many years before. …

New and improved

So lets see…where were we…oh yes..the motherland..Ireland.

After our adventure in the centre of Dublin and some much needed rest, Aja, dad and I made the pilgrimage to Northern Ireland.

More specifically to Belfast where dad’s family came from on his mothers side.

Luckily Aja had the weekend off so she offered to drive us up and then dad and I would hang out for 3 days while she went back to Dublin.

I had highlighted a side trip which was about 10 minutes off the motorway and am I ever glad we took this detour!

The place is called Mellifont Abbey just west of Drogheda and is the first Cistercian monastery to be built in Ireland around 1142.

Once again we had gorgeous weather (not to be taken lightly in Ireland in May!) and not a soul around….it really lends to a place so sacred and beautiful when there’s no one else there.

So while we were up looking around the ruins, we met a man and his young son who lived up the road. He asked us if we had been to Monasterboice and if we hadn’t we really should see it as it is home to some of Irelands’ oldest High Crosses from the 10th century….

Of course we took him up on his offer to follow him about a 5 minute drive up the road. 

Good thing we followed him because it was around a few good winding, narrow and twisty, turny tracks that might not have been too easy to find by description alone.

Out in the middle of a pastoral valley was this amazing 5th century cemetery complete with the crosses and a gorgeous round tower made of stone….

BIG cross…wee da..

The incredible thing is that the big crosses were all carved by hand and made of a single slab of stone….must’ve had a hell of a lot of time on their hands, those monks…

 I even found a little birds nest in the window of the Roundtower!   

                                                                 

We got a bit lost in Belfast but after a few dead ends and looking over our shoulders a few times we found our B&B on a lovely tree lined street.

The reason for a bit of nervousness was that when Aja came up to Belfast a year ago, she arrived on the day of the Orangemens Parade. Hundreds of people marching in support of Prods and British rule…not a day when you want to be driving around with Irish license plates.

After we checked in we went for a stroll into the city and had a look at the beautiful sight of Queens University built in 1879.