I am Irish and I am proud of it…at least that is what my parents taught me. I’ve been hesitant to take one of those DNA tests to determine exactly where my ancestors originated from. I choose to go back to the line from the John Ford movie, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. At the end of the movie, a reporter trying to dig up dirt about the late Tom Doniphon, played by John Wayne, changes his tune when he hears the true story, states, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” I choose to live the legend my parents told me. Besides, what would I do with all this St. Patrick’s Day stuff and the refrigerator full of Guinness? At least I know what to do with the Guinness but the Kelly green, plastic bowler, not so much. Would I have to stop rooting for the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame? My life would have no purpose.
Recently one of my many cousins (A clue that my family may be Irish Catholic) just completed a family history project that she has been literally working on for decades. Half of that history focused on the family of her father and his brothers, including my dad. This past Christmas she was kind enough to share nearly 600 page history with all of her cousins from that family line. That is dedication and compared to the 10 to 15 minutes I spend researching these articles of mine, kind of embarrassing for me. At least I can use Wikipedia as a source. Who’s going to fact check me?
The large folder with my family’s history has been sitting on a counter in my living room and every time I walk by, I get drawn to it, to learn a little more about my ancestors. In the process, I discovered some of the conceptions about my dad’s side of the family were wrong. I had always thought that it was my great-great grandfather who immigrated to this country in the 1850s. It turns out, it was my great grandfather who came here and it was in the 1870s. I was surprised. I’m a third generation Irish American. At this news, I immediately started researching Irish citizenry to see if I qualified, just in case that former guy gets reelected one day. To my disappointment, to qualify to live in the land of green grass, constant rain and pubs of unlimited dark beer, my grandfather would have had to immigrate to America. I thought I could be the next Quiet Man and reclaim my family’s cottage somewhere in western Ireland. Another John Ford movie. Is there a theme forming here? So it turns out I am Irish and all of my father’s ancestors originate in Ireland. Most of them arrived in this country at about the same time. I discovered that I had Fitzpatrick, Walsh, Kelly, Tobin and Flynn in my lineage. How Irish is that. My stash of St. Patrick’s day green clothing is safe.
It will take me quite awhile to get through the massive volume of information in this family history but it should be fun. I have learned where my ancestors were from in Ireland, who they married, when they decided to leave the Emerald Isle and why. They were all part of a great migration from Ireland to find a better life, as the result of a 800 year occupation by the British. Am I getting a little political…you bet I am.
One interesting fact I learned is that my great-great grandfather Patrick, born around 1805, did some prison time. According to the family history, he spent a bit of time in court making charges against a few neighbors and answering to a few. The most serious charge was “the concealment of a sack of dried malt in the ground of his farm and a mill to process it (resulting in the highly alcoholic malt beer). He was sentenced to six months in prison.” Considering the tight grip the Brits had on every aspect of the Irishman’s life at the time, way to go gramps. Now back to my beer making in the garage.
As far as my mother’s side of the family, she also claimed Irish heritage. My sister-in-law is collecting information on her Irish roots and at the same time digging up info about my mom’s. Again, there are a lot of connections to Ireland on her side of the family and a few that might not be so Irish but close enough. Hey, any excuse to order a Guinness while dining is fine by me.
My mom used to tell me a story about her grandfather who immigrated to the U.S. and in the 1920s started receiving letters from the old homeland asking him to come back and save the family castle before it went into default. I always thought it was an “old wives tale” but when I finally got the chance to visit Ireland, I found out that the story was most likely true. Many of the old landlords were on the verge of losing their properties and in hopes of saving the family home, they would write letters to relatives who immigrated to America. They assumed that if they lived in America, they were rich. Unfortunately, by the time they wrote my great grandfather, he was old, feeble and near death. On top of that, he was not rich and couldn’t save the family property if he wanted to.
When I got back home from my trip to Ireland, I did a little more digging and found a very famous Irish castle with my great grandfather’s family name, and they did desperately try to find rich relatives to save the family estate. In the 1930s the family deeded the estate to the government and it’s now a very popular tourist site. Is it too late for me to claim my castle? I could see me wearing ermine, sitting on my throne (no, not the bathroom one) and lording over my subjects. Kind of like how I treated people who worked for me when I still had a career. Probably why I don’t have one now.
My final John Ford reference was a result of visiting the city of Galway in the west of Ireland. While checking out the waterfront and a landmark called The Spanish Steps, I was overcome by a sense of déjá vue. I had seen this place before, and I thought it might have been in a movie. When we arrived home I did some digging and found a 1950s John Ford movie called The Rising of the Moon. It was a trilogy about the Troubles in Ireland during the late teens and early 1920s in Ireland. The final scene has an IRA member escaping from custody in a row boat from the Spanish Steps while singing the old Irish folk song, The Rising of the Moon. I guess I have something for John Ford movies. That’s it. Just some useless information I needed to unload.
One of my brothers did take one of those genetic tests and according to his results, we are 100% Irish. I take that news with a grain of salt, considering how many different conquerors invaded our tiny island, the Irish are a mix of many different cultures. Like my articles, who cares about facts, I will go with the legend. Now, get out of my way, I have a Guinness that won’t drink itself.
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