2021 #AtoZChallenge N is for ...Not just Ned : a true history of the Irish in Australia

  I've been researching my family history for over thirty years. Along this genealogy journey I have been supported by hundreds of books, many of which I have listed on my Librarything page. 

During the 2021 #AtoZChallenge I will be writing about two of my passions, books and family history. I'll be taking a trip down memory lane and revisiting some of those books that have enriched my genealogy experience.

Ten years ago when in Canberra I visited an exhibition at the National Museum of Australia, Not just Ned : a true history of the Irish in Australia. I blogged about that visit on this blog.

While I am not in the habit of buying souvenirs from events I sometimes make an exception for a book and, on this occasion, I splashed out and purchased the catalogue from the exhibition, Not just Ned : a true history of the Irish in Australia is an attractive and informative book that helps me recollect the things I learnt at the exhibition. To be sure, to be sure it was a wise investment.

Housed between two sturdy soft covers on nice thick paper, is a work generously illustrated with images of images and objects from the collection. This book is another example of creative and effective design that I am pleased to have on my bookshelf. 

The book commences with messages from the Irish Ambassador and the Director of the Museum followed by a multipage explanatory report from the Senior Curator, Richard Reid. 

And then its on to the main event, a reprisal of  many stories from the exhibition of Irish people and their influence in Australia. The object descriptions and stories are each limited to one page of text with one or more glorious large images on the opposite page. It is a beautiful book. If you have Irish ancestry or are just curious you will enjoy this book.

You can read about and see items from the exhibition here, https://www.nma.gov.au/exhibitions/not-just-ned. I found several copies of the book for sale here on the Abe Books site.

We'll all be rooned!

For my 2021 St Patrick's Day post I am thinking about my Irish Catholic ancestors who lived in the Australian bush and sharing a poem by John O'Brien.  John O'Brien was the pseudonym for Catholic priest, Patrick Joseph Hartigan.

O'Brien's poems have a special meaning for me as my Grandmother, Mary Tierney, gave me when I was quite young a book of O'Brien's poems, Around the Boree Log, that she had owned. I treasure this book today as I have fond memories of reading these poems with Nanna Curry. I especially loved performing the poem I have chosen for today as I enjoyed putting emphasis on the  word "rooned" that is repeated throughout.

For people living in the bush as my Irish ancestors did the social aspect of Sunday Mass was most important. It gave them a chance to talk about the effects of Australia's harsh elements on their farming activities. I can imagine my ancestors gathered on Sundays in Dungog, Cobar, Cowra, Canowindra, Burraga and Bathurst taking part in conversations similar to those related in this poem.

You can hear a recitation of the poem, Said Hanrahan, from a recording on Youtube

The poem was first published in The Catholic Press (Sydney, NSW : 1895 - 1942), 31 July, p. 19. which is available here on Trove: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article106072280. It was republished throughout the 1920s in many Australian newspapers and was published in O'Brien's collection Around the Boree Log in 1921. 

Following are all 21 verses of the poem.

SAID HANRAHAN by John O'Brien

"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
  In accents most forlorn,
Outside the church, ere Mass began,
  One frosty Sunday morn.


The congregation stood about,
  Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock, and crops, and drought,
  As it had done for years.


"It's looking crook," said Daniel Croke;
  "Bedad, it's cruke, me lad,
For never since the banks went broke
  Has seasons been so bad."


"It's dry, all right," said young O'Neil,
  With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
  And chewed a piece of bark.


And so around the chorus ran
  "It's keepin' dry, no doubt."
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
  "Before the year is out."


"The crops are done; ye'll have your work
  To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-o'-Bourke
  They're singin' out for rain.


"They're singin' out for rain," he said,
  "And all the tanks are dry."
The congregation scratched its head,
  And gazed around the sky.


"There won't be grass, in any case,
  Enough to feed an ass;
There's not a blade on Casey's place
  As I came down to Mass."


"If rain don't come this month," said Dan,
  And cleared his throat to speak -
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
  "If rain don't come this week."


A heavy silence seemed to steal
  On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
  And chewed a piece of bark.


"We want an inch of rain, we do,"
  O'Neil observed at last;
But Croke "maintained" we wanted two
  To put the danger past.


"If we don't get three inches, man,
  Or four to break this drought,
We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
  "Before the year is out."


In God's good time down came the rain;
  And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
  It drummed a homely tune.


And through the night it pattered still,
  And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
  Kept talking to themselves.


It pelted, pelted all day long,
  A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
  Way out to Back-o'-Bourke.


And every creek a banker ran,
  And dams filled overtop;
"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
  "If this rain doesn't stop."


And stop it did, in God's good time;
  And spring came in to fold
A mantle o'er the hills sublime
  Of green and pink and gold.


And days went by on dancing feet,
  With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
  Nid-nodding o'er the fence.


And, oh, the smiles on every face,
  As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey's place
  Went riding down to Mass.


While round the church in clothes genteel
  Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
  And chewed his piece of bark.


"There'll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
  There will, without a doubt;
We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan,
  "Before the year is out."

From Around the Boree Log and Other Verses, 1921

Blog in Malay - On St Patrick's Day!

Blogger made an inappropriate suggestion to me..

I have seen no evidence of St Patrick's Day while out and about in Singapore today but thought I should not let the day pass without blogging as the ethnicity suggestions from my DNA tests suggest that I have a good bit of Irish DNA.

Ancestry DNA suggests that I have 51% Irish ancestry while FTDNA suggests my DNA is 86% from The British Isles (which includes Ireland). My traditional research suggests that I am more than 60% Irish so I do have cause to celebrate. In fact I can claim to have a Green Tree.

But let's get back to Blogger and that inappropriate suggestion. The people at Blogger think they know me well but today they suggested that I should blog in Malay. Here is the message I received when I logged in to write this post today.

Thanks for your interest, Blogger. As the only phrase I know in Malay is Selamat Datang, I think I'll pass on your suggestion and concentrate on tracking down my ancestors from Ireland.

St Patrick's Day Image from https://clipartfest.com/">clipartfest.com

Eyes on Ireland

It's been a long time since I've sat down and systematically revisited my Irish ancestors. As I have a trip to Ireland planned I thought it time to become reacquainted.

I found that much of my old research is unsourced or that I have sources listed in the notes field of my software ( a result of using an unsophisticated genealogy software program years ago). So as I go through the records I am doing them over.

So what have I done? I identified my earliest ancestors and wrote their names on a piece of paper then starting at the top of the list I started researching on the free digitised  Catholic Parish Registers at The National Library of Ireland. It wasn't long before I struck gold, I identified, using the FAN principle or Cluster Genealogy, the Regiment in which my 3xGreat-Grandfather, John D'Arcy served. I knew he was a Lieutenant in the army but for over 25 years had been unable to identify his regiment. I'm indebted to the priest who recorded this information on a baptismal record of an ancestor's sibling. It found it hard sticking to one resource as my discoveries threw up tangents I wanted to pursue.

This early success fired me up. I spent seven hours on that first day going through the registers. I found baptisms for a few more family members and a marriage in 1839 for Dennis Tierney and Eliza Darcy,  I had this recorded (unsourced) as 1834. It had always bothered me how Dennis and Eliza had avoided having children in the first five years of their marriage! I was surprised to learn that Eliza's name was recorded as Elizabeth on her baptismal, now I can tell my daughter that she is named for her 2x Great-Grandmother. I scribbled on my piece of paper details of the registers I had consulted. Discovering a new sibling, Michael, for Eliza/Elizabeth has given me a whole new line to chase down.

On waking with a clear head and a mighty resolve the next morning I realised that my scrap of paper just wasn't going to work. I opened up Google Drive and created yet another geneasheet. Down the left side are names and details of the ancestors and across the top columns are listed the resources I may consult during my hunt - this has morphed into a very wide spreadsheet. As I have trouble researching down a straight and narrow path this document allows me to Zigzag and follow whims and be organised at the same time.

I remembered that there was a more efficient way to search the Registers so I took out a one month subscription to Roots Ireland. As well as offering Registers searches this resource allows me to search other indexes.

Resources at Roots Ireland

Using this resource found a record I had missed when scrolling through the microfilmed Parish Registers late at night. It was 18GBP well spent.

State Library of New South Wales

As I was meeting genimate, Lilian, at The State Library yesterday I decided to use my time chasing up the Irish. I searched the library catalogue for my Irish surnames and also the towns in which the ancestors settled. I ordered around twenty promising resources which I perused in the hope of finding snippets of information on the ancestors. I found a few more family members (remember those FANS) in cemetery registers, one line in a printed genealogy but not much more. One of the resources I found will be of great assistance with my CurryAus study but that's a story for another day. I love visiting the State Library and have resolved to do so again before I travel.

Lilian and I settle in for a day of research

I need to repeat this exercise with the catalogues of The Society of Australian Genealogists. I have a busy few weeks ahead of me. Before I set off the catalogue of the National Library of Ireland will get the same treatment.

While I was jumping all over the place I found a few mentions of the Irish ancestors in Ancestry Member Trees  (much of which appears to be copied from my website) and one of these actually sourced a book, a printed genealogy. Trove tells me that there is a copy of this in the Newcastle Region Library so I'm planning a trip up there to see if it will verify the information in that Ancestry tree.

Discovering via a hint on another Ancestry Tree that my ancestor Bridget Ryan wasn't a swimmer after all was another high spot for me. I had a newspaper reference that said Bridget had travelled to New South Wales in 1847 with her brother, Michael Harrington Ryan. I have now verified that she actually travelled to Victoria on British Empire in 1849 with her sister, Anne.

Hopefully, with the support of my new geneasheet, I'll be able to give my Irish ancestors a good doing over.

Trove Tuesday - Irish invasions

At the moment I am focusing on my Irish research and revisiting research done years ago which I  had put in the too hard basket.

I am more than 60% Irish so I wonder about my Irish ancestors and the many members of their extended families who came to New South Wales and Victoria in the nineteenth century. The convicts, of course, had no choice in the matter but the others came of their own free will.

Knowing nothing about the numbers who came I turned to Trove to find some contemporary information on the subject. I learnt that over 200,000 Irish came to Australia between 1851 and 1876 and that huge numbers went to the US and Britain - perhaps I should be looking for cousins in those places.

1877 'EUROPEAN INTELLIGENCE.', Advocate (Melbourne, Vic. : 1868 - 1954), 9 June, p. 4. , viewed 03 May 2016, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article170436026

Many Irish arrived earlier than the dates covered in the article above. My Irish convict ancestors including Ellen Moore, Mariner, arrived in the 1820s and my famine orphan, Mary Criggan, on Derwent in 1850. The first three of my Tierney/D'arcy line arrived in 1839 on China.

1825 'SHIP NEWS.', The Australian (Sydney, NSW : 1824 - 1848), 14 July, p. 3. , viewed 03 May 2016, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article37071634

1839 'Shipping Intelligence.', The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1803 - 1842), 21 December, p. 2. , viewed 03 May 2016, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article2549634

1850 'PORT PHILLIP.', The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), 6 March, p. 2. , viewed 03 May 2016, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12916203

My Irish Eyes were Smiling

Guess who I heard speak on Wednesday?

HINT - she was the star turn at the Hawkesbury Family History Group meeting for National Family History Month.

1. She has a wicked, dry sense of humour.
2. She knows her topic inside out.
3. She is a non-boring academic type.
4. She is obsessed with her topic.
5. Perhaps she should have been named Colleen.
6. She is the Chair of the Great Irish Famine Commemoration Committee (GIFCC) which is actively seeking information about Earl Grey’s Irish Workhouse Immigrant women. 

I have heard Dr Perry McIntyre speak on a number of occasions and was privileged to hear her again on Wednesday morning. Perry's topic was "Single female emigration in the 1830s & 1840s". As examples to illustrate her presentation Perry cited Irish examples. Now that was right up my alley as I have a couple of troublesome Irish girls in my tree including my Great-great-grandmother Bridget (Did she swim?) Ryan.

Perry's opening slide

Perry explained the options, criteria and processes for single Irish girls who wanted to come to the colonies and illustrated her talk with images of contemporary newspaper ads, paintings and photos. She then explained what happened to the girls from when they came off the boats until they got hitched. The stories and photos she shared of several Earl Grey girls were interesting.  I wish I could find a picture of my girl, Mary Cregan/Cligan/Creigan/Gregson. 

As Chair of the Great Irish Famine Commemoration Committee (GIFCC) Perry is actively seeking information about Earl Grey’s Irish Workhouse Immigrant women; as requested I will be emailing Perry with the scant information I have on Mary Cregan/Cligan/Creigan/Gregson, another of my Great-Great-Grandmothers.

Perry suggested the Atlas of the Great Irish Famine as a useful resource for background information on the famine. She neglected to say that one needs to be a weightlifter to lift this weighty tome!

My revelation for the day came when I asked Perry about how I could access a resource in PRONI that refers to my girl Mary. Apparently our friends at Familysearch have filmed the records and I could order it in to a local centre but I will wait until I go to Salt Lake City for Rootstech in Febraury. It will be something to look forward to.

Should you wish to hear Perry speak on a similar topic she will be talking at The Quarantine Station at North Head later this month. Details here.

Thanks to Jonathan for the happy snap. Perry (left) and me

My super morning was topped off when I had a cup of coffee and nice chat with Jonathan Auld and Michelle Nichols in a nearby cafe. Thanks to Michelle for organising another great talk at Hawkesbury and to Michelle and Jonathan who, knowing about my fetish for geneabling, brought me back a badge from the London "Who do you think you are live" event they attended.

Not just Ned: a true history of the Irish in Australia...

... is an exhibition I had been looking forward to visiting since I heard Richard Reid talk about planning for it  at the SAG Irish Day last year. Richard displayed such enthusiasm for the exhibition and passion for the Irish in Australia that I knew I had to attend.

The exhibition was my last stop this morning before travelling back home after a  few days break in Canberra. As Mr Geniaus was busy with work I dragged a friend, who also has Irish heritage, along with me. My friend hadn't heard much about the exhibition even though he lives in Canberra, not far from the National Museum of Australia where the exhibition is housed, and had no idea of what he would see.

The excellent exhibition, that shows many artefacts begged and borrowed from institutions and individuals from Australia and overseas, has a wealth of information about the Irish in Australia. Highlighted in the exhibition, in addition to Ned Kelly and his notorious gang, are many famous and infamous Australians of Irish heritage, their stories are told with photos, maps, video, sound and  artefacts.

There is a reading area that has a collection of books on Ireland, the Irish in Australia and Irish genealogy; unfortunately, as there were no copies of these for sale, the Museum is probably missing out on  some extra revenue. I did manage to buy a couple of books from the small collection that was for sale. Additionally in a corner of the retail/reading area there is a family history area with a few PCs that visitors can use to research their family history. It would be useful if there was a person available to help budding genealogists use the resources on these PCs.

Les Darcy - Locket

What I didn't realise was how much I would be emotionally affected by my visit, how many memories  of my early years it would dredge up and what a connection I would feel while in the exhibition space. It was because of  Patrick and Ellen, Bridget, Denis and Eliza, Mary, Michael and Catherine, Mary, Margaret and Ann, my Irish ancestors, that I felt such closeness. I recalled spending many hours with my grandmother, who was born in Australia and had never left its shores, talk longingly of Ireland and teaching me Irish songs like "The Rose of Tralee". That grandmother's cousin, boxer Les D'arcy, was one sportsman featured in the exhibition. I have not been able to find evidence to support her claim but am confident that, as they lived near each other in NSW and came from the same place in Ireland, that there is a relationship to our D'Arcy ancestors.

Hearing a recording of  "Hail Queen of Heaven" reminded me of my years in a catholic school and seeing the model of Tarmons, the first site of St Vincent's Hospital, and later part of St. Vincent's College caused me to reflect on my schooldays and the influence the Sisters of Charity.

When I saw the chalice that Father Therry, the pioneer priest, used in the early years of the colony tears welled up. Father Therry baptised my 2 x great grandfather, Patrick Curry. Patrick's parents, my convict ancestors Patrick Curry and Ellen Moore, would have taken communion from this cup when Father Therry visited the area near Camden Park where they lived. I was  glad that I had a friend with me with whom I could share my joy at seeing that object. Sadly, as photography is not allowed, I was not able to take a photo of the chalice to add to my family story.

I learnt so much about Australia from this exhibition and have added too many books to my "to buy" and "to read" lists; I am now anxious to organise another more leisurely trip to Ireland than my last one. My friend was thrilled that I had taken him along and, as our tickets allowed re-entry on the day, was returning  to continue his exploration after dropping me back to my hotel.

Not just Ned - Catalogue

The highlight of the day was when my friend called me over to see the exhibit on The Irish Memorial at Waverley Cemetery. He knew that he was a direct descendant of an Irish Rebel from Wicklow called Michael Dwyer (a cousin now deceased had given him this information) but did not know where he was buried; he discovered at the exhibition today that his ancestors Michael Dwyer and his wife, Mary, are buried in that monument and that "it was the largest funeral Sydney had seen with 400 horse-drawn carriages following the hearse in a procession of 10,000 people watched by 100,000 others." (Source)

I would have liked more time at the exhibition but am pleased that I was able to have a couple of hours there. The beautiful catalogue of the exhibition that I purchased will ensure that I can revisit and read about the event for years to come. If only it had a picture of Father Therry's chalice it would be perfect.

I would recommend this exhibition to anyone irrespective of their heritage, it is a must for those with a connection to Ireland  who should head for Canberra before the exhibition closes on July 31.

Top 100 Irish Australians revealed

I recently came across Australia's Irish newspaper, Irish Echo, online.

As my fathers ancestors were all Irish I have an interest in all thing Irish so I had browse through the paper. I found an interesting article from November, Top 100 Irish Australians revealed. Sadly none of my lot were on the list.

If you have Irish ancestors take a look, you may find mention of an ancestor.