Day 3 - My Ireland Family Heritage Tour

Tuesday, 17 September 2019
Somewhat better night last night, but we've still got a way to go to really hit our stride on the sleeping front. Today we need to be up and organised for an 8 am pick up by Ian of My Ireland Family Heritage for an Ancestral Homelands tour. This tour has been eye-wateringly expensive but the reviews online are excellent. It sounds too good to be true and you know what they say about things that sound too good to be true.
Before we check out of the Temple Bar Hotel I guess I should say a few words about the breakfast. It's good. The pastries are very fresh and I find that's a pretty good litmus test for a hotel breakfast. Hubby's not having too much success resisting the full Irish when it's available. I've been no more successful trying to eat sensibly while sticking with the continental. This morning we both resist the pastries (gasp).
When we finally get downstairs Ian is parked out front waiting a little ahead of time, but it's a little after eight before Michael's done with reception.
We're away. We start with a little loop around either side of the Liffey and Ian gives us a rapid fire explanation of the bridges and other sights along the way. The Ha'penny Bridge taunts us as Ian asks did we cross it?  One for next time. The Ist Duke of Wellington brought in the iron for it. Yes, the man of infamy who is so often quoted as having said when it was observed that he was born in Ireland so doesn't that make him Irish, replied "being born in a stable does not make you a horse." We've had this told to us a few times during our stay, but Wikiquotes says that this is misattributed. The earliest record of this statement was by Irish Politician Daniel O'Connell about Wellesley rather than by Wellesley about himself.
As we pass the council building a finger of accusation is pointed in its direction once more with "That should never have been built!" followed by a very quick explanation of why and indications of strong agreement from all present. We proceed like this down as far as Heuston Station and cross over and head downstream along the quays. Note that the Wellington monument in Phoenix Park has panels on the side cast from the melted down guns captured at the battle of Waterloo.  Up past what was a military barracks but now Museum of Decorative Arts and History. Passing now Croppie's Acre - so called because they buried the 1798 Rebels there. They called them croppies for the style in which they wore their hair. Wikipedia reckons that they displayed some rebels bodies there tied to pikes at the burial location and that archaeological investigations have found no evidence of this plot having been used as a burial ground. It notes that the alignment of the Liffey was altered in this area to extend the quays and that this site was used as a playing field for the barracks. Either way, it's a nice thing to have a memorial to the Battle of Vinegar Hill and those executed. The convict rebellion dubbed the Second Battle of Vinegar Hill occurred at Rouse Hill in Sydney in 1804 so my ears always prick up when anything around the 1798 rebellion is discussed. On we go past the Four Courts where our genealogical records were destroyed by fire in 1922 during fighting related to the civil war.
Our city tour isn't restricted to the proud places of Dublin, having noted one such ugly building, heading away from the Liffey we pass the memorial to James Connolly and travel around behind the Custom House to admire the splendid ugliness of the Busaras Central Station on which was spent rather a lot of money. I observe that even more than the architecture, the problem seems to be that the materials used have not worn well.  We drive up and over in the distance the rim of Croke Park is visible so we discuss Gaelic football and Aussie Rules football (AFL). I didn't know that Gaelic Football is a source of players for the professional AFL but Hubby is more aware of that. We take a quick look at Bram Stocker's birthplace and childhood home and head on to the motorway and the north.
Our first stop is a service centre for the motorway where we take a toilet break and grab a bite to eat and a drink and head back on our way past Drogheda. When we were at Vaults Live there was a mention of Drogheda as we were welcomed. Irish among our group pointedly corrected pronunciation by our guide and I got a sense that mispronunciation of this town name is like fingernails on a chalkboard to local people. I studied Ian's references to Drogheda across the two days we are together and I think I've got it down pat. It's Drahda with a very slight gutteral catch in the middle.

On through Newry and the distance flies as we chat and laugh together, then suddenly we're pulling up at the Drumlough Gospel Hall. It's a tidy building and gravel yard with a small graveyard.  We drive in and get ourselves organised, I don my white sunhat and we walk down to the rear of the block and peer out over the wall. The weather is about as good as weather gets anywhere on earth and so is the scenery. Wow.  "I told yus it was gorgeous scenery". "Yes, It most certainly is".

The Mountains of Mourne loom in the distance and in between is green fecundity. Ian pulls out his folder of maps in sleeves and his phone and lines up what is showing on the phone with the illustration the right spot and which plot of hedgerowed field was apparently occupied by my relatives back in the day. They rented of course. You wouldn't leave this land if you owned this! We spend some time checking out particular plots and tracing back on the phone to current maps. Get a shot of the two of us with the scenery, then we're back in the car and heading for Rathfriland.

Rathfriland in the distance on the top of a nearby hill

It's always deceptive looking at two dimensional maps and sometimes really surprising when you arrive on the ground. Rath means a ringfort so it's not a great leap to the liklihood that a town named Rathfriland would be in an elevated position and it is. As the town centre is at the top of the hill, the main streets inevitably take a downward trend with beautiful views in every direction. The township has an air of quiet middle class comfort. It's well presented with a tidy town square and memorials at either end with parking in between. We spend some time looking at familiar family names on the war memorial. Which is nice. I like paying my respects at war memorials but as an exercise in genealogy it's a bit ho hum. A big deal is made of the name George Morrow being present on his own large stone at the base of the memorial.  One of my 4th great grandmothers was a Morrow who would have been born about 1800, so anyone named Morrow in the Great War or later would at best be a very distant relative.

Rathfriland War Memorial

Happy to move on from Rathfriland we head out of town a short way to Monegore Road and a building now labelled Moneygore Orange Hall 1948. This is a replacement to the National School as shown on Griffiths Valuation. I wander about photographing the marvellous views across to the mountains and some lovely old buildings across the road.

Some bees and other insects hover about flowers in the hedgerow, it is an idyllic scene. Oh how my forebears must have yearned for this place, that they were destined never to see again. Life must have been very hard despite the natural beauty of the area. No prospects of security or financial comfort. Why else would you leave. I wander down the road and return. Then we drive back down and pause again to gaze across at some additional plots occupied by persons who had surnames with which we are familiar.

Residence of Alexander Anderson and Joseph Morrow as recorded in Griffith's Valuation

Neither ourselves or Ian are sure why people named Irwin are highlighted in our copy of Griffiths Valuation. Some of the plots of interest to us are not accessible from the road. There's still some sensibilities in Protestant areas of Northern Ireland to persons with Republic of Ireland number plates wandering about, so some caution is apparently required.

Further along, seeking the closest vantage point to the plots in areas where we can't really access them from the road, I walk up past a farm where the squeals of pigs send shivers up my spine. We've only just been joking and laughing about never cross a pig farmer.  Then the almightly scream of an alarm going off and I head back for the car which Ian has driven up behind me. We're up the hill looking at some more distant buildings and one nearer the road that would have been similar to the sort of dwelling my forebears would have lived in. Quaint now perhaps, if one images a 100,000 or so to renovate and perhaps modernise.

Time is getting on and well and truly lunch time, so Ian takes us into Maginns in Castewellan. As we walk into the sombre light from the bright sunshine we find a complex layout richly decorated and choose a table down towards the rear, a large TV playing sports and a beautiful lead light ceiling overhead.  Lunch is on Ian (I should think so given the cost of the tour). We each had a small serve of seafood chowder with homemade wheaten bread. I followed with the daily special of  Cod Coujons with mushy peas, chips and tartare sauce. Michael (predictably) went for the King Prawn Linguine with garlic, coriander and lemon balm, double cream and a slice of garlic ciabatta. The chips were pretty ordinary but the rest of the food was very nice. Michael won that one, his linguine was lovely.

Ballyroney Presbyterian Church

I think I could handle being laid to rest in this spot for eternity

Back on the road we are into the part of the day where we wander about cemeteries looking for surnames we recognise. One was a large grey stone Ballyroney Presbyterian church, where the dead have a better view than most people living, then we're onto the church of most interest: Ist Rathfriland Presbyterian.

Ist Rathfriland Presbyterian dates from the 17th Century

There's a man mowing the grass in the lower area of the graveyard. It's a beautiful location once again the slope of the ground overlooking the countryside. We photograph gravestones of varying interest. It's good to be here. I have a nice little chat with the groundsman, he's friendly and tackles the maintenance in stages. All the graveyards we've visited are beautifully cared for. As we return back up to the church, the minister is present (just by coincidence) and talking to Ian who introduces us. Soon we're invited in to look around inside the church. Once again we have a lovely conversation, us foreigners reasonably oblivious to some political undercurrents as we discuss everything from the weather to Brexit to the upcoming Harvest Festival. Unfortunately my family left Ireland too early to be of much use to a local history project they've got going focusing on more recent events. We discuss the architecture of the church, Trevor having asked us about churches in Australia. In Australia you don't see this arrangement with a second level, not in Christian churches anyway. This church would originally have been built without the mezzanine section which was added to increase capacity. Upstairs you have limited visibility which was fine for the religious practice so long ago when all that was needed was to be able to see the bible and minister, but nowadays technology is used to give greater visibility of goings on downstairs to those above.

Margaret Anderson, lawful daughter of Joseph Anderson and Sarah McCullough was baptised here in 1842

 It's a wonderful thing to be able to be within the church where my 2 x Great Grandmother was baptised as an infant. This we know for certain to be true.
We end the day checking out the graveyards of 2nd and 3rd Presbyterian with mixed results before jumping back in the car and heading for Trim, where we have a dinner reservation for 7 pm. We'll be late.

Checked in to the Trim Castle Hotel we dart across the road to the Stockhouse Restaurant. Running somewhat late for our reservation, for which we are mildly chastised. They thought we weren't coming and there's a little wait for a table after which we are seated at one that was free all along.  Neither of us is very hungry due to the huge lunch. I go for a serve of bruschetta with buffalo mozzarella, sundried tomato and basil pesto, this we can share, followed by another starter, Fish cakes made from fresh cod, salmon and crab meat in a sesame crumb, chilli, coriander and lime mayonnaise, rocket and pesto dressing. Michael chose Lamb Cutlets cooked medium well. We amuse ourselves while we wait for our meals by reading the signs used to decorate the room. Intended to be funny, some are and some are well past their use by date. Food was OK. Michael's main arrives with four cutlets, I think I could have cooked them better based on appearance. I'm not tempted to try them. Fortunately, Hubby's not as fussy as I am.The most amazing thing about dinner was that they have alcohol free Heineken. We don't have that at home. It smelled good, Hubby says "yeah, it was alright". We're exhausted though. We head back to our hotel room, admire the view of the castle again briefly and fall into bed. I'm asleep in moments.
So what's the verdict on the My Ireland Family Heritage Tour that sounded too good to be true? Well, yes, as a geneological exercise it's a complete crock, as I suspected. It's an exercise in compiling stacks of information, but there's nothing whatever in the way of proper geneological analysis of the information provided. It's enough to bluff the uninitiated or  provide those who simply do not have enough information to track down their specific origins in Ireland a sense of connection and get people out off the beaten track into the "real" Ireland. In my case, we do know precisely where in Ireland my 2 x great grandmother and her parents were from. I already have the baptismal records from Ist Rathfriland, along with details of extended family names that clustered together took us pretty emphatically to the townland of Moneygore. I was curious what else they may have to say and really was just looking for a guide on the day to help us find the precise locations in Griffiths Valuations and add some contextual commentary along the way.  Ian was a charming guide for our days and we enjoyed our time with him so that my objective there was realised. The company sells their services on the fact that they arrange to have churches open and so forth, however in our case our being able to see inside Ist Rathfriland was a complete coincidence and not preplanned. To some extent this appeared to be due to tensions around Northern Ireland v Republic, My Ireland Family Heritage being based in the Republic of course, they seemed pretty wary wandering around in Loyalist areas of Northern Ireland.
To justify the very high price tag, the company puts together a little package of souvenir materials and a beautifully bound book of records and contextual information. As it turns out though, the book that was provided to me was a bit less than expected in terms of what was included. Some entries for the Townland of Moneygore were included but not first page for Moneygore which provided the most likely record for my 4 x Great Grandmother who we know was widowed and still living in Rathfriland at the time the Griffith's Valuation was done. On the other hand the book did include a lovely page about Ellis Island, which of course, doesn't go down well with an Australian client. The book also stated that the client had done no previous research, which was patently untrue. In fact I offered what we know to the company and they refused to accept it, saying they don't rely on the research of anyone else, they do it all from scratch. I have challenged My Ireland Family Heritage on what I regard as a fairly colossal failure in the book, and have received a reply from the researcher, but it's just more spin that does not address my compliant. So, I guess it just depends what you're looking for and how much you're happy to spend, but go in with your eyes open as to what you are paying for. I should also note, that these days, you can access Griffith's Valuation for free online INCLUDING a map of the townlands and a slide that lets you look at the modern day map against the townland maps. So My Ireland Family Heritage's claim that you could never find the locations by yourself is complete and utter rubbish.