It’s NGP @ PDF 2007 in NYC. We had to catch an early train to get here (guess who missed the 5:02 and had to catch the 5:25?), but it’s been worth the effort. Now I’m ready for the cocktail party, and a snooze on the train ride home tonight.
Our Eyewitness Travel book was our primary guide book for our recent visit to Ireland. It served us very well, providing useful historical background, context, and practical information certain to be of use to any visitor. The challenge of travel guides is to fill them with enough information to be useful, but keep them small enough to be practical for carrying around. This guide, while packed full of information, photos and maps, is a bit too big and heavy for hauling around. And the city detail maps could benefit if they provided a larger view. We sometimes found ourselves stuck in a middle-ground, trying to get into a city centre, but lacking the detail in our national road map, and not having a broad enough view in the DK city centre map. But these are nitpicks. Overall this guide book served us very well.
When my GG Grandfather Michael Casey was born in 1850, his father Michael was a tenant farmer working land rented from the Barrington Estate. About 70 years later, after their only daughter was killed in an IRA ambush, the Barrington’s sold their estate to the Benedictine monks who continue to run the estate today as Glenstal Abbey. And after breakfast on Friday morning, we took a nice stroll on the Abbey’s grounds, taking a quick look at the castle and meeting some Donkey’s along the way. Was the stone watchman in the castle tower there 150 years ago, watching my Casey ancestors harvest potatoes? I wonder.
Next we headed into Limerick, and despite hitting some traffic heading into town, and getting turned around a bit, we ultimately succeeded in getting the car parked so we could do some shopping, which we did. I failed in my mission to dunk a friend’s hat into the Shannon River, sorry Bobby, the banks were too high.
After our short stop in Limerick, we returned to Murroe to keep our date with Father Ryan. We met him at the church and then followed him to the Annagh Graveyard. The church in the center of the graveyard has been a ruin for more than 100 years according to the land valuation map I obtained in Dublin to locate the Casey plot, but the cemetery is still in use and has recent burials in it. Among the older markers, there were many so worn or damaged that there was nothing legible on them, and having found no Caseys among any that could be read, we had to assume that we may be close but would never know for certain if this was Michael Casey’s final resting place or not. Father Ryan returned to the church, having been very generous with his time this Easter eve, and we stayed a bit longer taking pictures in the graveyard, and then along the nearby road of what we guessed must have been the Casey plot of farmland. And our family hunt might well have ended there.
But it did not.
At Ryan’s pub in nearby Newport, I asked the woman tending bar if there were any Casey’s in the area. She said she wasn’t from nearby, but would ask the owner, and shortly he came by to speak with us. When I asked him about Casey’s, he paused for a bit and then told me to follow him outside into the street. Pointing up the street at a house a few hundred yards away he said, “Willie Casey lives there, you should talk to him.” And so we finished our drinks, which they wouldn’t let us pay for, and we set off to find Willie.
The woman who answered my knock at the door was quick to welcome us in when I mentioned my name was Casey and I was hoping to speak with Willie. And in no time we were sitting at the kitchen table with Willie and his wife Maureen, comparing Casey notes. Soon Maureen had me on the phone with Willie’s cousin, and while we didn’t find any direct connection between ourselves, they knew of other nearby Caseys and mentioned another neighbor we should speak took, and a graveyard we should visit called Ballymackeogh. A few doors down, we dropped in on Mary Ryan, and after a quick explanation we again received a warm welcome. Mary’s aunt was married to a Michael Casey, and when Mary confirmed that this Michael’s father had been named Thomas, and that they had farmed land in Annagh across the county line, the pieces all seemed to fit to say this Michael was my first cousin, three times removed (or more easily, my GG Grandfather’s nephew, I couldn’t sort any of these complex relationships out without my computer!). Mary gave us directions to another local cemetery, Rockvale, in which she said Michael had been the first burial. When we asked for directions, Mary pointed and said, “It’s just that way across the fields. But by car you’ll need to turn right at the main street in town and follow your noses from there”. That worked, and at Rockvale Cemetery we located my distant cousin Michael Casey, and a number of other Casey’s which we have yet to sort out. I should say ‘Jennifer located’, because she was always first to find the headstones we were seeking.
Finding Ballymackeogh was a bit more difficult, but after a few tries we found ourselves at then end of a gravel road facing a locked gate with three signs nearby. The first read ‘Ballymackeogh Graveyard’, the second essentially said ‘Private Property, Keep Out’, and the third read ‘Beware of the bull’. It was the third sign that most caught our notice. But having traveled so far, and now standing outside the gate that I thought could lead to my ancestors graves, was I to let a bull stop us? Never! I went first into the field, with Jennifer bravely following about 25 yards behind (wearing her new bullfighting red sweater), and our caution was rewarded by our arrival at the graveyard gates about 100 yards across the pasture, with no bull anywhere in sight.
Ballymackeogh was similar to the other graveyards that we had visited in that it had a roofless, ivy-covered church ruin the in middle, but was different in that the grounds around the ruin we terraced with paths, and the ground much more uneven. Headstones jutted out of the ground at every angle, some laying flat on the ground and others in broken piles. In placed the ground had collapsed in on a grave, while in others the grave was a large mound pushing upwards. It was late afternoon by this point, and long shadows hung everywhere. It was a very peaceful place, and as graveyards go, could be a scary one.
Once again, Jennifer found the Casey’s. A plot of four graves near one of the church corners had four burials, one of which seems to match well with our hunt. Reading with our fingers, we found a headstone that read:
Erected by Thomas Casey in memory of his Father Michael Casey of Polough who died Oct 9 1884, aged 70 years. May his soul rest in peace.
The death certificate for my GGG Grandfather Michael Casey says he died on 12/1/1882 at age 66, a pretty big difference from this headstone which is specific enough to give confidence in its facts. So do I have the right Michael Casey and just some errors of fact over time? Or are there two Michael Caseys, with sons named Thomas, who lived, farmed and died at about the same time in very close proximity? I don’t know. Progress brings new questions, that’s just how it goes in genealogy. Wherever the truth is, the hunt continues.
We made it back through the pasture without any sign of the bull, and headed to Bunratty hoping to get in on one of their Castle Banquets for our last night’s meal, but finding it booked we had a very fine meal at a nearby restaurant and headed back to our B&B for our last night’s sleep in Ireland.
Day Five of our journey was a new day of travel, heading to our third and final two-night destination in Murroe. But we weren’t going to take the short way, so would took a very round-about route that took us around the popular scenic drive called The Ring of Kerry. We started in Killarney and set out on our drive around the Kerry peninsula. We could sense the sea as we got closer too it, and enjoyed the opportunity to stop for a scenic view. The opportunities are sometimes at distant spreads.
Driving on the left side of the road was not too difficult to me, but driving on shoulder-less one-lane roads that are serving two-way traffic mixed with tractors and tour busses can get a bit edgy. Sometimes you have a slow poke ahead of you, and you need to find the opportunity to bust a passing move, and other times you are the slow poke looking to find some room to pull over and facilitate your own passing by the speed demons behind you. There were several points along the Ring where we’d have liked to pull over and stop to take in the view or snap a photo, but frequently driving on is the only option unless you don’t mind stopping in the middle of a road.
We went as far as Waterville at the end of the peninsula, passing on going out to Valencia Island in consideration of time. We found a nice cafe in Sneem on the return side of the loop for a nice bite of lunch. Since it’s Good Friday, pubs are closed, reducing our options, and a bit down the road when we passed another Casey’s in Kenmare we had console our regret at not stopping with the knowledge that they would be closed anyway.
The last part of the Ring goes through Killarney National Park, which had some dry brown rocky scenery that I didn’t expect to find in Ireland, covered by some bold grazing goats that would climb any rock. It was here also that we stopped at Ladie’s View stop where you could gaze on the Lakes of Killarney.
After finishing the Ring, we could have stuck to the main roads to make good time to Murroe, but I wanted to pass through the village of Feenagh, the home town of my Great Great Grandmother Mary Geary Casey. I know very little about Mary other than that she came from Feenagh, married Michael Casey and lived with him in Chicago where only one of at least four children they had lived to adulthood. Mary died in 1885 at age 29 of ‘consumption’. In Feenagh, we stopped at the Post Office where I was told there are still many Geary’s in the area and got directions to the nearest cemetery, St. Ita’s Graveyard in Kilmeedy, where I thought we might find some (we did, although I don’t know if they have any family connection to my Mary Geary). Across the street in a local convenience store, Geary’s Garage was pointed out as an example of the name’s continuing presence in the area.
We continued onto Murroe, the village closest to where my Casey’s ancestor’s came from, and found our way to our final destination in Ireland, the Rinnaknock B&B. Mary and Tom Seaver gave us a warm welcome and we got settled into our room. Our dining options were still limited due to it being Good Friday, so we got some cheese and crackers in a grocery store and after a quick snack we attended the Good Friday service at the Murroe Catholic Church. The choir sang beautifully. After the service, we introduced ourselves to Father Ryan, who had a few years earlier responded to my request for baptismal records of my GG Grandfather Michael Casey and his siblings. He welcomed us into his house and generously offered to lead us to the Annagh graveyard the next day, where I hoped we might locate Michael. And here this day came to an end as we returned to our B&B for the night.
We covered a lot of ground today, starting out in the port town of Cobh (pronounced ‘cove’). Cobh is literally in the cove of the city of Cork, and was the primary point of embarkment for millions of Irish emigrants. Cobh as also a major stop for transatlantic ocean liners. It was the last stop of the Titanic before it’s fateful voyage, and the Lusitania was sunk by a German U-Boat nearby in 1915, precipitating the entry of the United States into the First World War. We visited the Cobh Heritage Center which did a good job providing background on the causes and conditions behind the Irish Diaspora. Outside of the Heritage Center is a monument to Annie Moore, the first immigrant to be processed at Ellis Island in the United States in 1892. We then strolled the streets of Cobh, and took a look in the Cobh Cathedral before heading off for our next stop of the day, Blarney.
Blarney Castle is one of those Irish destinations that so much is made of, you’re not quite sure what to do about it. Will it be such a tourist trap that you’ll regret going, or if you skip it will you regret having passed on such a quintessentially Irish rite? But since reading Richard Scarry’s Busy, Busy World
as a kid, I knew that some day I’d kiss the Blarney Stone. The grounds around Blarney Castle were beautiful, and the weather was spectacular as it was for our entire stay in Ireland. And the castle itself is amazing, climbing the steep spiral stone staircase was scarily cool. Jennifer, not lacking in eloquence, took a pass on performing the backbend required to kiss the stone, but I went for it and haven’t shut up since.
We were headed into Cork to find some lunch, but aborted that plan quickly. We had to stop and ask directions to find our way into town, and quickly turned back due to pedestrian and vehicular traffic. And so though it was already late, it was time to set out for Casey’s. I had searched for pubs named Casey’s online in advance of our trip, and found three in the general region we would be, in Union Hall, Glandore, and Baltimore. So we set out to find one ore more.
The Casey’s in Baltimore was the farthest away, and from the web site seemed the largest and least personal, so we didn’t get that far. Maybe it’s great, we’ll give them a try again some day. So we overshot Casey’s in Glandore, which wasn’t yet open, and headed to Casey’s in Union Hall, to which crossing the one-lane bridge was the final obstacle to what was becoming a very late lunch. At Casey’s Bar in Union Hall, we finally found our lunch a a few fine pints we enjoyed on their back patio with a serene and beautiful view. And we enjoyed a nice visit with Martha Casey and her daughter Katherine before setting out for our next Casey’s Bar in Glandore, where Mary Casey gave us a warm welcome in their family business which has been in business for something like 200 years and five generations of Caseys. It was a no-brainer that I would leave wearing a sharp looking sleeveless fleece from Casey’s Bar. We’d have stayed much later, but we had a long, narrow, winding drive home, made all the trickier by the darkness, and so had to say goodbye to another Casey’s bar and head back to Halfway.
[Note: I lacked any Internet access during most of our trip, so these remaining Ireland travel entries are being written after the fact, but will display a posting date of the day being described]
We needed an early start on Wednesday because we had a lot of ground to cover. After breakfast we got checked out of the hotel and trekked down Grafton Street one more time with our luggage in tow to catch an airport bus just across from Trinity College. Once at the airport we caught another bus to get our rental car from Hertz and were soon ready to hit the roads of Ireland. I had varying reports from people on how difficult or easy they found it to drive on the opposite side of the road and was a bit apprehensive about it. Construction near the Hertz lot left only a single lane road leading to their car lot, and as I turned onto it I was heading straight for the Hertz shuttle bus coming my way. So I beat a quick retreat back to the lot, did a lap around, and tried again, this time successfully exiting the lot. Nothing could stop us now. As I focused on staying on the left side of the road, Jennifer got to work as navigator, working to identify our exits and interpret road signs. Those that we couldn’t figure out couldn’t have been too important. We wanted to reach our B&B just past Cork before dark, and so this was a travel day with only brief stops.
Stopped for lunch in Killkenny and enjoyed lunch at Matt the Miller’s. Operating on the “When in Rome…” principal, I had the ‘Cod & Chips’, which is of course ‘Fish & Chips’, which aren’t chips at all, they’re french fries. We’re learning something after our first few dining experiences, it can be difficult to get a check so you can pay and leave when you’re done. I think I left my Cubs cap in Matt the Miller’s. It was getting kinda scrody anyway so a replacement is due, but still, if anyone in Ireland finds a Cubs cap with ‘Casey 2004’ written on the bill, please return to me. Thanks.
We snapped a few photos of colorful storefronts in Fermoy as we passed slowly through town, and a few more of various ‘Casey’ sightings (a bar and a furniture truck), before ultimately reaching our destination for the next two nights, the Flushing Meadow Bed & Breakfast in Halfway. And I am certain the warm welcome we got from the proprietors Anne and Seamus wasn’t just because they are also Casey’s, but it couldn’t have hurt. We headed into the seaside village of Kinsale, just in time to see the last of the shopkeepers closing up their shops, the whole place was shut down. So after a quick stroll we got back in the car and set out for Anne’s recommended dinner destination, Kirby’s. Our arrival there was delayed only slightly by the crowd of gambling road bowlers we encountered on the way.
Back at Flushing Meadow after dinner, we enjoyed a cup of tea with Anne and Seamus, comparing notes on our Casey families looking for connections, and learning something about each other, before we headed off to bed to end Day 3 in Ireland.
Family Hunting and Souvenir Shopping was the program for the day. I had thought I would allow myself just a couple of hours this morning at Ireland’s National Library to see what I might find out about my Casey ancestors, in particular my GGGG Grandfather, Michael Casey. I was already aware that the Church Diocese of Cashel and Emly are available only via Tipperary Family History Research, and I have already obtained some records by that route. So my visit to the Library was more in hopes of perhaps finding something that I didn’t yet know I was looking for. The very helpful library genealogist was great, and although there was little there at the library to search, he set us out on a family hunt that took us to three other offices in Dublin; the General Register Office, the Valuation Office, and Ireland’s National Archives.
BUT…
The story will have to wait. I REALLY need to get some sleep, as it’s 3:16 am and we have a very big day tomorrow, needing to get our rental car in the morning at Dublin’s airport, and then seek to make our way across the southern part of the island on our way to our next destination, Kinsale. More details to follow about the family tree hunt, but I’ll include this teaser, I found information about the Casey brother who stayed behind and farmed the family plot while his siblings had emigrated to America. And his son (?) was still owned that same plot until 1956. So guess which one of the above offices was the source of that breakthrough?
More to come, going to bed.
Thanks for a wonderful evening! There are four more nights after tonight still to go on our trip, but we already know we’ve enjoyed one of our trips hilights, which was to be invited to dinner at the house of the daughter of an very dear friend of my parents, Noel Moran. It wasn’t until we left that we realized we’d stayed up talking until almost 2am! Thanks to Gerry & Jennifer for the wonderful meal, and to your wonderful children for tolerating and entertaining us, we truly enjoyed ourselves very much. Thanks Noel as well, for the scenic tour on the way there and for bringing us into your family for one night here in Ireland. No tourist destination could match the warm welcome you all showed us.
There is so much to cover as to the first part of our day, but I will do that in a separate posting. This one is just to say ‘thanks’ to our wonderful hosts.
Greetings from Dublin! Our long awaited trip has arrived at last, and the fun started fast. My dad got us to our flight at National, from where we headed to Boston to catch our flight to Dublin. We did an extra lap on the airport shuttle at Logan Airport, thanks to the shuttle’s unexpected failure to announce when we were at Terminal E, the International terminal. But other than that, we got off OK. Memo to Logan, work on your signage problem, and also there’s a ‘D’ between ‘C’ And ‘E’!
All was smooth on the flight with the added bonus of some young children who spent the whole flight acquainting us with the wail of the Banshee, a sound whose portent of death we were close to welcoming by the time we arrived. As a parent who has flown with kids, I felt much sympathy for the mother of these wailers as she struggled with her screechers, but I also still silently prayed she could learn how to shut her kids up.
But I digress.
We landed at Dublin at 5:30 am local time, which was 12:30 am on Monday morning our time. We found a bus that said it would get us near Grafton Street, but which instead left us at the central bus terminal. So we caught a cab to the hotel from there. It was hours before we would be albe to check in, so we ditched our bags for a brief walk around the surrounding blocks, and then returned to the hotel for some breakfast.
Recharged, at least for a bit, we set out on foot towards Kilmainham Gaol, Dubin’s infamous prison which had come highly recommended by virtually everyone I spoke to about things to see in Dublin. It was a healthy morning walk for two tired travelers, but we got ourselves there about 10 minutes before opening, and the Gaol’s museum and tour were a sombering introduction to Ireland’s sad history of political oppression.
From Kilmainham, we continued on foot to the Guinness Storehouse, a popular tourist destination in honor of Ireland’s national drink. The self-guided tour gives a good lesson in the history and making of Guinness, and by the end of the tour when you get to collect your Pint in the 7th story Gravity Bar, the beer and the view are a happy reward. It was 12:30 in the afternoon here, but we had been up all night and it was 7:30 am Eastern time while we enjoyed our first pint in Dublin. Yes, the Irish breakfast of champions! We then paid our dues in the well-stocked Guinness store, buying some souvenir’s to bring home, and then caught a cab back to our hotel where we got checked in and crashed for a much needed jet-lag nap.
After waking up, we set out for the Temple Bar area, known for its shops, restaurants and pubs where we enjoyed a great dinner at The Quays Restaurant. From there we stopped at The Stags Head for another pint on the way back to our hotel. Now that photos are uploaded and Day 1 is in the blog, it’s time to crash again and get attuned to this time zone.
We’re on our way home from watching the Nats beat our Cubs, only to find ourselves trapped in stopped traffic on the Wilson Bridge. According to the radio the lanes ahead will be closed for about the next 20 min. Damn!
