HAREBELLS OVER MANNIN BAY Half moon of moon-pale sand. Sea stirs in midnight blue. Looking across to the Twelve Pins The singular harebells stand. The sky's all azure. Eye To eye with them upon Cropped grass, I note the harebells give Faint echoes of the sky. For such a Lilliput host To pit their colours against Peacock of sea and mountain seems Impertinence at least. These summer commonplaces, Seen close enough, confound A league of brilliant waves, and dance On the grave mountain faces. Harebells, keep your arresting Pose by the strand. I like These gestures of the ephemeral Against the everlasting. -- C. Day-Lewis, late Poet Laureate of England, born in Co. Laois

Some may find this poem by John MONTAGUE, born 1929, unsettling, even offensive because of the subject matter - still, I thought that the message was one of acceptance of others through understanding and of the ability of individuals to overcome great wrongs done to them.. Note -- "cailleach" is Irish and Scots Gaelic for "old hag." THE WILD DOG ROSE I go to say goodbye to the Cailleach that terrible figure who haunted my childhood but no longer harsh, a human being merely, hurt by event. The cottage, circled by trees, weathered to admonitory shapes of desolation by the mountain winds, straggles into view. The rank thistles and leathery bracken of untilled fields stretch behind with -- a final outcrop -- the hooped figure by the roadside, its retinue of dogs which give tongue as I approach, with savage, whinging cries so that she slowly turns, a moving nest of shawls and rags, to view, to stare the stranger down. And I feel again that ancient awe, the terror of a child before the great hooked nose, the cheeks dewlapped with dirt, the staring blue of the sunken eyes, the mottled claws clutching a stick but now hold and return her gaze, to greet her, as she greets me, in friendliness. Memories have wrought reconciliation between us, we talk in ease at last, like old friends, lovers almost, sharing secrets. Of neighbours she quarreled with, who now lie in Garvaghey graveyard, beyond all hatred; of my family and hers, how she never married, though a man came asking in her youth. "You would be loath to leave your own' she sighs, "and go among strangers" -- his parish ten miles off. For sixty years since she had lived alone, in one place. Obscurely honoured by such confidences, I idle by the summer roadside, listening, while the monologue falters, continues, rehearsing the small events of her life. The only true madness is loneliness, the monotonous voice in the skull that never stops because never heard. And there where the dog rose shines in the hedge she tells me a story so terrible that I try to push it away, my bones melting. Late at night a drunk came, beating at her door to break it in, the bolt snapping from the soft wood, the thin mongrels rushing to cut, but yelping as he whirls with his farm boots to crush their skulls. In the darkness they wrestle, two creatures crazed with loneliness, the smell of the decaying cottage in his nostrils like a drug, his body heavy on hers, the tasteless trunk of a seventy year old virgin, which he rummages while she battles for life bony fingers reaching desperately to push against his bull neck. "I prayed to the Blessed Virgin herself for help and after a time I broke his grip." He rolls to the floor, snores asleep, while she cowers until dawn and the dogs' whimpering starts him awake, to lurch back across the wet bog. And still the dog rose shines in the hedge. Petals beaten wide by rain, it sways slightly, at the tip of a slender, tangled, arching branch which, with her stick, she gathers into us. "The wild rose is the only rose without thorns," she says, holding a wet blossom for a second, in a hand knotted as the knob of her stick. "Whenever I see it, I remember the Holy Mother of God and all she suffered." Briefly the air is strong with the smell of that weak flower, offering its crumbling yellow cup and pale bleeding lips fading to white at the rim of each bruised and heart- shaped petal. -- John Montague (born 1929)

BIO: Mary HARRIS (1837-1930) was born in a poor farming family in rural Cork. Her father, Richard HARRIS, emigrated to the U.S. first and sent for his family in 1850. Mary became a teacher and later a dressmaker, before marrying iron molder, George JONES, in 1861. Living in Memphis, TN, the couple had four children. All four died along with Jones' husband in a devastating yellow fever epidemic in 1867. Jones returned to Chicago and re-established herself as a dressmaker. Again tragedy struck when her business was consumed in the Great Fire of 1871. In the years of toil that followed, Mary grew increasingly concerned about the growing gap between the rich people for whom she worked and the poor people with whom she lived. She joined the Knights of Labor and took to active organizing. The first strike she was involved in occurred in Pittsburgh, against the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad in 1877. The local government's decision to call in the state militia, an action! that led to a bloody riot, appalled her and pushed her to take up labor activism full time. She traveled the country organizing unions, leading strikes and giving inspirational speeches. She was especially active among railroad workers and miners. By the late 1890s, "Mother Jones" was one of the most well-known figures in the labor movement, and one of its most controversial. Small in stature, she stood large in the eyes of both the workers she served and the employers she chastised. Her signature motto was "Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living." In 1898, Mary helped to found the Social Democratic Party . In 1904, now in her 70s, Mary wrote a scathing letter to Gov. James H. PEABODY in Denver who had ordered her deported from the state for helping strikers -- "Mr. Governor, you notified your dogs of war to put me out of the state. They complied with your instructions. I hold in my hand a letter that was handed to me by one of them, which says under no circumstances return to this state. I wish to notify you, governor, that you don't own the state. When it was admitted to the sisterhood of states, my fathers gave me a share of stock in it; and that is all they gave you. The civil courts are o! pen. If I break a law of state or nation it is the duty of the civil courts to deal with me. That is why my forefathers established those courts to keep dictators and tyrants such as you for interfering with civilians. I am right here in the capital after being out nine or ten hours, four or five blocks from your office. I want to ask you, governor, what in Hell you are going to do about it?" There apparently was no response. In 1912, the average pay for textile workers in Lawrence, MA was sixteen cents an hour. When the legislature reduced the 56-hour work week by a paltry two hours and mill owners cut pay accordingly, thousands of outraged workers, mainly women and children, stopped their looms and marched in the "Bread and Roses" strike. The Massachusetts militia attempted to drive the laborers back to work, causing at least two deaths and a profound outrage among countless unions in the country. After a month, the number of strikers in New England had reached 50 thousand. "Mother JONES" and Bill HAYWARD kept the International Workers of the World (IWW) organized. A year later, Mary played a key role in the Ludlow, CO Copper Mine strike. Mary Harris Jones always attributed her fearlessness and radicalism to her Irish heritage. "I was born in revolution," she once said. She was 91 when she worked her last strike. The "Angel of the Mines" died at age 94 in 1930. In his eulogy the Rev. J. W. McGUIRE said, "Wealthy coal operators and capitalists throughout the United States are breathing sighs of relief...Mother JONES is dead."

The Tallest Flowers hide the strongest nettles. The Man who ask what good is money has already paid for his plot. A man cutting his wisdom teeth the first time he bites off more then he can chew. Even if you are on the right track, you `ll be run over if you stay there. The road to heaven is well signpost but badly lit any night. Love is like stirabout, it must be made frish ever day. Mary E Coss Staley Wheeling Area Genealogical Society

THE OLD WOMAN As a white candle In a holy place, So is the beauty Of an aged face. As the spent radiance Of the winter sun, So is a woman With her travail done. Her brood gone from her, And her thoughts as still As the waters Under a ruined mill. -- Joseph Campbell (1879-1944)

Mary Ann McGOLDRICK was born and grew up in the sturdy thatched roof cottage that still sits high on the hillside of Killavoggy, Co. Leitrim, near Drumahair. Her late husband was Michael MORLEY formerly of Co. Mayo. Mary Ann, who immigrated to the United States, would tell her daughter (Mary) stories about Ireland when she was growing up and often said that "on a clear day, from that hill you can see for miles and miles the green hills and the valleys and the beautiful lakes." The life-style in Killavoggy was rural and simple. Not too far away from the hillside was the small school house she attended and just beyond it the church she worshipped in. To get to the hill from the main road she had to cross an old iron bridge. On Saturday evenings her mother's family, friends and relatives would gather on that bridge to dance and sing to the music of a fiddler. Mary Ann would say, "I often wondered how that old bridge ever stood up with all the dancing that went on there. T! hank goodness they finally built a new steel one." Mary Ann's own mother had gone to America and lived in the Boston area for eight years; she would later return to Leitrim and marry there, but would often share stories about her time in Boston. In 1916, when Mary Ann was 18, she left Killavoggy in a cart pulled by a donkey, down the narrow dirt roads, past the schoolhouse, the church, and all the other memorable places that she held so close. She boarded the train at Dromahair, and the first stop was at Manorhamilton. She remembers her Uncle Owen, her father's brother, stepping aboard the train briefly and giving her a kiss good-bye. She recalls, "I felt so sad and alone as I waved to him from the train window and I wondered whether I would ever see my mother, father, sister and brothers again." As the train headed for Queenstown, she said she watched from that train window, and saw for the first time much of the Irish landscape that up until that time she had only heard about. In Queenstown she boarded a boat for Liverpool, and from she sailed on the "Carpathia, " for her trip to America. ("The Carpathia" was an English liner that in 1912 became famous as the first ship to reach and rescue some of the passeng! ers from the sinking "Titanic.") After arriving in NY and going through customs, she took another boat for Fall River, MA. From there she left by train for South Station in Boston where her Aunt Bridget and Uncle Mike met her. She lived with Aunt Bridget for six weeks until she got domestic work in the household of a Jewish clothing manufacturer where she lived for five years; she looks back with fondness on the wonderful relationship she had with the manufacturer and his family. Mary Ann and her cousin from Dorchester would go to Hibernian Hall dances where Irish immigrants would gather on weekend evenings. She would later met another Irish immigrant, Mike MORLEY, from Mayo, and they would be married in a double wedding ceremony; also exchanging vows on that Easter Sunday was Mary Ann's brother, Jack, who had arrived in America a few years after his sister, and his bride, Barbara, from Co. Galway. Mary Ann and Mike bought a house and raised their five children in Ever! ett. In 1954, Mary Ann returned to the land she had loved so much. Her mother was now in her 90th year, her father had died a few years before, and her only sister, Bridget, died in 1918 at age 16 from influenza. Her remaining brother in Ireland, Martin, was still living and they were reunited after all those years. Mary Ann's trip to America in 1916 had taken two weeks, her return trip to Ireland was completed in one day. Her husband was to die in 1963. Mary Ann's daughter says that each generation is linked to the next generation and the generations to come with a wonderful gift of continuity. As she and her mother sat in the kitchen of her Everett home over tea, Mary reached over and took her mother's frail hand in hers and asked her how she felt now, about her life, looking back over the years. In that wonderful Irish brogue she said, "You know I often think about that hillside. So many things have changed. At times life hasn't been easy, but as hard as it was, sure, and I wouldn't have missed it for anything." -- Excerpts, "My Irish Mother," Mary Morley Armato, 1995 "Leitrim Guardian."

Patrick J. POWER wrote in his collection of short stories, 'The End of the Honeyflow" in 1993, that no man was prouder of his native county than his father who was born in Park near Duncormick and who joined the Garda Siochana in 1923 For 30 years, his father had carried Wexford in his heart across Ireland from one barracks to another and had a dream that one day he would return and end his days among the clover fields of home. Patrick grew up on stories about Wexford, and when a teen he first set foot there when he and his father set off from Tarmonbarry in Roscommon, a little village beside the Shannon where his father was a Sergeant. They travelled by train to Killinick, for many years voted the most beautiful railway station in Ireland. From Killinick they cycled the back road to Broadway, down the hill to Saint Ibar's, then on to Patrick's Aunt Susan's house near Tagoat, where they would be staying. On that occasion, the elder Power was visibly moved to be back among his own. Cares and worries tumbled from his face. Red silurian soil, he told Patrick, as they cycled along - no boulder clay here. No stone walls, either, no bogs, no eskers or drumlins. Apple trees growing on the sides of the road, and the best farmers in Ireland, where not a rush or thistle were in sight! Three years after that visit Patrick's father realized his dream and bought a small holding in Broadway, four acres on top of a hill overlooking Lady's Island lake. The name "Sunnyside" was just about visible on the crumbling masonry of the gate pier. Rusted iron gates creaked open as they walked down a weed-strewn avenue towards a two-storey thatched house. The thatch was black with age and the once whitewashed walls had turned yellow. His father did not appear to even notice the old house with all its cobwebs which had not been lived in for several years - all he could see were the apple trees on either side of the avenue, the upper and lower orchards as they came to be known, an acre in each. The month of May had come and the trees were in blossom. He feasted his eyes on them, and so began a love affair. "Sunnyside" was to become his kingdom. He came to know every blade of grass, every tree, bush and shrub. No piece of ground on this earth was more intensively cultivated. Gooseberry bushes were sown alongside apple trees, black currants grew up through hedges, pear and plum trees tangled with one another in a confused mass of branches. Wherever there was a spare foot of ground his father kept on planting. Although his father attempted to conduct a successful fruitgrowning business and had a passion for beekeeping, Patrick said that "no man who trod this planet had less commercial sense." Patrick, himself, never lived in "Sunnyside" because he started working in Dublin shortly afer his father moved in, but every year for 30 years he went down on holidays the first two weeks in July to help his father pick gooseberries. Those long, peaceful summer evenings were among the happiest of his life. As they moved from bush to bush, conversation ranged from the Reformation, the buried city of Bannow, the other side of the moon, to was Hitler in hell. So it went on, year after year. As his father grew older he found it difficult to get around to all his chores, particularly, cutting the grass, but he wouldn't let anybody else cut it, either, in case they mowed down the fruit bushes. Briars and weeds began to take over. Then one May afternoon, in 1980, a chimney fire went out of control and the house rafters under the thatch caught fire. By the time the fire brigade arrived from Wexford the place was gutted. Later that year, a new bungalow was built. His father survived the fire by two years until December 1982 and was buried a mile down the road in Lady's Island cemetery. The elder Power said he had once heard a missioner say that heaven is here on this earth, that the souls of the dead are as thick as blades of grass around us and that God permits them to return to the places they love. If so, Patrick's father is back in "Sunnyside" again - this time, forever. -- Excerpt, "Ireland of the Welcomes" >

RUBBER LEGS But then I mind Keenan and this man Brian McAleer, there was a big barn dance in it one night and the thing got going that good and Brian came out of the kitchen Och, he was going on maybe seventy years of age at the time. but a light, thin man, you know, and always in good spirit. Great singer too. And him and Keenan hit the floor for a reel. Well, if you seen them two men dancing, boy, they were dancing from when they were young fellows, you know, in their youth, and still this was a great meeting for them to meet again two old men, you know, they'd been dancing whenever they were young fellows. I'll tell you what they done too and they sung together and they herded, and there was no ditches and no fences about and if you went out and herded your cattle the whole day and him and Brian was raised together. That was Keenan's farm there and McAleer's farm was here and the two men herding on the one mountain together and they sung together the whole day and exchanged songs. And Brian and him going out that night on the floor and if you seen them boys, you would just think their legs was rubber. I could mind Brian McAleer, you want to see that man and him over eighty, and the thin light legs of him, and I can see him yet. And Keenan was down below, and Keenan was a small man, a small tight wee man, a sort of wee pernickety man, you know, and he was down there dancing. And Keenan and McAleer was up and then they would change places. Well, you want to see McAleer; you'd think the legs was rubber, for a man like that, no pains nor arthritis nor rheumatism nor damn what else. He was quivering and carrying on with his feet and Keenan was down below and Keenan was putting in nice fancy steps, you know. Ah Jesus, you want to see them two men dancing, you could have played for them for a week. -- John Loughran

Just a reminder that Ken BURNS celebrated documentary on the American Civil War (in which many Irish participated) will be shown on TV in the USA beginning this evening and continuing all next week. Of interest, BURNS grandfather fought for the Confederacy.

Hi list, We're very new on this list and thoroughly enjoying and learning from Jean Rice's placements here on the list. I'm not much of a historian but am learning a lot from her transcripts. It all brings up a question I have about something I once heard. One of our surnames is PATTERSON, another DICKERSON. Someone told us that both those names were not originally Irish but instead came out of Scotland into one of the northern Irish counties. I do know that our grand and great grandparents were mightily proud of their Irish lineage. Does anyone have any knowledge about these surnames? Thank you, Shirley in Ohio, USA

Many Irish fought bravely for both sides in the American Civil War. The Battle of Bull Run, which took place just 25 miles from the White House, was the first major clash. Unbelievably, civilians from neighboring areas rode out ot the perimeter of the battlefield, some with binoculars and picnic baskets, to watch the fighting unfold. Well aware that the battle might be their first and last, soldiers made preparations accordingly, including writing letters home to loved ones. Major Sullivan BALLOU, of the Second Rhode Island Volunteers, addressed the following eloquent letter to his wife, Sarah, in Smithfield. July 14, 1861, Camp Clark, Washington - "My very dear Sarah, The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days - perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more. Our movements may be of a few days' duration and full of pleasure - and it may be one of some conflict and death to me. "Not my will, but thine, O God be done." If it is necessary that I should fall on the battlefield for my Country, I am ready. I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in, the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans on the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and sufferings of the Revolution. And I am willing - perfectly willing - to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt... Sarah, my love for you is deathless. It seems to bind me with mightly cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me unresistibly on with all these chains to the battlefield. The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them so long. And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our sons grown up to honorable manhood around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me - perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar - that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have often times been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortunes of this world to shield you and your children from harm. But I cannot. I must watch you from the Spirit-land and hover near you, while you buffet the storm, with your precious little freight, and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more. But, O Sarah! if the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the gladdest days and darkest nights, advised to your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours, always, always, and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; as the cool air fans your throbbing temple; it shall be my spirit passing by; Sarah do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again. As for my little boys - they will grow up as I have done, an never know a father's love and care. Little Willie is too young to remember me for long, and my blue-eyed Edgar will keep my frolics with him along the dim memories of childhood. Sarah, I have unlimited confidence in your maternal care and your development of their character, and feel that God will bless you in your holy work. Tell my two Mothers I call God's blessing upon them. O! Sarah, I wait for you there; come to me and lead thither my children. Sullivan." The Union Army was ultimately defeated at Bull Run, and of the more than 70,000 Southern and Northern soldiers who went into battle, some 4,500 were killed, wounded, or captured. Major Sullivan Ballou was among the dead. -- Excerpt, "Letters of a Nation," A. Carroll Note - There is a Smithfield in Rhode Island in Providence Co.

Having both Irish and British roots, I agree with those who recognize there are two or more sides to every story. Equally importantly is that as times change, ideas change and most people learn from past mistakes. Per, "Paddy's Lament," 1982, by Thomas GALLAGHER perhaps nothing during the famine years more appropriately symbolized England's "helping hand" to Ireland than Soyer's Dublin soup kitchen. Monsieur SOYER was England's favorite chef de cuisine of the Reform Club of London. Since millions were to be fed, cost was uppermost in the minds of those in the exchequer, soup was naturally chosen over a bulky and substantial stew, the latter of course being what the people really needed to survive. Soyer took it upon himself, with the British government's blessing, to "feed and keep alive all the starving in Ireland" with one serving of his soup each day. On hundred gallons of it was to cost only one pound sterling, and yet it was to supply, according to Soyer, enough nourishment "for the poor of those realms" to assure that in Ireland there would be no more deaths from starvation. Soyer concocted soup recipes with and without meat that were deemed to be "tasty;" for the former, ! every two gallons of soup was to include four ounces of beef, two ounces of dripping fat, eight ounces of flour, and one-half ounce of brown sugar with a few onions, turnip parings, and celery tops thrown in to help flavor and color the water,. Broken down it would contain the essence of one-half ounce of meat, amounting to only one of the many morsels of meat eaten by British lawmakers at the Reform Club every day in London. On April 5, 1847, fully eight months after the blight had destroyed Ireland's entire potato crop, a model kitchen and food distribution center built according to SOYER'S specifications opened its door in Dublin. The wood-framed canvas building, erected near the main entrance to Phoenix Park, was 48 x 48, with an entrance at one end, an exit at the other. Iin the main apartment were a 300-gallon steam boiler and an oven capable of baking one hundredweight of bread at a time, both heated by the same fire. In front of this equipment were rows of tables 18 inches wide, in which holes were cut to hold a white-enameled quart basin to which a metal spoon was attached by a chain. Soyer planned for the people in need of his soup to file into a zigzag open-air passageway capable of holding 100 persons outside the tent. When a bell rang, these first 100 would enter the main apartment and occupy benches at the 100 bowls of soup set in the tables. Grace being said, they would use t! he chained spoons to consume the soup (the "Poor Man's Regenerator," Soyer called it), until another bell signaled that their soup time was over, whereupon, as they filed out the exit in the rear, they would each be given one-quarter pound of bread or savory biscuit. About a minute later, or just as the bowls and spoons had been swabbed with a sponge and another quart of soup poured into each bowl, the bell at the entrance would invite another 100 people in from the zigzag passageway. Soyer estimate that each cycle would take six minutes, allowing him to feed 1,000 people every hour. But opening day was a special event not so much for the hungry, who were impatient to be fed, but for the gentry, who had come for a wee nip of the famous soup and to watch the hungry fed. "His Excellency the Lord Lieutenant was there," reported the 'Dublin Evening Packet,' "the ladies PONSONBYand many other fair and delicate creatures assembled; there were earls and countesses, and lords and generals, and colonels and commissioners, and clergymen and doctors; it was a gala day, a grand gala." For the privilege of watching the hungry eat, the gentry were expected to donate five shillings each, which was to be distributed by the lord mayor in charity. "Five shillings each to see paupers feed!" wrote one reporter, "Five shillings each! To watch the burning blush of shame chasing pallidness from poverty's wane cheek! Five shillings each! When the animals in Zoological Gardens can be inspected at feeding time for sixpence!" Hence, with the beating of drums and the soundi! ng of horns, with the Union Jack proudly flying from the kitchen's smoking chimney and a splendidly attired gentry nodding its approval, the British government fed the Irish a soup incapable of keeping a newborn cat alive. When copies of "The Lancet's" criticism of the soup was distributed and Queen Victoria's own physician's opinion of watery soup got abroad, SOYER decided to resign as "head cook to the people of Ireland" and return to England. After being given a dinner and a snuff box by the Dublin gentry who had watched the hungry fed on the "gala day," he boarded the first outgoing ship, never to return to the country he had vowed to save. Just before leaving, he published a sixpenny cookbook called "Charitable Cooking or The Poor Man's Regenerator," in which he said: "It requires more science to produce a good dish at trifling expense than a superior one with unlimited means." One week after opening his soup kitchen in Dublin, he was back in the more congenial atmosphere of the Reform Club in London, where he continued to delight his English patrons with "superior dishes made with unlimited means" - that is, with beef, veal, lamb, and pork brought over from Ireland on the same Live! rpool steamers whose upper decks were jammed with Irish emigrants!. Appearing on the verge of perishing from hunger was not enough; recipients of outdoor relief had to be certified by the commissioner of the district as having no means of support, no animals to eat or sell, and a potato patch utterly laid to waste by the blight. They had to give up all but a quarter acre of their land. Since there were no strict nutritional standards set up, the soup often turned out to be worse than Soyer's, depending on who was in charge at any given location. At one center it might be wholesome, with chunks of meat, vegetables and rice, and Indian meal from America, and at another, thin, almost worthless gruel, at still another, nothing more than greasy water. Many persons waiting in line to receive rations were literally dying of starvation and had walked great distances. In some areas, where guardians struck the poor off the lists for the least reason, it was necessary to appear that starved in order to receive. At Ennistymon (Co. Clare), for exam! ple, anyone imprudent enough to look healthy was refused and had his ticket taken from him. In one documented case there a woman was struck off the list for giving a few spoonfuls of her ration to the children of her starved brother who had been struck off the list. She was reinstated only after the magistrate presiding at her dead brother's inquest intervened on her behalf.

More on Poor Law Unions -- They were a new set of boundaries. As I understand it, state registration of non-Catholic marriages began in Ireland in 1845. All births, deaths and marriages have been registered in Ireland since 1864. Registration was an offshoot of the Victorian public health system, in turn based on the Poor Law, an attempt to provide some measures of relief for the most destitute. Between 1838 and 1852, some 163 workhouses were built throughout Ireland, each at the centre of an area known as a Poor Law Union. The workhouses were normally situated in a large market town, and the Poor Law Union comprised the town and his adjacent area -- with the result that the Unions in may cases ignored the existing boundaries of parishes and counties. In the 1850s, a large-scale public health system was created, based on the areas covered by the Poor Law Unions. Each Union was divided into Dispensary Districts, with an average of six to seven Districts per union. A Medical Officer, normally a doctor, was given responsibility for public health in each District. When the registration of all births, death, and marriages began in 1864, these Dispensary Districts also became Registrars' Districts, with a Registrar responsible for collecting the registration within each District. In most cases the Medical Officer for the Dispensary District acted as the Registrar for the same area, but not in every case. The superior of this local Registrat was the Superintendent Registrar who was responsible for all the Registers within the old Poor Law Union. The returns were indexed and collated centrally, and master indexes for the entire country were produced at the General Register Office in Dublin. These are the indexes which are now used for public research.

"They carved the date above the gate "Eighteen Forty-Nine," When they built the workhouse on the hill of limestone tall and fine. The people came to drink the soup Ladled from greasy bowls, They died in whitewashed wards that held A thousand Irish souls." So wrote author M. J. McMANUS of the workhouse in Carrick on Shannon where he was born. It was in fact built in 1841 at a cost of over 11,000 pounds and it was (unfortunately) to play a big part in the life and death of the town in the folowing years during the Great Famine. It was one of three workhouses built in Co. Leitrim as a result of the passing of the Poor Law Act of 1838. The other two were at Manorhamilton and Mohill. Both of these buildings have since been demolished. The workhouse was built to accommodate 800 inmates. The Poor Law Union of Carrick administered the following areas. In Co. Leitrim, the parishes of Kiltoghert and Kiltubrid, parts of Annaduff, Drumreilly and Mohill. In Co. Roscommon, the parishes of Aughrim, Kilmore and portions of Ardcarne, Clooncraff, Creeve, Killukin, Killumod and Tumna. The administration was under the control of the Board of Guardians. Half of the members of this Board were made up of Justices of the Peace resident in ! the Union area. The other members were elected by the Union's rate-payers and property owners. The day to day running was left in the hands of the Master, who received a salary of 50 pounds per annum. He was assisted by the Matron who received half that. There was also a porter, a medical officer, two school teachers, a Roman Catholic chaplain, a Church of Ireland chaplain and the Clerk of the Union who recorded and maintained the records. Only the destitute were meant to avail of the Poor Law system. Conditions were to be as miserable as possible. Families were not allowed to live as a single unit, husbands and wives, parents and children, brothers and sisters were all assigned different quarters. Parents were admitted to see their children on Sundays only. Despite some problems, conditions at Carricks's workhouse in the early years were reasonable, but workhouses and the Poor Law were hopelessly inadequate to deal with the tragedy of the Famine that was just a few! years away. A succession of "small famines" in the early part of the 19th century had led to crop failures throughout Ireland and eventually to what became known as the Great Famine. In 1845 blight caused partial failure to the potato crop in Co. Leitrim. There were shortages of food in the workhouse and towards the end of the year the number of deaths rose significantly. The reaction of the government to the food shortages was to repeal the Corn Laws which led to a fall in the price of home-grown crops. Indian corn was imported into the country from the U.S. Local Committees were set up to identify the worst hit areas and to allocate relief accordingly. Public work schemes were introduced to give employment. Many of the fine cut-stone public buildings and bridges date from these mid 1840 schemes. In 1846 the blight reappeared and there was a complete failure of the potato crop. A change in government saw the end of the relief measures introduced by the previous a! dministration under Robert PEEL. This was done so as not to interfere with what the new cabinet felt was the right of the suppliers to a "fair profit." The task of coping with the now worsening situation in the country was in the hands of the Poor Law Unions, local voluntary relief committees and the Society of Friends also known as Quakers. In November 1846, William FORSTER of Norwich and James TUKE of York, both Quakers arrived in Carrick on Shannon. The scenes of poverty and suffering witnessed by them had a profound effect. There were 110 applicants for the workhouse, all destitute, for which there were only 30 vacancies. Starvation and disease were everywhere. FORSTER purchased all the bread available in the town and distributed it. Conditions in the workhouse were deplorable. There was no sanitation and clothing was scarce. Inmates were idle. Suppliers were profiteering. Built to accomodate 800 the workhouse was trying to cope with over a thousand, 170 were! in the hospital suffering from typhus and dysentery. Inmates were dying at a rate of 12 per week. There was no bedding and nothing to lie on but straw. In January 1847 the government finally saw the folly of its eariler policies and direct relief which included soup kitchens were introduced. It reduced starvation but it did not prevent the spread of disease. A temporary Inspector, Capt. Edmund WYNNE was appointed in an effort to administer the workhouse more efficiently, but the Board of Guardians refused to cooperate with WYNNE and they were disbanded and replaced by Vice-Guardians, James O'REILLY and Robert DUNCAN. Although there was initial success, WYNNE was replaced by Capt. Philip HAYMES, the Board of Guardians were reinstated. A special committee of the Board of Guardians was set up following a visit to the workhouse by the District Inspector, William CLARKE. All officers of the workhouse except the clerk were dismissed. Various charges were made against Capt! ain WYNNE and the Vice-Guardians for abuses and irregularities which included placing a Catherine FOLEY, with whom Capt. WYNNE was allegedly having a relationship, on an emigrants' list with fnancial assistance from the Union to enable her to emigrate. The story of the Great Famine was one of poverty, suffering and disease. Thousands died, many of them children. Foodstuffs were being exported out of Ireland while the families were too poor to purchase it themselves. The country's workhouses strugged with the crisis but more often than not they did not succeed. The workhouses, poorhouses, were seen by the poor as a last refuge and many wished rather to die than enter their grey walls; they were viewed worse that the gaol (jail). The workhouse in Carrick closed in the early decades of the 19th century. It was closed in the 1930s, then re-opened as a geriatric hospital. At the rear of the hospital is a destitute graveyard in which hundreds of victims of the Famine were buried in unmarked graves. It was hoped in 1994, to have the area turned into a Garden of Remembrance with a monument to the people who were buried there. -- Excerpts, "The Leitrim Guardian"

SNIPPET: Rose ROONEY served in Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia for four years and fought in many battles. She was still in the ranks when Lee surrendered at Appomattox in 1865. She was not one of the women who posed as a man in order to fight in the American Civil War; rather, she joined the Confederate Army, openly signing on as a female enlistee in the Crescent Blues Volunteers at New Orleans in 1861. Her designated duty was to serve as cook and laundress for the company. The men saw nothing wrong with this arrangement and welcomed her as a member of the unit, which eventually became Company K of the 15th Louisiana Infantry. Ms. ROONEY accompanied the men to Virginia, and it was there where her role abruptly changed. As the First Battle of Bull Run raged, and the outcome was still in doubt, she ran through a field of heavy fire to tear down a rail fence, allowing a battery of Confederate artillery to race through in time to stop a Union charge. Her heroic! act was credited with turning the tide in that sector of the battlefield. -- Excerpt, "That's Not In My American History Book, A Compilation of Little-Known Events and Forgotten Heroes," Thomas Ayres (2000)

Hello i'm new to the list the surname BLAKE-KELLY does any one recognise it? My great grand father may have been born in Cork or Waterford but I am unable to find any trace of him . Any ideas ? from a wintry spring in New Zealand Ray Nelson

Lush, rolling fields and hills of deepest green, land of leprechauns, spirits and shamrocks, home to many of history 's most beloved writers and artists, Ireland possesses a musical tradition as rich as its countryside. Throughout its often turbulent history, the folk music of Ireland has been a magical alchemy of a people's love of the land and for each other. Its unique and unmistakable sound, borne out of struggle and triumph, continually praises the kindest, most graceful aspects of the human spirit. It is music that has become special and loved by people around the world. Who can forget tenor John GARY's tender renditions of "A Little Bit of Heaven," "My Wild Irish Rose," "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen," "How Are Things in Glocca Morra," "Cockles and Mussels," "That's An Irish Lullaby (Too-Ra-Loo-Ra-Loo-Ra), "Mother Machree," "Kathleen Mavourneen," "Macushla," "Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms" and "Danny Boy," Perhaps you remember tenor Dennis DAY singing "Clancy Lowered The Boom," "How Can You Buy Killarny," "Galway Bay," the soulful "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling," "Back to Donegal" (Dear Old Donegal) and the lovely "The Rose of Tralee"? Then there is the wonderful voice of tenor Leo McCAFFREY with his "Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms," "Birthday of St. Patrick," "The Wild Colonial Boy," Killeater Fair," "Typical Irishman," "Irish Jaunting Car" and "Sweet Marie." These tenors from '40's-60's are only a few of those who rendered these tunes and others with reverence without losing sight of each of their own artistic styles. The union of powerful lyrics with an equally powerful, God-given voice fully captures the grace, passion and exuberance of Irish music and leaves the listener with a profound sense of what it means to be Irish. Whether it is a tender ballad, a tale of Irish rebellion or a rollicking. joyful song that gets you up and dancing, Irish music deeply touches the listener and draw him or her into the moment. While the bouncing melody of "Jaunting Car," jaunts and swerves like a car navigating the narrow streets and roads that cover Ireland, many other song lyrics reveal the ingrained sadness and undercurrent of mourning that courses through the people of Ireland in their longing for a deceased parent or a sweetly remembered way of life.

The Donner Party -- In 1846, thousands of people headed West in America with the hopes of securing land and opportunity. As members of the ill-fated Donner Party, the Irish American family of Patrick and Margaret BREEN and their seven children could not have known that their own hopeful trip to California would become a 3-1/2 month nightmare. Donner Pass cuts through the Sierra Nevada, a mountain range in eastern California. A party of 82 settlers from Illinois and adjoining states, lead by George and Jacob DONNER became snowbound there in brutal winter conditions and only 47 were to survive. The party had reached the High Sierras in late October, but a snowstorm had already closed the pass. In December, 15 persons tried to get through the snow-blocked pass. Eight of them died, but seven got through and sent back rescue workers. Those stranded had built crude shelters of logs, rocks, and hides, and were forced to eat twigs, field mice, their animals, their shoes, and finally their own dead. Rescuers found the BREENs in a hollow of snow 24 feet deep. Of the twelve recovered families, only two made it without losing any members. The BREENs were one of those fortunate families and were described by survivors as generous, sharing their few remaining provisions with others whose supplies were depleted. Donner Pass lies 7,088 feet above sea level, about 35 miles SW of Reno, NV. The first transcontinental railroad, completed in 1869, went through the pass. Donner Pass is a national historical landmark.

THE WILD SWANS AT COOLE The trees are in their autumn beauty, The woodland paths are dry, Under the October twilight the water Mirrors a still sky; Upon the brimming water among the stones Are nine-and-fifty swans. The nineteenth autumn has come upon me Since I first made my count; I saw, before I had well finished, All suddenly mount And scatter wheeling in great broken rings Upon their clamorous wings. I have looked upon those brillant creatures, And now my heart is sore. All's changed since I, hearing at twilight, The first time on this shore, The bell-beat of their wings above my head, Trod with a lighter tread. Unwearied still, lover by lover They paddle in the cold Companionable streams or climb the air; Their hearts have not grown old; Passion or conquest, wander where they will, Attend upon them still. But now they drift on the still water, Mysterious, beautiful; Among what rushes will they build, By what lake's edge or pool Delight men's eyes when I awake some day To find they have flown away? -- William Butler Yeats, 1917. Note -- Coole is the estate of the Irish playwright Lady Augusta GREGORY (1852-1932). Yeats began to spend his summers at Coole in 1897, often staying into the fall. Once home of Lady Gregory, it is now a national forest and wildlife park (per my dated tourist guide), where ruined walls and stables remain of a once fine house where she held literary court with other notables as Sean O'CASEY, G. B. SHAW, J. M. SYNGE, and Frank O'CONNOR. There is a famous tree there where they carved their initials while taking after dinner air, and Coole Lake still has swans. Roxborough, in Co. Galway, was the childhood home of Lady GREGORY, Yeats' colleague and patron, whose practical nature helped the Abbey Theatre to survive its early years.

THE FIDDLER OF DOONEY When I play on my fiddle in Dooney Folk dance like a wave of the sea; My cousin is priest in Kilvarnet, My brother in Mocharabuiee. I passed my brother and cousin: They read in their books of prayer; I read in my book of songs I bought at the Sligo fair. When we come at the end of time To Peter sitting in state, He will smile on the three old spirits, But call me first through the gate; For the good are always the merry, Save by an evil chance, And the merry love the fiddle, And the merry love to dance: And when the folk there spy me, They will all come up to me, With "Here is the fiddler of Dooney!" And dance like a wave of the sea. -- William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), from "The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats," Macmillan & Co., London.