Not Just A Web-Site....More a way of Life!
I recently received this
nostalgic story and powerful photograph by email from
Sheila MacAvoy Block over in the
USA whose ancestors came from the
Glencairn / Lismore area
of County Waterford
Shelia’s letter gives us some idea of the difficult struggle
for
survival it must
and
countless others who were forced to
1840s
and 50s in order to survive the Great Famine.
Dear
Pat,
Here's a treasure of a photo, which we were only recently able to
see
through the miracle of technology. The image was on a glass
negative
covered in dust and retrieved from a shoebox in my brother's
basement.
The picture was taken about 1900 by my grandfather, Thomas
MacAvoy, an
amateur photographer. The image is of Mary English Coleman
and
her daughter,
Mary English left her home in Glencairn, County Waterford,
at
the end of the famine
She
came to America alone and was met by her older
Ellen,
who lived at 30 Broadway in Lower Manhattan.
Their
parents, Michael English, then aged about 60, and his wife
Mary
Sullivan English, aged 53, left Ireland in 1853 aboard the
ship "Marmion." Mary Sullivan English did not complete
the trip to
re-join her 8 children all now in New York. She died of cholera
on the
voyage and was buried at sea.
Young Mary English married John Coleman in New York and had 8
children
also, seven of them still living when this picture was taken in
the back
garden of her grandson Thomas' home in Brooklyn.
She was widowed at age 48 when husband John
was
killed in an accident on the
and
in all other pictures of her, she wore black in his memory.
The research into this family has been brought to life by
web
pages and newspaper
columns such as yours and by the good help of Heritage Centres,
libraries and archives all around Waterford and
the
Blackwater Valley.
I thought I would like share with your readers, this face
of
one beautiful woman
Co.Waterford so
long ago,
Best
wishes,
Sheila MacAvoy Block
You can now
through Pay-Pal.
Towards the costs of running this web-site by credit card or by post to
Pat Kiely,Ballyratfter Cottage, Lismore, Co.Waterford, Ireland. (no zip code required)
NOW PLAYING: 
Time to say Goodbye!
.............A.Bocelli
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