Researching Our Irish Genealogy

arly in 2005, before we left for our St. Patrick's week vacation, we found The Leitrim-Roscommon 1901 Census Records on the internet. We were trying to find out from what part of Co. Leitrim Terry's grandfather, Terence Reynolds, had come, and to see if we could locate the house or property where the family had lived. Terence would have been a boy of about 10 or 11 at that time. We knew that his father's name was Bernard, his mother's name was Winifred, and he had a brother named Hugh and a sister named Mary Katherine. Well, we found the Bernard Reynolds family in the Townland of Aghalough, the Parish of Cloone, the Barony of Carrigallen, in Co. Leitrim. Bernard was 56, Winifred (Una) was 40, Mary Katherine was 11, Margaret was 9, Hugh was 8 and Bridget was 5. But where was Terence?

I kept searching using the name of Terence Reynolds as a member of any household. Finally, Eureka!! I found him. He was working as a servant at the Francis Bohan home in the neighboring Townland of Killyfea, the Parish of Cloone, the Barony of Carrigallen, in Co. Leitrim. This was a young family with two small children, ages 1 year and 2 months. When we inquired about such a young boy working as a servant, we were told that he most likely worked in the home helping the wife. It was a coincidence that the family's name was Bohan, because we had become friends with Teresa Bohan, one of the caretakers at the Lough Rynn Estate in Mohill, which is just a few miles from Cloone. Although Bohan is her married name, we will try to find out if she might know anything about it.

Terence immigrated to the United States the following year, 1902, which was information we obtained from the 1930 U.S. Census Records. We have not found any information about with whom he traveled or where he lived when he arrived. We do know that he settled in Norwood, Massachusetts when he married Margaret Clarke in 1912. This was in the Irish section of Norwood, where all the neighbors were of Irish descent. When we went to St. Mary's Catholic Church in Dedham, Massachusetts, where they were married, we found that Terence's Best Man was named Patrick Lydon. This was another coincidence because we had met the Michael Lydon family in Co. Meath, and they told us that they had relatives in Norwood. This couldn't possibly be the same Lydon's, could it? We would try to get that information as well.

If the Bohan family and the Lydon family turn out to be the same families that we met, I guess I would have to say that it was fate!!

Note: We were unable to find the Bernard Reynolds family home or property. We were also unsuccessful in finding the family burial plot in the cemeteries where we looked in March 2005, but have since learned of another old cemetery in Cloone, where we will look on our next visit.

There were so many places where we received confusing information about Terry's Reynolds family. We recently learned that Grandfather Terence arrived in the port of Boston aboard the Cymric in 1908. He would have been about seventeen years old, which contradicts the information we previously had by six or seven years. It makes more sense now that he was seventeen when he arrived instead of ten or eleven. We also learned that his brother, Hugh, and his sister, Brigid, arrived in Boston in 1914.

We still don't know when Mary Catherine arrived but we do know that she did come. We believe that Brigid and Mary Catherine returned to Ireland as there is no other information about them living here. Although Grandfather Terence never returned to Ireland, Hugh traveled to Co. Leitrim every few years, probably to visit his sisters. We found that Terry's grandmother, Margaret Clarke Reynolds, came from Kells, Co. Meath, in 1911.

We found out that the Patrick Lydon who was Terence's best man at his wedding was not related to our friends, the Michael Lydon family of Co. Meath. The relatives that lived in Norwood were Mary Lydon's side of the family, the Baileys. We also learned that Teresa Bohan of Rynn had no information about the Francis Bohan family that lived in Killyfea. Terence worked for that family when he was about ten or eleven years old and we still don't know if they were related to Teresa's husband, John P. Bohan.

We have recently started a couple of searches with LittleShamrocks.com's new Irish roots affiliate, Records Ireland. The site is easy to use and not as expensive as other genealogy search engines.

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