Queen Elizabeth today completed her four-day stay in Ireland. President Obama will be in Ireland on Monday. Their visits to sites in the the Irish Midlands have connections to some of my ancestors.
“O'bama” will visit Moneygall, from where F. Kearney, the President's great-great-great-grandfather on his mother's side, emigrated in 1850. Moneygall lies along the N7 highway, in County Offaly, but very close to the boundary with County Tipperary. (The Offaly-Tipperary boundary crosses the N7 highway five times within about ten miles of Moneygall.) Traveling east from Moneygall towards Dublin, the N7 crosses into that part of Tipperary that is Ikerrin, the ancestral homeland of the O'Meagher clan.
Two of my ancestors on my mother's side emigrated from locations that are within 20 miles of Moneygall. My great-great-grandfather, James Meagher, emigrated from near Cappawhite, about 20 miles southwest of Moneygall. My great-great-grandmother, Ellen Powers, left from Kilcormac, about 20 miles northeast of Moneygall.
Today Queen Elizabeth visited the Rock of Cashel, which is about thirty miles south of Moneygall. Although it is a bit of a stretch, there is a connection with another of my ancestors, my great-grandfather John Murtha. John, along with most of his Murtha siblings, emigrated from County Cavan, which is a long way northeast of Tipperary. About the time when John Murtha was a very young man, there was a land survey known as the Griffiths Valuation. Griffiths recorded that the Murtha homestead and farm was owned by “Dean Adams” (the Reverend Samuel Adams, a Cavan squire holding the office in the Church of Ireland, “Dean of Cashel”).
