Thanks Joseph for a lovely remembrance.
My paternal family came from south of Dungannon in Blackwater country.
During the war my parents and I lived with my grandparents in Belfast
(we had to flee Kent during the Battle of Britain) and I can still see
my grandparents saying 'goodbye' and g'ma crying as she acknowledged she
would not see her son and family again. We left on the ferry to
Liverpool, then train to Southampton and ship to Australia. I fondly
recall the soda bread that my aunt in Australia made, and the coke and
peat fires that we shared on Robinson's farm in Hillsborough, NI. Those
word pictures by Joseph are a vivid memory to me. I am now 86 and if it
wasn't for COVID we'd have revisited the places of my childhood and my
ancestors patch. Sadly I can't travel now, so won't be seen under the
great marquee.
That is my father's line. On my mother's side, her great uncle left
Derry for NY, in the period covered, where he soon joined the Union
army, then later became a pioneer settler of Nebraska (growing potatoes
of course). The comment of mis-spelling names occurred just like that.
His family was McBeath, which became McBeth in US. I have traced his US
descendants and followed their drift west to Colorado. Yet most of my
mother's side came to Australia from the 1920s on. Both mother's and
father's sides are now well established in Australia from Queensland to
Tasmania and all in-between. I do recall the smell of the peat fires and
the sulphurous coal & coke. Is that why I have a fondness for
single-malt peat-flavoured whisky? The old ones have passed and soda
bread is now a fading memory, yet my sister does recall the warm flat
loaves from the wood fire range in the country kitchen in western
Victoria, where we stayed during summer school holidays. The Irish and
Scottish influence in Geelong, Victoria is still apparent, and the
family name is well known in the district. Oh those memories. As I wait
to join my ancestors, those memories come flooding back on so many
occasions. Compiling the family history book and pouring over old
photos brings tears to my eyes as I relive their journeys. But this is
not the time or place to get maudlin.
A lovely picture of life then, and the anguish in families when young
adults left on precarious journeys for far flung countries, half a globe
away.
Gordon Wilkinson
On 8/06/2026 6:34 am, James McKane via CoTyroneList wrote:
From Tyrone to the Globe: The 19th-Century Diaspora
<https://www.cotyroneireland.com/misc/globe.html>
Thanks again to Joseph Mullin for a great addition to CTI!
Jim McKane
Kitchener, Ontario
[email protected]
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