In this series we’ve discussed the important resources to consult for your Irish ancestor in America. At this point, you should hopefully be armed with some specifics about your ancestor, their Irish-born family, and an idea of what province, county, or parish they came from in Ireland. Now, we will cross the Atlantic and examine the resources you will use in Ireland to pinpoint your ancestral family. First, it’s crucial to provide some historical context for Ireland and its records. As far back as the 18th century, most of the Irish population outside of Ulster were tenant farmers who rented...
Discovering you have Irish ancestors can be very exciting. Where in Ireland did they come from? Is there a tombstone or an ancestral farm you can visit on your next vacation? Before you start googling, know that accurately tracing an ancestor from America to Ireland isn’t easy; in fact, it’s one of the hardest fields in genealogy. Irish immigrants were often illiterate, and many key records in both America and Ireland have been lost. But rather than feel overwhelmed, take comfort in knowing the journey is not impossible. This is the first of a six-part series that will help you...
You sent off your Ancestry DNA test in the form of a tube of saliva and you just received your results. Are you surprised? Excited? Puzzled? Wondering what to do next? Why not explore your ethnicity results and learn where in the world you come from. The science of DNA can seem daunting to the beginner, so I invite you to join me as I learn about DNA and how to use it for genealogy purposes. I’ll be posting regularly about my discoveries, so follow along and see what you can learn. My genealogy paper trail has so far led...
