By Janet
Cassidy-Stroh
In
the far west of Ulster, among the hills and
lakes of County Fermanagh, is the little village
of Derrygonnelly. I've come to think of
as my "hometown," although my great-great-grandfather,
Patrick Cassidy, left it more than a hundred
sixty years ago.
Today I was returning for another visit with
Ada and Katherine, the Cassidy cousins I'd met
twenty years ago through my family history research.
I had just driven down this morning from Belfast,
where three days at PRONI and the GRO had turned
up new clues in my family research.
As I neared the village I could see the prominent
limestone cliff of Knockmore which rose up from
the Sillies River valley. I knew that
Knockmore, as well as the neighboring mountains
of Boho, contained caves and sinkholes which
had played a part in local history.
This cliff had a special importance to my own
family's history, and, it had provided the clue
I had needed to find my ancestor's home area.
When I first began the search for our family's
roots twenty-five years ago, I had some bits
of information passed down in the family.
My great-grandfather, Patrick Francis Cassidy,
was the last of his siblings born in Ireland.
According to oral tradition, the family had
emigrated when Patrick Francis was a year old,
about 1842. We knew his parents, Patrick
and Mary Cassidy, had settled in Washington,
DC. We also knew that they were from County
Fermanagh, and though I had never seen any of
it, family story said that Patrick wrote poetry.
"Gentleman farmer and poet" is how
he described himself.
Eagerly I began the search. I talked to
the older generation. My grandparents
were no longer alive, and my father did not
know much of the history, but I talked to his
cousins. I gathered birth, marriage, and
death records. I tracked the family through
the censuses, discovering that Patrick Francis
had three older siblings, (Mary, Peter, and
Charles) all, like him, born in Ireland.
There were also five more children born in Washington,
DC. Sadly, I learned that two daughters had
died in infancy. I discovered that the
family lived in Georgetown and that Patrick
was the sexton of Holy Trinity Church.
From the family grave in
Holyrood Cemetery I located living cousins,
Doe Schram and her brother Tom, descendants
of Patrick's oldest daughter, Mary Cassidy Ashe.
And wonder of wonders! Doe had a charcoal
portrait of Patrick and Mary Cassidy!
Doe and Tom had more stories to add to the family
lore. It seems the pastor of Holy Trinity
in Georgetown, Rev. Peter B. O'Flanagan, S.J.,
was a cousin of Mary McCaffrey Cassidy.
When the foundation for the new church was dug
in 1850, Mary turned the first shovelful
of dirt. I checked out the family stories
about the Civil War, and found a service record
for Patrick Francis's older brother Charles,
who fought for the Union.
Later, my cousin Bernadette Zappala would discover
Patrick Francis's record. The boys had
run off to Baltimore to enlist together.
But Mary Cassidy didn't want her sons to be
soldiers. She swore an oath that Patrick
Francis was under age (he wasn't) and after
serving six months he was sent home.
Later this would come back to haunt him, when
he was turned down for a pension based on his
service.
But the question was, where in County Fermanagh
had the family come from? No one seemed
to know. Back I went to my father's cousins
and asked more questions. More stories
were revealed. Supposedly Patrick had
come to the States twice. The first time
he came by himself, probably before he married,
then returned to Ireland. Later he emigrated
with his wife and children.
Other stories were even more intriguing -- Patrick
had been involved in secret meetings in caves
in the hills. And another clue: Patrick
used a pen name for his poetry -- Knockmore,
which meant "big hill."
When the breakthrough came it was pure serendipity.
One day while browsing in the New York Public
Library in a section of collective biographies,
I spotted a slim volume entitled The Poets of
Ireland by D. J. O'Donoghue, published in Dublin
in 1912.
The entries were listed alphabetically, so I
did what I always do with a book about Ireland
-- I looked for Cassidy. I didn't really
expect to find anything. But to my surprise,
there was an entry for "Patrick Cassidy."
Curious but doubtful, I read: "Irish-American
poet born about 1790 in County Fermanagh, and
resident for many years in Georgetown (D.C.)
USA. He wrote verse frequently for the
Boston Pilot and other Irish-American organs.
The poems of Peter Magennis (q.v) are dedicated
to him."
I almost did a dance there in the library!
This was MY Patrick! They had his birthdate
wrong, but without a doubt, this was my gg-grandfather.
I read the entry again. Unfortunately
there was no birthplace listed. But wait.
Who was this Peter Magennis? I turned
to the entry for Magennis and learned he was
a National schoolteacher and writer, born near
the village of Derrygonnelly in County Fermanagh.
As soon as I got home I wrote a letter to the
National Library in Dublin. Did they
have anything written by Peter Magennis that
mentioned a Patrick Cassidy? While I
waited for an answer, I went to my own library
and looked at the most detailed atlas I could
find. I found the village of Derrygonnelly just
west of Enniskillen, and not far from the shore
of Lower Lough Erne. And there, just outside
of Derrygonnelly, was a hill marked Knockmore
Cliff!
A few weeks later, I received a package from
the National Library of Ireland. In it
was a copy of a long poem by Peter Magennis,
entitled, "To Patrick Cassidy, Esquire,
Georgetown College, Washington, America."
It began, " Dear friend, who pin'st on
foreign strand." It went on to recall
the days they had spent fishing in the Screenagh
and the Sillies (two rivers near Derrygonnelly)
and the men they had known in years past.
There was no doubt about it -- Patrick had come
from near Derrygonnelly. But where
exactly?
In 1976, I visited Ireland with my sister Joan
and my niece Joanne. We went to Derrygonnelly
and went into a store on its one main street.
"Are there any Cassidys living around
here?" we asked. "Aye, there's plenty
of them," we were told. In fact,
just down the street was a grocery store, The
Casson, owned by Cassidys. So off down
the street we went. There we met Ada Cassidy,
who ran the store with her husband Jack.
We told her about our ancestor and she took
us down the street to the garage to meet Jack.
We repeated the story of Patrick Cassidy and
Mary McCaffrey. We told how Patrick had supposedly
gone to America twice, and we mentioned the
poem by Magennis. Everyone in Derrygonnelly
knew of Magennis; he was a sort of local hero. "We
should ask my cousin Packie Flanagan,"
said Jack. "He's a bit older than
me and knows more about the family."
Ada promised to ring up Packie who lived on
a farm right next to Knockmore Cliff and to
call us at our B&B to let us know. That
evening we got a phone call from Ada.
"Packie thinks it is one family,"
said Ada. If we would come out the next
day, she'd take us out to Packie's farm at Knockmore
to meet him and his wife, Bridie. When we met
Packie, whose mother was Mary Jane Cassidy,
we did a double-take!
Packie bore a remarkable resemblance to my grandfather.
While we enjoyed tea and Bridie's fresh-baked
bread and homemade rhubarb jam, Packie remembered
something his grandfather had told him.
"My grandfather had an uncle who went out
to America and then came home and lived with
them for a while. But then he went out
a second time and stayed." What was more,
Packie had a copy of the same poem by Magennis,
and he remarked, "I never knew who that
Patrick Cassidy was for sure, "but I knew
he had to be my mother's relative."
Packie's mother, Mary Jane Cassidy, and Jack's
father , also Patrick Cassidy were born in the
townland of Drumgormly on the ridge directly
above Packie's present-day farm. Drumgormly
(the name means "blue ridge" ) looks
right across at Knockmore Cliff. The Screenagh
River mentioned in Magennis's poem runs through
it. Their father was Francis Cassidy who
was 45 when he married his cousin, Sarah Ann
Love, in 1880. His father was also Francis
Cassidy, and was probably the Francis Cassidy
Sr. listed in Griffith's Valuation in 1862.
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September
12th is the feast day for St. Molaise.
The stained glass portrait of St.
Molaise on the right was created in 1968.
It is located in a stone window
over 450 years old that originally was
within St. Mary's Priory on Devenish Island.
The portrait of St. Molaise is inside
the Church of St. Molaise (Church of Ireland)
in Monea, Co. Fermanagh. The photo was
taken by Janet Cassidy-Stroh.
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My own Patrick, besides naming a son Patrick
Francis, named another son Edward Francis.
So Francis was obviously a name that was important
to the family -- more evidence that I had
found the right Cassidys. I've been
back to Derrygonnelly several times to stay
with Ada and Katherine (Jack passed away in
1982). Each time they greet me with
"Welcome home." I have made
other friends in the area, too. And
each year I come, I find another piece of
the puzzle.
Just this year I wrote to the Maryland Province
of the Jesuits, for information on Mary McCaffrey
Cassidy's cousin, Rev. Peter B. O'Flanagan,
S.J. They sent me his records, which showed
that Peter was born in the townland of Aghakeeran,
right behind Packie and Bridie's farm.
It is a short distance from Knockmore Cliff.
There are caves in Aghakeeran, too. The
Jesuit information listed Peter's father as
Andrew Flanagan.
And just the day before at PRONI, I had found
some intriguing information: A field book kept
by the landlord's agent listed Andrew Flanagan
among the tenants. And a note in the book
linked him (at least in the agent's mind) to
a notorious local murder. In 1826, a colorful
character named Dominick Noon came to Derrygonnelly
from County Roscommon. He became a member
of the Ribbonmen, a secret society which defended
Catholic farmers from Orangemen. Soon
he turned informer and gave evidence against
several men from Derrygonnelly.
At least one man, John Maguire, was convicted
and sentenced to transportation. Shortly
after the trial, Noon disappeared, and a few
weeks later his body was discovered in a cave
in Aghakeeran townland, known to this day as
Noon's Hole. No one was ever convicted
of the murder. But was it a coincidence
that my ancestor emigrated to the U.S. for the
first time around the time of that murder? Could
the "secret meetings" in the caves
of Knockmore have been Ribbonmen's meetings?
My search continues. This last trip I
spent hours in the Enniskillen Library, reading
newspaper reports of trials in the 1820s and
30s. I have found a Michael Cassidy of Drumgormly
who was accused (but acquitted) of being a Ribbonman.
Maybe someday I'll find the proof to link my
Patrick Cassidy to Drumgormly. Or maybe
not. But in my heart I know I have found
my "hometown"
in County Fermanagh.
Editor's Note: Janet lives
in New York State.
