Grey eyes taking in the view at the Capilano Suspension Bridge in Vancouver.
I’ve never really liked the colour of my eyes.
In the grand scheme of things, they fall into the category of blue but, really, they’re a nondescript, wishy-washy, slate grey – manky grey, it was usually called.
It was never really a big issue until just before I became a teenager when I watched a film called ‘North’ starring a young Elijah Wood and those impossible Hollywood blues of his.
I’d never seen eyes like it – the azure of French seas on a sunny July afternoon – and became all too aware of my own, which resembled the drab, dull and overcast sky of rainy Irish Sunday. Was that really his natural eye colour? How could that be? Why weren’t mine like that? What was wrong with them?
Since then, each of the many, many models staring out from the pages of magazines with their bright, luminescent blue eyes has been like Nelson from The Simpsons, heartlessly pointing at me and sniggering, ‘ha ha!’
Recently I was talking to my mother about the Stafford side of our family tree. She mentioned that her father had an aunt (my great-great aunt), Mary Kate, who went off to America and nobody ever knew what happened to her.
We had a look online at the Irish censuses of 1901 and 1911 (via the National Archives) and there she was: Mary Kate Stafford.
We then stumbled upon the website of the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, which allows access to the records of all those who sailed into Ellis Island/Port of New York. Guess what a quick search turned up?
Aged 22, Mary Kate boarded The Cedric in Queenstown (Cobh), Co. Cork, and set off for a new life, arriving at Ellis Island on May 22 1911. On the ship’s manifest it says she paid her fare herself, she was going to join her uncle Frank in Chicago, she was 5′ 7″, had brown hair and her eyes were…grey!
My heart skipped a beat when I saw that. Immediately a switch flicked in my mind as this family connection, this unexpected link to my past, saw dislike quickly kicked to the kerb by pride.
Hollywood blues are SO last year. I’ve got me a set of Stafford steely greys and I absolutely love them!
SmallHouseBigGarden
January 6, 2013 at 1:24 pm
I can’t even tell you how much I love this post! Isn’t it exciting to find a lost ancestor or bit of info about the family tree?
Everything in life is a matter of perspective. I daresay, you’ll never forget how Auntie Mary Kate taught this fantastic life lesson!
emmastafford1
January 6, 2013 at 1:35 pm
Thanks very much! Just last night when double-checking the ship’s manifest for Mary Kate, I found also found a Minns Stafford who came from the same place and was also going to visit her uncle Frank Stafford in Chicago! She’s not a sister and so much be a cousin. Apart from that we know nothing of her…how exciting!
Just had a look at your own blog and it’s very interesting to read about gardening in another part of the world, all the different plants and, ick, bugs! I’m just a novice gardener and keep killing everything but I’m trying!! Keep up the good work!
Dr Richard Simmons
January 11, 2013 at 3:04 pm
Hi Emma
Thanks to the wonders of Google I found this post and thought that you and your mother might be interested to know that my wife, Elizabeth Stafford (now Simmons), is a relative of yours. I can’t work out the exact relationship without knowing who your grandfather was.
As you will know from the census, Mary Kate came from a farm called Ballyvarogue (spellings vary) in Tintern, Wexford, Ireland. The farm is very near to the ruins of Tintern Abbey (http://www.heritageireland.ie/en/tinternabbey/). There were two families who lived in neighbouring farmhouses, called “Above” and “Within” by the Staffords, because the farm was divided between two brothers, John and Martin, by the time of the Griffith’s Valuation in 1853. Some time after 1911, the “Within” family moved away, leaving the whole farm in the hands of the “Above” Staffords. The “Withins” home fell into ruin and was eventually demolished to make way for a beautiful garden. Mary Kate was one of the “Withins”.
My wife is descended from the “Aboves”, who are here: http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Wexford/Fethard/Ballyvaroge/1796918/ in the 1901 census. Some “Above” Staffords still live at Ballyvarogue, though they have rented out the farmland and make their money in other ways now. They demolished the “Above” farmhouse some years ago to build a more modern home. Liz’s parents moved to England in 1954. She used to spend her summer holidays on the farm and we have just rediscovered a photo of the “Within” ruins which she took in the 1960s. As we are tracing our family histories it would be very interesting to know more about your Stafford connections. We are in touch with some people in the USA who think our Mary Kate may be an ancestor of theirs, but there are some doubts because their Mary Kate’s age doesn’t seem quite to tie in with ours.
I guess you may know some or all of this from your own family stories, so apologies if any of this is old news.
By the way, Liz also has those eyes and I can confirm that they are indeed very special, as is the Stafford smile.
Best wishes,
Richard Simmons
Chatham, England
Dr Richard Simmons
January 11, 2013 at 6:35 pm
Hi Emma
My wife has told me, on getting in from work, that my understanding of the “Above”/”Within” thing is (yet again) awry.
So,:
1. Mary Kate was a “Within”, but so is my wife, which makes Mary Kate her great aunt.
2. It was the “Withins” who kept the farm and still live at Ballyvarogue, while the “Aboves” departed for reasons unknown.
3. The census link is, however, correctly to the “Above” family, as I said.
I will get this right one day!
We are now intrigued by the fact that your grandfather called Mary Kate his aunt. We only know of two brothers. One was John, who inherited the farm and became my wife’s grandfather. The other was James Stafford, who never married and, so far as we know, had no children.
We wonder if your Staffords are from the “Above” family, and Mary Kate was nominally an aunt but actually a cousin. Then again, we don’t know who Frank Stafford is, as he doesn’t appear in any of the records that have turned up so far, so there are mysteries still to solve.
There is no doubt that the Mary Kate in the Ellis Island and census records is the same person, and is Liz’s great aunt, and Liz thinks your photo shows a definite family resemblance, so we hope that you or your mother will be interested in sharing some more information, as we would also be happy to do.
Best wishes,
Richard
emmastafford1
January 11, 2013 at 7:52 pm
Hi Richard,
Thanks so much for getting in touch! All this family stuff is very confusing – hopefully, when we can ties all the loose ends together, it’ll make much more sense. All I know right now is the family is far too fond of the names John and Thomas!
So let’s start at the start.
- I’m a ‘within’ who still lives in Ballyvarogue (or rather, moved away as a child but is now back). My mother is Marie who, I think, is your Elizabeth’s first cousin; my grandfather was Johnnie and his father was John who inherited the farm.
- In the census, Mary Kate, John and James were all siblings which would make Mary Kate my grandfather Johnnie’s aunt. According to my mother, James died quite young so there’s no mystery family to be found there.
- Apparently a descendant of Mary Kate’s (a grandson we think) came to visit Ballyvarogue years ago – my uncle, who is in his late forties thinks it was just after he made his Communion. This man’s name was Timothy P. Chandler but no-one can remember which part of America he came from.
- When I was double-checking Mary Kate’s record on the Ellis Island website the other night, quite by chance I discovered that there was a Minns Stafford on the same boat, on the same trip also going to visit her uncle Frank in Chicago! Mystery cousin??? The age would match Mary from the ‘Above’ family but supposing it’s her would be a leap too far I reckon!
Using what we believe is written on the gravestones in Poulfur cemetery, we’ve scribbled out a very sketchy family tree but there are glaring gaps that need to be filled in. At the minute I seem to be coming up with more questions than answers!
I didn’t think I had much of a family resemblance but, hey, if there is one, who am I to argue? I’d love to see that photo of the ruins at some stage…I lived down the bottom of the lane until I was five so it’d be interesting to see if I’d seen them fashioned into something else!
All the best for now,
Emma
Dr Richard Simmons
January 12, 2013 at 12:46 am
Hi Emma
Aha! It was the photo of you in Canada wot fooled us! I didn’t realise that you are in Ballyvarogue and thought you were one of the family who are in the the Americas. I have been badgered by some folk from over there, who seem to think that they might be descendants of Mary Kate. One of them is familiar with the bantam hen story, which Sean can tell you if you don’t already know it, so must be connected to the people who showed up at Tintern. However, none of them is a Chandler (though there’s a flock of them out there, so there might be a Chandler among ‘em). Sounds suspiciously like a character from Friends to me, though. One of the flock sent me a weird email today saying that there is a vacant Stafford baronetry if only I could help him trace the family tree. Oh dear. Americans and family history don’t always mix well. Now it all makes sense, however (well, as much as any of it makes sense). Sorry for not realising who you are.
Yes, we too have trekked round Poulfur and Siobhan also gave Liz copies of the family tree she had assembled. The abundance of Johns, Jameses and, indeed, Thomases is a nightmare. One branch of my family comes from Bantry and my great great grandfather was a Jeremiah Harrington. Would you call your son Jeremiah? Well there are shedloads of Harringtons in Bantry, and guess what their favourite boy’s name was… The Simmonses came from Dublin and at least there weren’t many of them there, though I haven’t got back beyond the 1850s with them and they also passed names down the male line.
When we come over later in the year we plan to meet up with Leish to compare notes but, given the unfortunate loss of so much data during the civil war, I don’t know how much further we can get. Not enough to make Sean a baron, I don’t think! Pity. I don’t know if he still plays polocross but I can picture him on one of those big horses in the armour. Minns sounds interesting. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was Mary from Above but, as you say, it’s wise not to leap to conclusions. And we still have to track down Frank. Liz’s dad is Francis James and given the family tendency to repeat male names we couldn’t fathom where Francis came from. Now we are wondering if Frank was an Above who set sail before being captured in the 1901 census. Intriguing.
I don’t think I can post photos on here, but I could put it online and send you a link via this site, so why don’t I do that? We were fond of the old house and my kids used to enjoy playing in the barn, but I have to admit that its replacement is mighty fine.
All the best to everyone over there, some of whom we will no doubt see later in 2013.
Richard