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| Rossadillisk, Ireland is circled in red on this map |
At this point, however, I have multiple cousins on my paternal side who are getting very interested in family history and are actively doing research and messaging me with their discoveries. I have written little about my father's family, so I am going to switch focus and dive into Lacey and Beukenkamp genealogy here, hoping that sharing what I've learned over the years will be helpful to cousins who are now on their own journey with genealogy. Since 2013, I have received many comments on this blog from Lacey descendants all over the world, and will be incorporating what I've learned from them. If you are reading this and you're connected to the Lacey, Feeney, King, or Coyne families from Rossadillisk, near Clifden in County Galway, Ireland, please leave a message. Piecing together what we all know is the best way to understand the history of a family that did not leave a lot of written records.
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| Rossadillisk is highlighted in purple on this map |
Our Lacey family comes from Rossadillisk, Ireland.
Rossadillisk is in the Electoral Division of Sillerna, in Civil Parish of Omey, in the Barony of Ballynahinch, in the County of Galway.1 It is a townland, one of the smallest types of communities in Ireland, and it is just 188 acres in size. There is no commercial district in Rossadillisk. It is made up entirely of modest homes set along the sea. I cannot find a current population for Rossadillisk, but it is smaller than its neighbor Cleggan, which has about 200 residents 2, an active harbor, a few restaurants, and a smattering of bed and breakfasts. The nearest city is Clifden, which is a 20-minute drive from Rossadillisk, and has a population of approximately 1600.
The Irish name for Rossadillisk is Ros an Duillisc. Ros an Duillisc means "promontory of the dillesk or salt leaf." Dillesk, also known as Dulse, is an Irish seaweed.
More than 500 varieties of seaweed can be found in Ireland’s pristine waters, especially along the indented western shore, where mild temperatures, good wave action, and a varied rocky substrata provide an excellent growth environment. Most harvesting occurs in the Gaeltacht regions of counties Galway, Mayo, and Donegal. In 1994, the crop weighed in at 34,600 tons, securing Ireland’s position as one of the world’s important seaweed producers.
During the Great Famine of 1845-50, fortunate coastal dwellers supplemented their meager diets with a variety of seaweeds which are rich in iodine, magnesium, calcium, potassium, and many vital trace minerals. Several types of seaweed have long been important Irish dietary components.
Dulse, a reddish-brown seaweed unique to North Atlantic and Pacific Northwest waters, is found all around the Irish coast and has been eaten since the 12th century when the “Hymn of Columba” recorded dulse-picking as one of a monk’s daily chores. “A while gathering dulse from the rock, a while fishing, a while giving food to the poor, a while in my cell.” It is often eaten plain or served as an accompaniment to bowls of steamed mussels. 3
Dillisk or Dulse, a Irish seaweed [Source: scmp.com] Rossadillisk is part of Connemara, a gorgeous area of Ireland much beloved of tourists and poets. Having visited Connemara, I can attest to the enormous beauty of Connemara National Park, Kylemore Abbey, and the impressive western coastline.
Oscar Wilde wrote of Connemara’s ‘savage beauty’, declaring it a ‘wild, mountainous country’, ‘in every way magnificent’. It is raw and elemental; when the notoriously fickle Atlantic weather closes in to envelop everything in a thick, damp sea mist or when gales lash the coast, whipping the sea into a frothing frenzy, there is little choice but to retreat indoors with a stash of board games, a cheering fire and a bottle of Power’s whiskey. But when the sun shines, nowhere is the grass greener, the sea bluer and the soft, powdery sand so white as to give the Maldives a run for their money. Wild flowers carpet the grassy headlands from late spring, clouds of fiery-orange montbretia, scarlet fuchsia and yellow gorse fill the hedgerows in high summer, and heather and fading bracken shade the mountains mauve-brown in autumn.4
Rossadillisk moorings
cc-by-sa/2.0 - © Jonathan Wilkins - geograph.org.uk/p/5928346
This sort of romanticism about the area's physical beauty does not take into account the reality of living there in the 1800s, as our family did, and as some relatives still do. Rossadillisk is isolated. Its dwellings are simple and diversions are few. The elements were a daily challenge before electricity and gas were introduced, and simple cottages with peat fires were the only protection against harsh Atlantic cold and wind. Farming is difficult here, due to the rocky soil, and food sources were limited to the potatoes, cabbage, and turnips that could be grown and the fish that could be brought in from the sea. There was chicken for meat and cows for milk, but other meats were rare. Our ancestors' lives largely revolved around the ocean, and they toiled to haul halibut, codfish, and eel into small, unsophisticated boats. They were working people, not well educated, and they likely were not strolling the bogs pontificating about savage beauty on a regular basis. My father, upon first visiting Rossadillisk, and seeing the flat, craggy expanse of low-slung cottages and rocky fields understood at once why his grandfather left. This was not a place of opportunity and excitement for a young man. This was a place where a man would labor in exactly the same way his father and grandfather had, without better options, until he died and was buried next to his ancestors on Omey Island. At some point, around 1902, my great-grandfather Thomas Mark Lacey decided this would not be his path. That decision is the reason we all exist.
What we know about the Laceys comes from oral history passed down in our family, from the accounts given to us by other Lacey descendants, from church records in Clifden, and from the few civil records which have recently been organized and digitized in Ireland. Due to the challenging history of Ireland, its long occupation and subjugation of the Irish people, the overwhelming poverty, and the lack of written records that survive in rural communities, we will never have the depth of information about our Irish relatives that we do about ancestors from other countries. Knowing anything about the Laceys earlier than the mid-1800s is a feat. Rather than focusing on going backward in time, as I would with other family lines, with the Laceys I focus on knowing as much as possible about the approximately 100 years of their time in Ireland that we can realistically explore.
Bartholomew Lacey & Judith Corbett
Our earliest known Lacey ancestor is Bartholomew "Bartley" Lacey. We've recently learned, thanks to the digitization of new records, that his wife, my third great-grandmother, was Judith "Judy" Corbett. Bartley and Judy can be found together in the Omey parish records in August 1852, when their child Patsy was baptized. They are listed together on their marriage record, in September 1840, and they are both listed on the death certificate of their son, William Lacey.
Bartley and Judy had at least seven children in Rossadillisk.
This young family was growing during some of the most perilous years in Ireland's history. The Great Irish Famine of 1845-1849 caused the deaths of about one million people, and another two million people emigrated from Ireland during this time.
- Mary Lacey (b. abt. 1843; m. Patrick Feeney)
- Michael Lacey (b. abt. 1845; m. Ellen in 1888)
- Mark Lacey (b. abt. 1848; d. 1908; m. 1st Bridget Feeney in 1873, 2nd Mary Coyne in 1880)
- Valentine Lacey (b. 1850; m. Anne Toole in 1872)
- Patsy Lacey (b. 1852)
- William J. Lacey (b. abt. 1862; d. 1931; m. Margaret "Maggie" Mulkerin)
- Judith Lacey (b. 1868)
In 1841 Connemara had a population of 33,465; by 1851 that number was reduced through starvation, fever and emigration to 21,349.5
Like most of Ireland, Connemara suffered terribly during the famine. When I visited Omey Island, where families from Rossadillisk and the surrounding towns are buried, an area of famine-era graves were pointed out to me. However, the people of Rossadillisk were fortunate to be located next to the sea, where they had the benefit of fish and seaweed to supplement otherwise diminished food sources. There are no statistics on how the citizens of Rossadillisk fared during the famine, and there is no oral history that has been passed to our family down about this time period. We know that the situation in Clifden and other Connemara towns was extremely dire, and we must assume that it was also very challenging for the Laceys.
In my next post, I'll share information about the children of Bartley and Judy.
1 source: www.townlands.ie↩
2 source: lonelyplanet.com↩
3 source: irishamerica.com↩
4 source: www.cntraveller.com↩
5 source: Patient Endurance: The Great Famine in Connemara by Kathleen Villiers-Tuthill↩
Hello my mother was kathleen Lacey daughter of Patrick lacey he is my grandfather im sure his mother was coyne and they come from Rossidilisk
ReplyDeleteHi! Yes, Mark Lacey (my 2nd great-grandfather) and his second wife Mary Coyne had a son named Patrick, who was born about 1888. I don't know anything about Patrick and would love to connect with you to share info. Will you please respond here or email me at elaceyfield@ gmail.com? Thank you!
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