by Eda Payne My first Christmas in Australia was spent in 1959 in Renmark, a South Australian town on the River Murray. We erected a big marquee in the middle of a paddock. The heat was intense, every fly in Australia had settled there and the food was spread out in abundance on the groaning … Continue reading
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Caroline Chisholm had worked hard in Australia for the families of convicts to be reunited. No one knew we had been rejected from the list of travellers. Continue reading
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The sun slips behind the black silhouettes of the Rockies.
Fingers and ears chill with disturbing speed.
Faster than in an Irish winter dusk. Continue reading
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This brave act of defiance, with Caroline as part of the group, paved the way for discussions about access to contraception in the ROI and particularly highlighted the need to start exploratory discussions on the provision of contraception for Irish women living there. Continue reading
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What we seldom see in print, though, are those individuals stories from the Lambay-Rathcairn Gaeltacht experiment that point to another kind of success. Éamonn Ó Neachtain is one such person. Continue reading
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The branches were bending in the wind. Branches. An Craoibhín Aoibhinn. That was the pen name of the writer Douglas Hyde… Continue reading
The sense of life’s possibilities that this family history suggests is intoxicating. Continue reading
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Was the period between 1840 and 1869 the one when the influence of the Irish, at least, numerically, was strongest in colonial Australia? How do we account for the fluctuations? Continue reading
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The world seemed clear. The questions started later in life or when we went to the cities and were asked to convert and change our language to English, sometimes politely sometimes not so much. We got used to the requests, ‘can you please say that in English?’ or the statements ‘We speak English in here’ or ‘I’m afraid we don’t speak that language here’. Continue reading
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According to Diarmaid Ó Muirithe, the name Sheila derives from Cecily, ‘the English form of the Latin name of the…virgin martyr St Cecilia…The Anglo-Normans brought the name to Ireland and in time it became in the Irish language Síle.. Continue reading
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Tinteán 