With so much time at home I've been sorting, cleaning, and weeding out items for donation. Yesterday I started on my stacks of books, let's just say I have MANY of them. I've always loved books, I love cracking them open for the first time, I love revisiting my old friends filled with notes I've made in the margins, I even love their scent. Needless to say, I will never own a kindle. Historical fiction has been my favorite genre since high school, (imagine that), but with all we uncover about our families as we trip through their pasts, who needs fiction?
Most of my ancestors were Irish. The list of books I've acquired on Irish history and genealogy would fill at least ten blogs. The classic, The Great Hunger, by Cecil Woodham-Smith was one of my first purchases followed by Paddy's Lament, The Hidden Ireland, The Famine Ships, and too many more to list. My youngest son often chooses a book for my birthday and Christmas gifts, usually with a nod to my admiration for Irish rebels. I have a 1917 copy of, History Of The Sinn Fein Movement And The Irish Rebellion Of 1916, a copy of Allegiance, on the same subject, signed by the author Robert Brennan, and one of, Irish Rebel John Devoy and America's Fight for Ireland's Freedom. Those and many more like them all go in the keep pile. A long lost cousin, Tom E., has very generously sent me numerous books; it was he who first introduced me to James Charles Roy who has become one of my favorite authors. I love his quirky observations of historical and present day Ireland and I'm keeping all four books I own of his.
The majority of my immigrant Irish crossed the ocean during the famine, but a few left home in the 1860's. So of course when I saw a used copy of, Transatlantic, for sale at Amazon I had to have it and I'm so glad I bought it. Stephen Fox's descriptions of early steam ships, the Liverpool docks, and the harrowing voyage across the stormy North Atlantic were utterly fascinating. I could almost feel the dock rising under my feet with the incoming tide flooding up the Mersey.
One branch of my O'Hora/Hore line from County Carlow went west seeking their fortune in the mines and gold fields of California, eventually settling in San Francisco so when I spotted a used copy of, The San Francisco Earthquake, by Gordon Thomas and Max Witts it looked like something I really needed. And I was right, it's a painstakingly researched tome well worth the pittance I gave for it.
My eighth-great-grandmother Winifred King Benham, aka, The Witch of Wallingford, inspired my purchase of, Connecticut Witch Trials: The First Panic in the New World', and my son to buy me, A Storm of Witchcraft, when he came across it in a gift shop while vacationing in Salem, Massachusetts. I'm not giving that away, it was a gift! Speaking of Massachusetts, that was home to my Galloway ancestors one of whom, Milo, came to New York and was a mover and shaker on the Erie Canal, so of course I needed a copy of, The Artificial River, and just for a change, the fiction work, Canal Town, set in Palmyra, New York where Milo lived for a time and four miles from where I now reside.
Mary Augusta Vincent, my third-great-aunt, left New York for Nebraska with her husband George Matteson and two small children shortly after the Civil War. That necessitated my purchase of, Pioneer Women, by Linda Peavy and Ursula Smith. You won't find descriptions of prairie life like those included in this book on Ancestry. Definitely a keeper.
Their Own Voices;Oral Accounts of Early Settlers in Washington County, New York. Now this one is really special. Beginning in the 1840s and continuing until his death, Dr. Asa Fitch of Salem, NY, interviewed elderly neighbors, questioning them about the time of first European settlement, the Revolutionary War, and the first decades of the 19th century. Two of the interviewees were actually directly related to me! How often does that happen? I can't possibly part with that book. I even bought my uncle a copy.
I've barely touched on the number of books I own and love, there are books I bought when I found Civil War soldiers among my ancestors along with Revolutionary War soldiers, local history books of places they lived, etc, etc. and as I discovered about three hours in, I can't part with any of them. I'm buying more bookshelves.
I understand the value you find in those books. I haven't read any like that, but since getting my DNA results books like that are valuable. I can see history unfolding as I learn the whereabouts of my forefathers. It is similar to yours. I have been corresponding with my 3rd cousin in Dublin Ireland. I have a bunch of Smyrl cousins around Cinnsinati. I found out what what a workhouse is partly in your blog.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting how much history I'm learning along with my roots.
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