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Our last Beatty brick wall ends with Charles Beatty (Abt 1730-1798) of Farnamullan

September 14, 2024 by bushmaid

I’ve been more interested in birding than family history for the last seven years, but thought I should tie off this loose end after all the work I’ve put into it. Here are the earliest four known generations of our Beatty ancestors working back from James Beatty of the flowing beard who brought his family to Melbourne, Australia in 1878.

Unfortunately I haven’t been able to find out anything at all about his mother.

Some of the research progress leading to the connection between the Beattys of Aghavoory and Farnamullan is recorded here and in earlier posts, but briefly: from the marriage record from his second marriage we knew that James Beatty of Aghavoory, Fermanagh had a father Archibald who was a farmer. There had been no Beattys in Aghavoory before James. We knew from his death certificate that he was born about 1797. I was in contact with Pete Beatty who was the closest of all the many Beatty genetic matches using FTDNA. His earliest Beatty ancestors were from Farnamullan, Fermanagh, and were well documented for the time because they owned their land rather than leasing which was the norm in Fermanagh after the Plantation of Ulster. Therefore they wrote deeds to do with the exchange of property which mentioned a lot of names and relationships. Charles’ son Archibald Beatty of Farnamullan (1758-1831) married Martha Moore of Aghavoory in 1794. They had a second son James, born about 1797 of whom nothing else was known except he was still alive somewhere when his brother Archibald also born about 1797 left him 4 pounds in his will in 1869. I spent several days in Belfast and Enniskillen in 2016 combing through the archives for some documentary proof of the connection. I found a lot of interesting background information but no certain proof, and yet the circumstantial evidence alone is overwhelming. Apart from all the above, James’ son-in-law William Robinson was a witness at the wedding of Martha Beatty of Farnamullan to Alexander Carrothers in 1871, and James Moore witnessed deeds for Beattys of Farnamullan. In 1829 James went to register his new holding at Aghavoory in order to vote accompanied by his neighbour James Moore – his Uncle. On top of that is the very close genetic link.

I’ve rewritten the early part of The Beattys out of Ireland : 1700s and 1800s and have extended my family tree accordingly – at least my ancestry.com tree. I used to show the link to my Legacy tree on the sidebar of my website, but when my old ISP, grapevine, went defunct I lost the bit of web real estate where it was stored and haven’t been able to replace it yet. Instead I’ve replaced it with a link to my ancestry tree in the meantime, but probably only other people who subscribe to ancestry.com can open it.

I’ve also notified the Beatty Project that lineages 535 and 560 have been joined.

Posted in Aghavoory, Fermanagh, Ireland, Archibald Beatty (1758-1831), Beatty family, Charles Beatty (Abt 1730-1754), Farnamullan, Fermanagh, Ireland, James Beatty (1797-1873), James Beatty 1842-1903 | Tagged , , | 1 Comment »

I hate/love ancestry.com!

September 9, 2024 by bushmaid

After smashing through another one of my brick walls I love it that with ancestry.com you can whizz through a newly discovered branch establishing links using the sources that they make available. One disadvantage is that ancestry makes it seem very easy, but you actually need to be REALLY careful to cross-check every step or you just build a castle of crap and there are so many trees like that on ancestry!

I put up a tree based on my years of painstaking research which broke new ground (though I say so myself!) – and I guess I should be flattered rather than annoyed – but there are dozens of trees that have copied large chunks of it without citing any sources at all! Occasionally I find a tree with an unexpected new family member added in that I couldn’t find out anything about (eg one of my gg grandmothers!), with no source given and I would dearly love to know what information it is based on in case there’s something substantial there. But so often people don’t reply to questions you ask them in ancestry (sigh) And often people don’t even copy accurately, linking people in at the wrong generation etc. Please, if you’re going to copy my family at least get it right!

This leads to another pet hate which gets worse the more information I put in ancestry. Ancestry attach little green leaves to ancestors which are supposed to mean there’s some new information about that person. In fact 90% of those green leaves now just lead to yet another tree which has simply copied the information which I put in ancestry in the first place!

Worst of all, I get green leaves in ancestry for images which I can tell have been copied directly from this website and put into ancestry! I’m pretty sure I said my images could be used with acknowledgement… and thanks to some people who have asked and given acknowledgement – though none of you came via ancestry!

Why do I pay ancestry so much! Maybe I’ll delete my ancestry tree and leave all the copy-cats to chase each other’s tails in ever diminishing circles. On the other hand I did all this research because I wanted our family story to be known.

ALERT FOR ANCESTRY COPY-CATS. There’s a whole new branch of this Beatty family – never before linked on ancestry or anywhere else – for you to copy now 🙂 get to it!

Oh and I’ll give details of that here soon.

End of rant. Thanks for listening…

[Update Tues 10 Sept: Apologies for that! I could have avoided making our family story public and made my ancestry tree private and I chose not to, so it’s all self-inflicted. And I know that many people who follow this blog are serious family historians who would do none of the things that upset me yesterday. And not everyone who is curious about their family has the time or skills to do serious research and it’s OK just to see what you can find in ancestry, and ancestry’s silly algorithms are not your fault! The path I chose has advantages and disadvantages. Moving on.]

Posted in Beatty family, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 2 Comments »

Part of our Beatty family story I was too shocked to write about until now

September 1, 2024 by bushmaid

James Beatty 1842-1903

Family research can be a lot of fun, but one hazard is discovering things you would have preferred not to know about – and certainly things that your ancestors would not have wanted you to know about. When writing up our Beatty family story some years ago I discovered something that felt too shocking and embarassing to publish about – especially since my great grandfather James Beatty had already suffered a reputational knock by having his drapery business in Ballina go bankrupt.

I found this church baptism record (on the RootsIreland database) for a John Beaty born in Ballina 22 April 1869:

Name: John Beaty
Date of Birth: 22-Apr-1869
Date of Baptism: 02-May-1869
Address: Knox St/Ardnaree
Parish/District: Kilmoremoy/Ballina
County: Co. Mayo
Gender: Male
Denomination: Roman Catholic
Father: Unknown Beaty
Mother: Eleanor Loftus
Sponsor 1/Informant 1: John Loftus
Sponsor 2/Informant 2: Cath McLaughlin
Notes: The father is a draper (a protestant) living in Knox St. Ballina

You can imagine the father of this unmarried girl, and also the outraged parish priest, taking a vindictive pleasure in adding the incriminating note which, more than 150 years later, would shock a great grand-daughter researching her family story!

There were very few Beattys in Ballina at the time and James and his elder brother Archibald had come from Fermanagh and were only in Ballina for a few years from about 1860 after their mother died and their father remarried, until 1878 when James emigrated and 1874 when Archibald moved on. There was only one Beatty who had a drapery business in Knox Street in 1869. 

Baby John was born about four years before James Beatty married into the minor gentry and about eight years before he and his family emigrated to Melbourne, Victoria where they lived in anglican respectability and were friends of the bishop. I wonder how my distant cousin John fared? I can find nothing else about him in the records.

I guess we have all made mistakes and have things we'd prefer that nobody knew about.

What do family historians (and family members!) think? Should we tell the family story as we find it or should we cast a rosy glow over the past by ignoring the failures and mistakes of our ancestors that we uncover? I know at least one member of my own family who prefers to believe all the debunked family myths to the carefully researched family story that I've uncovered 🙂

Posted in Ballina, Co. Mayo, Ireland, James Beatty 1842-1903 | Tagged , | 6 Comments »

Marcella’s Bible : an example of the value of a website for family history research!

December 30, 2023 by bushmaid

James and Marcella Beatty with James, Emma and baby Archie in Dublin late 1877.

When our Beatty ancestors emigrated from County Mayo and Sligo in 1878 they brought with them a Bible given to Marcella Beatty (nee Paget) at her wedding to James Beatty in 1873. Four generations of the details of births, deaths and marriages were subsequently carefully written in it. The location of the actual Bible is currently a mystery and possibly it has been lost. If it resurfaces I’ll certainly post about it here. The information, particularly of the earliest generation has been invaluable. For example it gives the address in Ballina where both James and Emma were born, confirming the home address of the Beattys there as “Commercial House, Arran St.” it tells us that Archibald Beatty was born at “The Lodge” in Enniscrone, County Sligo. This will be Kinard Lodge, the home of Marcella’s father James Paget near Enniscrone. Possibly the Beatty’s lived there for a while after James Paget died, before their emigration. It’s a pity it doesn’t name the ship they came to Australia on, as extensive research has still failed to solve that mystery! The Bible was inherited by James, the eldest son of James and Marcella and passed down through the generations of his family. This means that the entries “Mother’s birthday August 10th. Father’s birthday October 31st” probably refer to James and Marcella themselves. I’m guessing that this is written in a different hand to Marcella’s, probably that of her son. Their dates of birth were previously a mystery as birth certificates can’t be found for either James or Marcella – quite common for Ireland at that time.

I only know about the Bible, and have a transcript of the family notices in it because of one of the many people who found my website and contacted me through it. What a lot of second cousins etc. I have connected with! It has been really fun and I learned so much to round out the family story. Anyway, Janet Godfrey (nee McTaggart) (1933-2007), a great-grand-daughter of James and Marcella through their son James, and whose own mother (Kathleen McTaggart (nee Beatty) (1906-1944) was an only child, was keen to connect with extended family. She saw the announcement of the Queen’s birthday Honours List in 1983 when Alfred Paget Beatty (1916-1998) was awarded the OA. Suspecting that with that name he must be a relation, she wrote to him about the Bible, with all the family details. They had planned to meet up, but she died before that happened. In 2011 Alfred Paget Beatty’s daughter Jocelyn Cooper found my website and sent me a copy of Janet Godfrey’s letter to her father. It would be great if Janet’s family could find the actual Bible, but it’s thanks to her that we do have all the information. I’m so grateful to her and to Jocelyn who found my website, and regret that I’ve taken so long to tell this story.

Here’s the transcript of the family notices in Marcella’s Bible

Source: Letter from Janet Godfrey to Alfred Paget Beatty, 1983

Posted in Alfred Joseph Beatty, Ballina, Co. Mayo, Ireland, Beatty family, Enniscrone, Co Sligo, Ireland, James Beatty 1842-1903, James Paget (1802-72), James Paget Beatty, Kinard Lodge, Enniscrone, Co. Sligo, Ireland | Tagged , | 3 Comments »

Harold Luke Forster (1881-1966)

August 26, 2021 by bushmaid

I’ve finally got around to keying up the reminiscences of Harold Forster as written down by his sister Hilda during her visit to England 1954-1955, which covers most of his long seafaring career. I typed it up originally in the 1990s from Hilda’s pencilled notes but couldn’t find the electronic version so keyed it all again. I’ve tried to organise it in chronological order as it jumps about a bit. I guess Harold told the stories as they came to him. Here’s the first page of the original:

Page 1 of “Dick’s digest” as written down by Hilda Forster

I’m sorry it’s taken so long as Harold was surely the most interesting of the whole interesting Forster family. For example in 1914 he was selected to navigate the plane for Gustav Hamel which was to be the first flight across the Atlantic. He’d navigated plenty of ships across it so why not? Hamel’s death over the English Channel put paid to the scheme – maybe just as well for Harold?

Yet to come are three letters he wrote to his sister Constance after sailing off “before the mast” at the very start of his career. He was Con’s favourite brother and her son Harold Beatty was named after him.

Here’s the link to the page with the text of Dick’s Digest It starts with a few photos.

Posted in Harold Luke Forster, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

New chapter covering 1935 to 1946

August 17, 2021 by bushmaid

I finally got around to writing more of the family saga. Being locked down has advantages. Fittingly it’s Chapter 13 – as everything went wrong for the Beattys of “Enniscrone”, Mont Albert and of Stanhope Grove over this period. Mind you a lot of other people’s lives were stuffed up during WW2 as well. I was going to call it “Camelot unravels” or somesuch, but thought maybe that’s too corny? Anyway, the section on Harold finally gives a point to the name of this website and the photo at the top of it, which is “Enniscrone”, Thornton (taken 1975) from Walker’s property looking across to Mt. Cathedral with Taggerty out of sight to the right.

I have to acknowledge the Diary of Peg Beatty as a really fabulous source. Unlike many diaries it isn’t a sounding board for her feelings and opinions, in fact she so rarely expresses either that it really gets your attention when she does. She just records every move she and members of her household make, including frequent mentions of numerous extended Beatty and Forster family that she sees or exchanges letters with, and she writes every day without fail for 55 years. Maybe I should offer it to the National Library?

I can’t write much further ahead now though I’ll think about it. My policy is the same as most family historians which is that you don’t mention people who are still alive, but you also don’t want to upset anyone – though I try to be very fair. I do have a fair bit of stuff about Harold Forster and Hilda Forster which ought to be up there and so I should get on with that next.

Posted in Archibald Beatty (c1836-1897), Beatty family, Charles Gordon Beatty, Constance Mary Forster, Coutts Family, Enniscrone, Mont Albert, Victoria, Australia, Enniscrone, Thornton, Victoria, Australia, Gwen Littleton, Harold Beatty, James Beveridge Coutts, Peggy Beatty, Sheila Beatty | 4 Comments »

Earlier Pagets of Knockglass discovered!

April 4, 2017 by bushmaid

I found and copied out Deed 169-116-112988 when I was in Dublin last year, but have only just got around to incorporating the new information into the Pagets of Mayo story. It’ll take a bit longer before it gets incorporated in my family tree.

Henry Paget of Knockglass  “did thereby deed, assign and make over” Knockglass and all his real estate in Co. Mayo to his nephew Thomas Paget (c1715-c1791) of Fahy in 1754. In return Thomas was to pay Henry an annuity of 13 pounds and 10 shillings for the rest of Henry’s life. Thomas’s own address at the time was another home of the Mayo Pagets, Fahy House. In the deed the surname is spelled Pagett. I’ve updated my tree in Ancestry with the new information, and am a bit startled to discover that there are now about 6 other trees with the early generations of Pagets – I think mostly derived from mine. When I made my tree there was nothing about them at all! Maybe they’re not so forgotten after all.  A couple of the trees have added the information that the father of above Thomas Paget, and therefore the brother of above Henry Paget was a Robert Paget. No source is given for this information although it could well be the case. Thomas’s father probably lived at Fahy too. If anybody knows a source, please let me know.

I knew there would be more to find out about the Pagets of Mayo at the Registry of Deeds in Dublin, but until now it has been a time consuming business getting the deeds on microfilm, or getting to them in Dublin. Miraculously, the entire Registry is now available online (well all the memorials and old indexes as images) indecipherable writing, impenetrable legalese and all! I guess there’s no longer any excuse not to trawl through the few dozen Paget deeds for further clues, though most of the deeds concern Pagets who live in Dublin. While I’m at it I’ll add records to the Registry of Deeds Index Project

Posted in Knockglass House, Crossmolina, Co. Mayo, Ireland, Paget family, Thomas Paget | Tagged , | Leave a Comment »

So who is Archibald Beatty, Farmer, father of James Beatty of Aghavoory?

April 29, 2016 by bushmaid

I’ve now updated the chapter: “The Beattys out of Ireland” in the family story to include all the latest information I have about the early generations of our Beatty family. The Colebrooke Estate records at the Public records Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI) didn’t go back quite far enough to tell me where our ancestor James Beatty (1797-1873) came from before taking up farming at Aghavoory townland just south of Fivemiletown, Co. Fermanagh, sometime before 1829. They did tell me the year he died, which enabled me to find his death certificate, so here is his death record.

James Beatty of Aghavoory, co. Fermanagh. Death record 1873

James Beatty of Aghavoory, co. Fermanagh. Death record 1873

They also showed that the land which James later farmed was leased in 1787 to a Robert McKnight, then aged 32, and that that name remained against James Beatty’s Aghavoory land in the Colebrooke Estate rent book until November 1865 even though James Beatty paid the rent. The original Robert McKnight would have been aged 105 by then. Maybe it was sublet to James by the McKnight family all that time? There seems to be no surviving lease for Aghavoory in James Beatty’s name, even from 1865.

So who was Archibald Beatty, Farmer, who was given as James’s father at his (second) marriage?

We know from genetic testing that we are very closely related to the Beattys of Farnamullan. The YDNA tests indicated a strong probability that Charles Beatty (1725-1798) of Farnamullan could be the common ancestor between our family and descendants of the Farnamullan Beattys. I’m told that analysis of “BigY” tests using the same DNA samples gives an even stronger indication that either Charles or his father must be the common ancestor. I confess that I don’t really understand “BigY”.  As mentioned in earlier posts, Charles Beatty of Farnamullan had a son Archibald Beatty (1758-1831), who married Martha Moore of Aghavoory in 1792. Their second son was a James. It was the coincidence of Martha Moore being from Aghavoory that compelled me to visit PRONI in Belfast. It’s now confirmed that our James was born in 1797. This is the perfect date to be the second son of a couple who married in 1792 and had 8 children. The order of Archibald’s children (but not their birthdates) is given in a transcription of his will whose original is lost. The birthdates of the two youngest children are known from tombstones, indicating that Martha had at least 2 children in her forties. The ages at death of Archibald, his wife Martha and their eldest son Charles who died young come from the transcription of a tombstone at the Church of Ireland in Lisbellaw, very faint when transcribed. From the date and age at death, eldest son Charles would have been born in 1805 – too late for our James to be his younger brother. But also there is a death certificate for third son Archibald who would have been born about 1797. There was no mention of the second son James having died young, and he was left four pounds in the will of his brother Archibald so was still alive somewhere in 1869. So where did he go then??

In short, I haven’t given up on Archibald Beatty (1758-1831) of Farnamullan as the father of our James after all, although there is still no documentary proof. If this Archibald is not the one, and we take the genetic test results seriously, then we’re probably looking for a son Archibald of a hypothetical brother of Charles Beatty (1725-1798) of Farnamullan who would need to have been about the same age as the above Archibald; have married at about the same time and also have a son James. There weren’t as many Archibald Beattys in Fermanagh as there were James Beattys, and only a couple of those seemed likely from a scan of the sparse Irish records. Sigh! I think I’ll leave it at that for a while!

Beatty tombstone CoI Lisbellaw, Fermanagh

Church of Ireland, Lisbellaw, Fermanagh. Tombstone of Archibald Betty [sic] (1797-1869), wife Martha and eldest son Charles.

Update September 2024: Something must be wrong in the tombstone transcription to make the  date for Charles’ birth 10 years too late. It’s transcribed as: “Also their son Charles who depd. this life March 27th 1818 aged13 [?] years” If the barely legible age was 23 and not 13 then he was born in 1795 OR if the date at death was 1808 and not 1818 then he was born in 1795 – and then the birth date of his younger brother Archibald (born 1797) makes sense and James of Aghavoory (also born 1797) is the right age to be the missing second son James. Most likely the age at death is 23 as it is also more likely that a 23 year old would have made his will a few months before he died. 

Charles Beatty will 1817

Will of Charles Beatty from Ireland Diocesan and prerogative Wills and Admins. Indexes 1595-1858

 

Posted in Aghavoory, Fermanagh, Ireland, Archibald Beatty (1758-1831), James Beatty (1797-1873) | Tagged , , | 1 Comment »

Dublin

April 13, 2016 by bushmaid

Only one more day in Ireland, and I’m spending a few days in Dublin in a down-at-heel but friendly and perfectly adequate guest house where you share a toilet (not the bathroom as was advertised – I get a shower of my own!) I’m on the top floor so get lots of exercise. The linen seems clean, I get eggs and toast for breakfast, I can come down to the kitchen to fill my cup with boiling water for my bed-time herbal tea, and if the free wifi is playing up I can come and work down in the kitchen where it’s always good 🙂

As it happens, I’ve suddenly found out what I came over here to establish – in a way.  We had hoped that our ancestor James Beatty of Aghavoory was the son of Archibald Beatty of Farnamullan. DNA testing had indicated  that it was highly likely (our DNA being practically identical to a descendant of the Farnamullan Beattys). The Farnamullan James Beatty was born in 1807. At PRONI in Belfast last week I found that our James Beatty died in 1873 – when the Estate Manager  wrote DEAD beside his name in the Colebrooke Estate rent book. Today I got his death record from GRO Dublin. Due to the number of James Beattys it took a couple of goes and he turned out to be 10 years older than I was expecting. Anyway, James Beatty, Farmer, aged 76, married, died of Bronchitis at Aghavoory 14 Nov 1873. His eldest daughter Matilda Robinson of Breandrum was the informant.

This means he was born in 1797 and is 10 years too old to be the son of Archibald Beatty of Farnamullan! Back to the drawing board. [4/5/2016 Not so sure about this now. See next post] We know that the families must be connected in the preceding generation or two, but how? One good thing about this is that it makes sense of something I was told while visiting Aghavoory and Agheeter . Tommy, who apparently knows the whole history of all the local families for ever, and who knew James’s grandsons, assured me that James Beatty had come from Breandrum. So now we’re looking for an Archibald Beatty of Breandrum  mid to late 1700s. As Pete says: The hunt continues!

Posted in Archibald Beatty (1758-1831), James Beatty (1797-1873) | Tagged | 5 Comments »

Aghavoory today

April 10, 2016 by bushmaid

Today was the sunniest day since I arrived in Ireland, and a lovely day to be driving around in Fermanagh. I was determined to find Aghavoory townland where James Beatty of Ballina/South Yarra must have been born in 1842. I drove over to Fivemiletown, found a house on what would once have been Farmer James Beatty’s land in Aghavoory, and knocked on the farmhouse door, not sure what to expect. To my astonishment, our relations are still farming there! James’s half sister from the second marriage of Farmer James, Eliza Ann Beatty, married Samuel Hall in 1886. Today their descendants were very kind and interested. They showed me an aerial photo of the old house (demolished in the 1990s) and fed me tea and pikelets.

The homes (both new and old) are beautifully situated on a hill with pleasant views over Aghavoory and neighbouring townlands. I forgot to ask the current farmer about farming on the townland, but you can see the Friesians in the photo.

This afternoon I couldn’t resist a tour of Coole Castle, built and furbished about 1800. The servant’s quarters were fascinating! Very Downton Abbey! Off to Dublin tomorrow.

Posted in Aghavoory, Fermanagh, Ireland | Tagged | 8 Comments »

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