Last week in Enniskillen!

Unbelievable we only have a few days left here! 

Today is Sunday & we are going to church in Tempo Presbyterian, where the COLLUMs (John & Eliza BAXTER) were married in 1864. At 1am we turned our clocks back to real time – I think there is now 11 hours difference to Sydney, will have to check. Huge storm predicted to ‘hit’ England & Wales today, haven’t heard Ireland mentioned, ferries cancelled between here & Eng. Pouring rain here now & COOL & WINDY!

Had a lovely afternoon yesterday. Went out to Ethel’s (Baxter) for last time. I took her an Aust/kangaroo embroidered towel (Denise’s Mum or sister made it) & James, her grandson was there. I’d taken little kangaroos &  koala keyrings for the 3 children. He was thrilled – made a lego house for it while we were there!

Ethel had found another of her Mum’s old family letters – about a great uncle Robert who fought in WW1 & ended up living & dying in Johanasburg (sp!), Sth Africa in 1919. Letter was from the lady he boarded with, they were like brother & sister she said. She was Irish, (3 miles from Enniskillen) had lived in Aust for 17 yrs, married an Aust & lived in  Sth Africa for 19 yrs!

Ethel had also found a map showing & describing all the land leases in 1789 – showing all the names of all the people on the leases I’d got copies of!!!!! In amongst ALL the Baxters was Thomas MACOLLOM!!!!!!!!

After afternoon tea we went to visit the BETTY sisters, Florence 86 & Jean 84 (both unmarried). They live in Grogey (a mile away) on the site where the COLLUM house was! Only the foundations of the tiny original house (2 rooms, thatched) were there when her parents bought it (Eliza died 1921) & built a house on them. Sisters moved there in 1960 & extended.

 The only things of the COLLUMs were the apple tree (still fruiting well!) & a stone with markings on it. John COLLUM was a stone mason (as was his son Robert – our g-grandfather who came to Aust - photos on blog). John worked on the many local stone bridges, earning a shilling a day.

Florence told me her aunt Jenny married Willie COLLUM (one of the elusive sons I haven’t been able to find out anything about in Boston  USA!)  I remember Uncle Bill COLLUM talking about him. He & his brother Matthew went to USA in 1903.  Florence told me they changed their name to COLEMAN!!!!!; didn’t have any children & Jenny (“she was the first woman bus driver in Boston”!) sponsored lots of relatives to leave Ireland & join them. They didn’t go back to Ireland.

Ethel drove us to see where her mother had grown up – house gone, only a stone shed left – it was known as the ‘halfway house’ between Monaghan & Enniskillen & she remembers ‘blackening the windows when the ‘Black & Tan’ arrived (the British soldiers seeking out the Sinn Fein Republican fighters ‘in the forests’ during the War of Independence after 1916).

We ended up at the old BAXTER house where their son David & family live. He & his dad, Roy, were organising the milking of the cows (done by robot machine – fully automated & ends up in tanker ready to be put into cartons/bottles!)

On Firday I went to Belfast again for a last day of researching. Couldn’t find anything on the MOOREs – although I did find the birth of Jane GIVINS in 1828 at ARBOE not Drunquin where they married. Coincidentally, we stopped at ARBOE (on the shores on Lough Neagh) with Denise & David when we did our Sperrin Mtn drive!!!!!!!

I met Belle (McCollum) & Harry at PRONI!!!!! I had told them about it & when he knew it was free…………. They looked up her family & I had lunch with them.