“Where do your people come from?” That question was a familiar one as I was growing up on various Air Force bases across the South; frankly, the answer to that question did not interest me in the slightest, until recently. As a child, I was told that “my people” were Scotch-Irish, but I thought the term was a catch-all phrase meaning “we have no idea but we are vaguely Northern European with possible links to what is now the United Kingdom.”
Oddly, despite my love of travel, and having lived in England twice, I had never been to Ireland, until now (I have just returned). In preparation for my first trip to Ireland, combined with the recent fortuitous discovery of a 1932 letter from a relative filled with pages of ancestors' names and important dates, I launched into the somewhat daunting world of genealogy.
Immediately I was fascinated to learn about Scottish ancestors who made their way to Northern Ireland and from there on to America before the Revolution. During my too-brief stay in Dublin, I made a quick visit to the Family History Research Centre at the National Library of Ireland. Even though time was insufficient for proper research, I was nevertheless greeted warmly and given instant help from a librarian. My experiences in Ireland invite me to return.
Learning about my family history has taken me inside American history, although I look forward to learning more about the Scotch-Irish connection. A month ago I found a letter posted on the Internet, written by a relative during the Civil War with a sentence that haunts me. Will the genealogical information that I am acquiring work its way into my writing? Hard to say. However, my mind toys with the idea of exploring the ramifications of that Civil War sentence by creating characters in a fictional piece; perhaps that would help me wrestle with its ramifications. Time will tell …
