Claire Bradley is a Dublin-based genetic genealogist specialising in ancestry from Ireland
Today is World Quaker Day. I’ve spent a lot of time studying the Religious Society of Friends in Ireland. Their records are phenomenal. So much so that I chose to write my Masters dissertation on them. The woman below is Dinah Wilson Goff (1783-1858), youngest member of a family who had 18 children. There are…
Now in its 10th year, Fingal Festival of History is part of the wider Dublin Festival of History and takes place over 26th September to 11th October next. There’s a fascinating array of talks, many of which are themed around the European Union to tie in with Ireland’s current presidency. I have two free talks…
One of the lovely features of the 1926 census is the detail of people’s employers. My great-grandfather, Fred Walters, worked in Clerys Department store on the then newly renamed O’Connell St. I knew he had worked there but not when he started. The census told me he was already there in 1926. Clerys was an…
I really enjoyed presenting this recent class for the International Insitute of Genealogical Studies so thought I’d share it here too. The last imperial family of Russia, headed by Tsar Nikolai II, were murdered by the Bolsheviks in 1918 in Ekaterinburg. Rumours that some members had survived persisted throughout the 20th century and were only…
As an Irish genealogist, I spend a lot of time explaining context. This comes in many forms. In reports, I have paragraphs to help clients understand different sources like Griffith’s Valuation or the Tithe Applotment books. I contextualise census material by explaining that the building a family lived in housed other families in a number…
Researchers for 20th century Ireland may be familiar with the Schools’ Collection, which can be viewed on Duchas.ie. This project was run by the Irish Folklore Commission in primary schools between 1937-1939. It had a much higher uptake in rural and suburban areas than in the cities. Children were asked to collect a story from…
It is often said that the Irish “do death well”. It is quite normal for people who never met the deceased to attend their funeral because they are a co-worker of a bereaved person. As I’ve been researching and revising death & burial recently for the International Institute of Genealogical Studies, I wrote some material…