Thanks for visiting the Derry, Northern Ireland website, a GenWeb project. I became interested in Derry as a natural part of my quest for geneology information on my family. My grandfather and father gave me a natural interest in my family history and the factors that confronted them. I was lucky enough to get information on one of my great grandfathers and his emigration to America from Derry. My wife and I made a recent trip to Northern Ireland to look over the “homeland” and we were lucky enough to meet Dr. Don MacFarlane. Don has a strong interest in this area and he has meticulously collected and maintained the valuable information contained on this site.
I expressed an interest in contributing my own personal experiences to the project. To accomodate my technically challenged mind, a colleague converted the site to a WordPress Blog. I believe this will allow for a more free exchange of ideas and inputs from a wide range of visitors.
About: Information about the contributors to this site
Introduction: A brief overview of Derry
History: Early and recent history of Derry with extensive links to other sites of interest
People: Famous sons and daughters of Derry
Tourism: Things to do in Derry
Geneology: A primer and links to more intermediate and advanced information
Further, general links of interest have been added to the blogroll on the front page. My intent is for myself, together with Don and the volunteers, to carry on the valuable work in this new format. I hope you find something interesting. Please feel free to add comments or suggestions. I look forward to hearing from you.
Vic Barnett
Dayton
Ohio
NEW**
‘Divided Race, Divided People’ (editor Donald MacFarlane), a companion to this website, will be available for purchase this Autumn. For more details on content, visit the Divided Race website or leave email details at donmac@doctors.org.uk
Filed under: General, Personal Stories
I am looking for information on my ancestor that immigrated from Londonderry, IRE about 1700 to America. The following is all the information I have on him when living in Ireland:
David Scott was born May 18, 1678 in Londonderry, Ireland, and died 1760. He married (1) Mary Stanley in Londonderry, Ireland. He married (2) Elizabeth St. John, daughter of Samuel St. John.
Notes for David Scott:
In the Irish War of Revolution, the young apprentices of Londonderry closed the gates against James II and the townsfolk manned the walls shouting ‘No Surrender’. The 105 day siege that followed from April to August in 1689 crushed Irish commerce and industry. At the turn of the century a great wave of Presbyterian “Scotch-Irish” emigrants from Ulster Province arrived in America, settling in Connecticut, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
John Steinbeck’s Derry Roots
Extract from Derry Journal May 2009
On visiting his mother’s forebears in 1952 – Hamiltons from Mulkeeragh, just outside Ballykelly in Drumachose Parish:
“Every Irish man – and that means anyone with one drop of Irish blood – sooner or later makes a pilgrimage to Ireland. I am half Irish, the rest of my blood watered down with German and Massachusetts English. But Irish blood doesn’t water down very well; the strain must be very strong”