Tracking down the old
Duffy Homestead
on our Ireland Honeymoon

Our honeymoon to the west of Ireland was fabulous and beautiful - the Connemara coast is spectacularly remote and wild - but we had in mind also to find the old farm in Kilmovee, County Mayo, where judy's grandmother, Mary Duffy, had been born in 1886.

And we found it! Cousins are still living there - the Cassidy brothers, Michael and Paddy. Their father and mother, Patrick and Mary Duffy Cassidy, inherited the house from Nana's father, John Duffy, when he died. Mary Duffy Cassidy was John's sister, who had married Patrick Cassidy and gone to live in the nearby village of Clooniron. John asked them to move in with him a few years prior to his death. John partitioned the little cottage so that he lived in one side (on the right when you look the picture - see below), and the Cassidys lived with their 4 children (including Patrick and Michael, the two who are still living on the farm) in the slightly larger portion on the left.

Herein are some images:

The old cottage where Nana - Mary Duffy White - was born. It's no longer thatched (red metal roof now), and no longer used as a house (the new house was built in front of it in 1949, and even that didn't have central heat until several years ago). The barnshed next to it still also stands (also now metal-roofed, but originally thatched).

A front view of the farm (it's only a few acres), with the new house evident in the front. (There's also a red barn to the right.) In the rear of the house and cottage, the land rises up beyond for a long narrow distance to the bogs. Back here, Nana's father had his vegetable garden. Here's also a view from the back toward the countryside in the front, (Michael Cassidy and Graham are chattering away). Most of the property is in the rear, but the farm's front yard overlooks the emerald countryside.

The youngest Cassidy brother - Michael - now retired from the police force in England, and back on the farm after 45 years. He had left at the age of 18, but is back to care for his eldest brother Patrick, who is very ill now with emphysema. Here's another image of Michael, standing in front of the door on the side of the old cottage where Nana's father lived , and a picture of Micheal with judy (also in front of the cottage). We also met another cousin, Mary Cassidy Roddy, who lives in the same village on a farm about a mile away; her grandmother was Mary Duffy Cassidy, mentioned above, who had inherited the farm from Nana's father, John.

There are Duffys everywhere in Kilmovee - it's the most common name in the area, and everyone eventually seems related to everyone else, like the Duffys and the Cassidys from Clooniron. We found this in the church, on one of the pews.

And of course, the pub in the town of Kilmovee is none other than Duffy's!

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