Where is "Shee-shay"?

mhmyers · Newbie

Where is "Shee-shay"?

Michele Erdvig · Host

mhmyers,

Welcome to my forum. Well that's a puzzle. There is certainly no "city" called that. Have you considered that it may have been a townland? Do you have any other info about it? Do you know where Grandmother Devlin was from?

Michele

mhmyers · Newbie

We think she was from Donegal, but that's about it. She spoke of her home as isolated and very old, so it probably wasn't a city. What is a townland? Here in California, even the farmers have an address that identifies them with the nearest city, so a town would just be a small city, but still be on a map. It might help if I knew enough Gaelic to take a guess as to how Shee-shay would probably be spelled. Can you help with that?

CowboyCraic · Guru

If I had to grab one village in Co. Donegal that would come close in pronunciation, that would be Creeslough. It is located within the area where most of the Devlins originated from within Co. Donegal. Depending on the Brouge, Shrees-Lahk could very well be understood as Shee-shay.

If you send me a message with whatever information you have for your gran, I would be happy to look into it for you.

If you base out of Letterkenny or Dunfanagahy, you would be in good shape to explore that entire area. The Inishowen Peninsula, around Clonamany, is also a Devlin area.

Slan Beo,

Bit

Itallian Chauffeur · Moderator

To help explain the whole "Townland" thing, here's something I wrote a while back for our Family's Google Group site:

"PLACE NAMES AND LEGAL BOUNDRIES

Ireland is an island, divided politically into two separate countries -- Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, and the Republic of Ireland, which is an independant country in its own right. The two individual countries are often referred to as THE NORTH and THE SOUTH, though, technically, the Republic, which includes Co. Donegal, actually extends further North than Northern Ireland. Also complicating matters is the tendancy to call the North, 'Ulster', as the PROVINCE of Ulster includes Co. Donegal,

So, Donegal is furthest North, but paradoxically, it is part of THE SOUTH. It is also part of Ulster, geographically,as is Cavan and Monahan, but NOT part of Northern Ireland / Ulster. Have you got all THAT????

Good. For puposes of discussing Doody Family history, all references to Ireland will concern the Republic of Ireland -- THE SOUTH.

PROVINCES

The ISLAND is divided into FOUR Provinces -- Ulster, Leinster, Connacht and Munster. Each Province is made up of varying numbers of Counties:

Ulster has nine (9), split six (6) within Northern Ireland and three (3) within the Republic of Ireland. Leinster has twelve (12) Counties, Connacht has five (5) and Munster contains six (6) counties.

Munster is divided into Counties Clare, Limerick, Tipperary, Waterford, Cork and Kerry.

KNOWN Doody history is centered around Counties Cork and Kerry, although the traditional Clan origins hail from the Province of Connacht, specifically the border areas of County Mayo and County Sligo.

FURTHER POLITICAL BOUNDRIES

SEE: http://www.ballybegvillage.com/land_division.html

Further complicating matters, there are NUMEROUS sub-divisions within the Provinces. firstly, there are Diocese, generally Catholic, which are made up of numerous Parishes. The next step downward in size is the County, followed by the Union. There are 162 Unions in all of Ireland. They are Districts formed between 1838-1852, to oversee the Poor Law Districts and the local Poor Law Workhouses. There are CIVIL Parishes and Church Parishes - both Protestant and Catholic, Baronies, ( Ireland is made up of 273 of them, although they have rarely been used since the 1901 Census), cities, towns and villages. Smaller still, there are Townlands -- areas of land varying from only a few acres, to a few thousand, usually depending upon some geographical boundary, such as a stream or a mountain, but sometimes, by nothing more permanent than a stone wall or a ditch. Even Townlands can be sub-divided into a given placename."

Hope this helps????

Bob

Anchoress · Guru

Forget villages; and certainly not Creeslough.

A "townland" is a tiny area usually out in the country, that wil include and define maybe a dozen houses scattered there.

Most will be miles from anywhere.

We are in Orbeg here; on the border with Lackrom, for example. A few scattered houses and farms.

Forget the term "city "also as that has a totally different meaning here.

Shee shay will be a townland waay out in the boonies as we are. Many loally will never even have heard of it as many in Donegal Town 3 miles away haven't.

To complicate it even more, there will be different spellings of the name. We spent four weeks trying to persuade eircom that the address here did exist as the way they spelt it is ogherbeg.. there is also agherbeg as spelling. And upper and lower ogherbeg also...

Have you any other line on the address, please? If so or maybe if not I can maybe trace it? I can access some names of townlands in Donegal locally. or our postman will maybe know.

Anchoress · Guru

OK: I think we have it

A townland called Seesiagh. And another called Seedagh

In the Roman Catholic parish of Clondavaddog

Diocese of Raphoe; Fanad peninsula.

See

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clondavaddog

Does that help?

Blessings and peace

mhmyers · Newbie

And wouldn't you know that one of the Sisters would give me my answer! I went through elementary school taught by the Sisters of Mercy based in Auburn, California, then graduated from Christian Brothers High School, and then taught with the Sisters at Mercy High School for 5 years until they closed the school. I have been teaching computers for 32 years now and those first 5 years were my favorite. Many thanks, Sister. One of the family remembers writing to Mary Devlin's sister Sarah 20 years ago (Mary had never met her 3 younger siblings!) and we think we might be able to find the address, so I'll let you know where Sarah lived. Go raibh maith agat (I hope that means "Thank you")
Michael Holland Myers

Anchoress · Guru

You are very welcome.

Actually we are not Irish and not connected with any Irish Order.

The Mercy Sisters and Christian Brs, like all the Irish orders, are dying out now and you rarely see any around.

Our Mother House is Canada.

But I have been in Ireland many years and done a great deal of genealogy reserch etc.

Would be very interested to hear if that IS the right townland; I know that area very well as it is not too far away.

I am not much online as a very poor connection up here; please feel very free to email me at anchoresscj at yahoo dot com. I check mail every day; always glad to meet folk when they are over here.

Blessings and peace

mhmyers wrote:

And wouldn't you know that one of the Sisters would give me my answer! I went through elementary school taught by the Sisters of Mercy based in Auburn, California, then graduated from Christian Brothers High School, and then taught with the Sisters at Mercy High School for 5 years until they closed the school. I have been teaching computers for 32 years now and those first 5 years were my favorite. Many thanks, Sister. One of the family remembers writing to Mary Devlin's sister Sarah 20 years ago (Mary had never met her 3 younger siblings!) and we think we might be able to find the address, so I'll let you know where Sarah lived. Go raibh maith agat (I hope that means "Thank you")
Michael Holland Myers

mhmyers · Newbie

Dia Duitt,

I forgot to mention my wife's brother Chris is a Christian Brother, here in Sacramento, California.

Slan go foill (can you tell I'm trying to learn a few phrases of Gaelic?)

Michele Erdvig · Host

mhmyers,

My thanks to Anchoress to helping you out with your quest. I'm sure you are delighted. You will have to let us know how it goes and what the area is like when you return.

MIchele