Everything You Need to Know About the Claddagh Ring
12 May 2022The Irish culture touches everything from our way of life right down to the jewellery we wear. But no piece encapsulates Irish tradition more than the Claddagh ring. This distinctive Irish ring has centuries of history, and men and women all over the world wear it today as a symbol...
A Brief History of Dublin’s Mysterious Molly Malone
08 April 2022Many have heard the name Molly Malone or seen her bronze statue on Grafton Street in Dublin. She represents an old, mysterious story set in Dublin, Ireland, that has firmly cemented itself within the Irish culture. The legend goes that Molly was a beautiful young girl who worked as a...
Joe Biden’s Irish Family History
22 June 2016Irish Family History Research Experts Fiona Fitzsimons and Helen Moss are delighted to have been chosen to research President Joe Biden’s Irish Family History in time for his trip over to Ireland to visit with his family’s ancestral home. We are delighted to be able to share our work with...
Submarines
13 April 2016In 1916 the Royal Navy began to recruit submarine captains from among its young naval officers. This was probably the first time since the Napoleonic wars that young officers could achieve such rapid promotion. Recruitment to the submarine corps offered potentially huge rewards, including the chance to captain a vessel...
Inter-war years,career during the Depression
13 April 2016Having worked with submarines for almost 10 years, Rickard was a trained engineer –the repair and maintenance of submarine engines was an essential skill. Consequently after he left the navy, Rickard was hired by William Beardmore & Co. engineering and shipbuilding, where he worked in the Naval Construction Yard on...
Rickard Donovan’s Role in Combined Operations
13 April 2016At the outbreak of WWII Rickard rejoined the Armed Forces, and was assigned to Combined Operations in its first incarnation under Roger Keyes who served as Director between July 1940 and October 1941. Combined Operations drew on the best practices and expertise available within the Royal Navy, the Army and...
Assessment and Identity
13 April 2016Rickard Donovan was very clear about his Irish identity, be that within the British Empire, or as an independent state. Among the family papers are his notes on proposals for treaty negotiations with de Valera during WWII, to bring Ireland into the war. In them he shows a remarkable clarity...
Research on Bram Stoker’s family tree offers new insights into how he created the vampire Count Dracula.
13 April 2016“I myself am of an old family…” Count Dracula to Jonathan Harker. Count Dracula is one of the most terrifying figures in popular culture. He first appeared in print in 1897, as the title character in Bram Stoker’s book. Since then the name ‘Dracula’ has become shorthand for all vampires....
Origins of the Stoker family
13 April 2016Bram Stoker was descended from a protestant Dublin artisan family of humble origins. Between the 1780s and 1840s, over two generations the Stokers pulled themselves up by their boot-straps, to establish themselves as professional middle-class. View Bram Stoker’s family tree. The earliest proven Stoker ancestor that we can document is Bram’s grandfather,...
Thumbnail Character sketches
13 April 2016Richard Stoker Although there is strong circumstantial evidence that Richard Stoker was father of William Coates Stoker (and so Bram’s great-grandfather), we cannot find clear proof. We know that between 1772 and 1775 Richard Stoker was a corporal in the 2ndRegiment of Horse. In later records of the 1770s Richard...
Abraham Stoker
13 April 2016In the first half of the 1840s Abraham Stoker met Charlotte Maria Blake Thornley, daughter of Captain Thomas Thornley, a retired officer of the 43rd Foot Regiment, and retired police-officer. Charlotte Blake Thornley was half Abraham Stoker’s age. They married in January 1844, and made a home at 15 Marino Crescent,...
Stoking Bram’s imagination – stories from Irish history
13 April 2016Bram Stoker was a sickly child, he saw more of his mother than any of his other siblings. She liked to entertain him with stories drawn from her early life in Sligo and Donegal, and from her own family history of the Blakes and O’Donnells. View the Blake family tree. Blakes...
