When you search, sometimes you don’t like all you find

January 2, 2006

Since returning from Ireland, I have used the Internet to search for more information on the Corliss side of my family. Unlike the McCarthy side, the only thing I really got out of the visit to Tuam and Galway City is a connection to the towns themselves but not my people. I also purchased a book of essays and articles providing a glimpse of what it was like to live in Tuam from the 1850s on – the period during which my great-grandfather lived and raised his family.

What I discovered online were a number of groups and bulletin boards. There is a Tuam Family History site. There are boards based on geographic location – like Galway, and based on surnames like Corliss. I posted messages seeking information on my family in all the relevant places I could find. There are very helpful people of no relation who have done quick searches to find bits of information for me. For example it appears my great-uncle Michael moved to Lancashire, England, married, became a widower and then remarried. I have also received responses from Corlesses in Ohio, Australia and Ireland who are also collecting information on their/our families. While it is likely we are related it seems to be at least a few generations back of the record collectively documented thus far.

The most diligent collector of Corless information I have come in contact with thus far seems to be Catherine who I believe lives in Ireland. In addition to some interesting tidbits, I received an intriguing message from her.

“. . . Also, Mary Kate, the youngest, died in tragic circumstances, in the Infirmary Hospital, Workhouse, Tuam. There is a long report on the tragedy, in the Tuam Herald, the local newspaper, (still going strong) for March 1900. Perhaps you are aware of this. As it is of quite a sensitive nature, that's all I will say, but I felt I should mention it, as it gives statements from some of the family, which may be of interest to you, and states that one son had emigrated to England, probably Michael, or Patrick, as they were the older ones. . . it makes tough reading, a very sad affair, but it is family history, and good or bad, I feel myself, that everything needs to be known.”

I did know that Mary Kate died at age 9 at the Tuam Workhouse and I assumed it must have been a sad story, but I found Catherine’s warnings odd. Yesterday, she faxed me the Tuam Herald article and now I understand her caution.

From my readings, things were quite bad in those days, especially for the people who loved in the section of Tuam where my great grandparents lived. It was a poor and quite an unhealthy place. Mary Kate was the youngest of eight. On the morning of Saturday March 23, my great-grandmother went to the market. Late in the morning all the other children still at home, except Mary Kate, went to a friends house leaving her at home with their Father still in bed – perhaps sick. Evidently he cracked under the strain of it all and murdered her with a stick and then walked to the police station and turned himself in. My then eleven-year-old grandfather was the first to find his dying sister bleeding on the floor. After the trial -- during which his sons testified -- my great-grandfather was declared insane and placed in the Criminal Lunatic Asylum.

I wonder what ever happened to him after that?

I wonder how my great-grandmother dealt with it all?

I wonder if grandfather ever told dad or Uncle Jim?

I wonder if that is why grandfateher seems to have left Ireland as soon as he was able?

Now I have even more questions and there may never be any answers. Not the story I would have hoped for, but I am glad to know.