Chat
|
Daily Search
|
My GenForum
|
Community Standards
|
Terms of Service
|
|
|
There is a rather interesting branch of the Rolleston family of which most of you will not be aware. My great-grandfather (James I believe) Rolleston, had to leave Portadown, Co. Armagh (he was undoubtedly a descendent of Richard) in rather a hurry somewhere around the 1870s, when it was discovered that in addition to his declared Irish nationalism and refusal to join the Orange Order, he was consorting with a Catholic woman in Waterford, where he was conducting family business. His mother secretly passed him the family mineral water recipes before he left. He died, a Catholic convert, in Waterford in 1898, when his daughter, my grandmother May Rolleston, was aged 2 years old. May Rolleston went on to become the Irish Dancing champion of all Ireland at the most famous Oireachtas na Gaeilge festival ever held, that of 1917, held across the street from the Rolleston home at Cathedral Square in Waterford. Her victory dance was with President de Valera, recently released from internment, and most of the Irish leadership was present. Thomas Ashe, senior IRB member working alongside Michael Collins, played the pipes for her, shortly before his capture and death within weeks. My mother Patricia Kelly still possesses the champion's medal. May Rolleston founded and ran the Rolleston School of dancing for decades afterwards, teaching all over Waterford and Kilkenny. She was an active member of Cumann na mBan during the War of Independence, and her two brothers John and Ned served in the IRA during this period. All took the republican anti-treaty side during the Civil War, and the brothers emigrated to Whitestone, New York USA. John's descendents flourish on Long Island, New York to this day. May married William Denn of Mullinahone, Co. Tipperary in 1921, some months after the ceasefire, and they lived long lives in Waterford. Most of their family emigrated to the US, but three of the 16 grandchildren remain in Europe, of whom I am one.
Notify Administrator about this message?
Followups:
|
| http://genforum.genealogy.com/rolleston/messages/63.html | ||
 |
Link to GenForum Add Forum |
|