Ash/ Day /Woods families from Donaghedy

Dear Beryl:

Many thanks for your post to the Ireland Reaching Out message board.

Yes, there have been a number of new records which have been put online in the last few years which have made a difference for researchers.

The Civil Registration records which start in 1864 are now online.  They are available at www.irishgenealogy.ie

The Calendar of Wills records are also online through the National Archives of Ireland which has added further records to their database. 

They can be accessed below:

http://www.genealogy.nationalarchives.ie/

In addition, there are several good websites which may be helpful--but they are subscription.

http://www.rootsireland.ie

There are also websites for graveyard transcriptions available through the link below:

http://www.historicgraves.ie

PRONI, the Public Records Office of Northern Ireland also has an excellent online database.

Their address is below: 

https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/proni

If you need further assistance, please let us know.

The best of luck with your research!

Kind regards,

Jane.

Thanks for that information.  Should keep me occupied for some time.

Hi Beryl,

My name is Michael Bayley and I live in New South Wales, Australia and William Woods & Eliza Day are my great, great, great, grandparents, on my mother's side. 

The information I have for these 2 is mainly since they arrived in Australia on 15 Jul 1841. Details of their life in Ireland before emigrating, has been very scant.

In your post here, there is quite a bit of information that I don't have. With your permission, I would like to include this info in my family tree on ancestry.com.au.

I am more than happy to share with you, all the information I have for them and their descendants, which are numerous. They had 11 children, including Mary, William & John, born before they emigrated.

My connection is through John, he being my great, great, grandfather. I have him as John Herbert Woods and he married Lucy Hodges on 1 May 1873 at Bathurst, NSW, Australia.

If you are interested, I can give you access to my tree on ancestry.com.au.

Regards,

Michael

Michael, I am delighted to hear from a relative on the same quest as I am and I am happy to share any information I find.  I am descended from Eliza Woods, younger sister of John.  I have among other details,a copy of her baptism, her parents' death certificates- William 1859, Eliza 1889.   I was intrested to hear that John was married in Bathurst, as were Margaret in 1871 and Eliza to Edward Field in 1869.  So it looks as though the family left Cornwallis after William's death and went to Bathurst, though Eliza Woods was in Sydney at the time of her death.  I would like to carry this research further, but don't know how to contact you directly.  I live in the ACT.

Hi Beryl,

Great to hear from you. We can exchange information via email if you like. My email address is mw.bayley@bigpond.com.

Is the Eliza you are descended from the one born 25 Aug 1849 at Windsor? I have her as getting married in Bathurst and having 5 children there. That's about all the info I have about Eliza. I also have her parents death certificates, but I don't have Eliza's baptism.

You mentioned in your original post about Nancy Day being present at Thomas' birth 26 Aug 1856. Interestingly, on George's death certificate 11 Dec 1856, it shows the informant as "William Day (his X mark), Uncle, Argyle Estate." It looks as though at least some of Eliza's family followed them to Australia.

May I make a suggestion regarding birth, death & marriage certificates? As there were so many children in this family, why don't we each make a list of the certificates we have, then swap this information? It would save us doubling up on certificates unnecessarily. If you'd rather not, I totally understand.

Look forward to further contact with you.

Regards, Michael

Thanks Michael.  Good idea.  I shall be in contact over the next week.  Thanks also to irelandxo for their great work.  I think we should work together on entering this family onto their website.

Dear Beryl & Michael:

I'm delighted to see that the two of you have connected and will be able to collaborate on your family search.

It would be wonderful if you would enter the family on the XO Chronicles.  You can do so through the following link:

https://www.irelandxo.com/ireland-xo/history-and-genealogy

Many thanks for your kind words, Beryl, about the project.  We have a wonderful group of volunteers who are happy to assist with queries and to try to reconnect families with their ancestral parish.

Please keep me posted as to your progress.

Kind regards,

Jane.

Hi Beryl,

totally agree with putting names into Irelandxo. Have just entered William Woods & Eliza Day basics, just to see how it all works. Not too difficult. 

Regards,

Michael

Congratulations on your research. 

Would you have found a Robert Woods, farmer,  with a daughter Martha who married a ? Donnelly before civil marriages and was widowed?  She remarried to a William Robinson in 1850 at the Presbyterian church in the parish of Donaghedy?  Crossing my fingers, Kathy Atkins

Hi Kathy,

Sorry, but haven't come across a Robert Woods, yet! I have a huge brick wall from whem my great great grandfather, William Woods, emmigrated in 1841. He was born about 1806 in Dunnamanagh, Donaghedy, Co Tyrone, Ireland.

Regards,

Michael Bayley

All I can say is "Fancy calling Windsor a suburb of Sydney". It is one of the 5 towns set up by Gov. Lachlan Macquarie 1811.

Thompson Square, 1795, is one of the few remaining 'Public Green' spaces in NSW. It is NSW Heritage listed.

And the bridge over the Hawkesbury River built around 1880s is also NSW Heritage listed.

However, these protections are not enough to save landmarks of European settlement. 

The bridge is marked for demolition. And, right now, Thompson Square is being dug up by NSW RMS to make way for 'wonderful' sweeping approaches to a modern concrete bridge - probably 4 lanes! 

On the other hand, Ireland sets the pace for research, documentation and preservation of all things heritage... even down to a remaining cow-bail or fence post.

Let alone the damage to foundations of Australia's oldest buildings. once the bridge & Thomson's Squar are gone, there are no tradesmen today with the skills to re-build.

Maybe all the Ash, Day and Woods family could gather with the current local residents and assist NSW Government to recognise their own follies.  

A suburb, by definition, is at the other end of the spectrum to a 'town', especially one set out by a Governor aware of the value of the flood plains as the source of food for the Colony. Sadly, much of the Sydney Basin (geological term) has been scraped of native vegetation and layered with tar, cement and multiple dwellings. Arable land in the basin is being converted to residential as we sleep!

There is a lot of protest from a range of citizens; but receiving little audience from NSW Gov.   A place to start could be CAWB (Community Action for Windsor Bridge)  http://www.cawb.com.au/ seem well informed and organised. 

MP Susan Templeman and Senator Lee Rhiannon are supportive of saving heritage, and have received infringement notices; are worth contacting.

Ditto, Hawksbury Shire Councillors. "HAWKESBURY Council has once again determined to write to federal and state ministers to request a halt to the Windsor Bridge Replacement Project." ref. 

A sit-in protest an Thompson Square has been continuous since 2013.  For some reason, the NSW gov. planners are fixed on destroying the 1811 heritage of your wider family grouping and the thousands of others who have an association with Windsor & surroundings.

https://www.hawkesburygazette.com.au/story/5321652/hawkesbury-council-to-again-write-to-ministers-to-request-halt-to-windsor-bridge-project/

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/two-arrested-protesters-removed-at-windsor-bridge-protest-20180108-h0fa7r.html

I believed that heritage belonging to the nation and for future generations was sacred - but a new rule is happening in Windsor.

Eire2Go

There is an interesting item of genealogical interest focussing on Windsor.  This 150 page document contained names connected to Windor for as much as 200 years, splendid anecdotes, opinions re preservation of 'heritage' and excellent reproductions of early photographs and lithographs. 

In it, you might find some relatives and/or details of the area.