Researching Ancestors in Ireland

Not done while on a RS tour, but research via Ancestry.com and the Ellis Island ship manifests. Did you know that if you have a grandparent born in Ireland (in your case, 2 grandparents) you can claim Irish citizenship and get an Irish passport? You will need a grandparent birth certificate and then your parent's and your own birth certificates to show the lineage. See the section "Citizenship Through Descent from Irish Grandparents" on this site https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/moving_country/irish_citizenship/irish_citizenship_through_birth_or_descent.html

I would not recommend trying to do genealogy research while on a tour. The tour may not go to the exact place your ancestors are from, and if you don't have fairly accurate information you may not be successful and you will have used valuable tour time to no avail. I attempted some genealogy on my solo trip many years ago and came away empty handed because I had some incorrect dates, and not enough other information to figure it out. I spent a whole day at the PRONI office in Belfast and ended up with nothing to show for it. Now, years later and many hours spent on Ancestry.ca and I now know exactly where generations of my family lived in large part due to other people who are researching the same ancestors. So, I would also suggest that you look at Ancestry.com and see what you can learn before you go. If you already have detailed information, and know where your people are from, then if the tour is close to that area you may be able to make a side trip by using some free time or skipping a tour activity, but don't use tour time to do research as you may be disappointed.

The NEHGS often has trips to Ireland for research on ancestors. You might want to look at those trips. You'll have to do the work, but you would have knowledgeable support. It's the New England Historic Genealogical Society or AmericanAncestors.org if you want to do online research. I've never researched any Irish ancestors myself. Here's their next Irish research trip: Dublin

Edit: That link isn't complete for some reason so here's the basic description:

Dublin, Ireland Research Tour
June 23 – June 30, 2019
Dublin, Ireland
Visit the treasures of Dublin’s many genealogical repositories, including the National Archives of Ireland, National Library of Ireland, Registry of Deeds, Valuation Office, Dublin City Archives, Trinity College, and more. Throughout the week, participants will discover each repository’s unique holdings through special orientations and tours, guided research, one-on-one consultations, and lectures. NOTE: Registrants must know where in Ireland their ancestor(s) came from. Register by March 20, 2019 to receive special discounts.

The RS Ireland trip is very busy and I don't think you'd have time to do any genealogy research. I'd agree that you need to do all you can here before you go. You might be able to visit a specific location on a free day or afternoon but you'd want to figure the links out ahead of time.

I'd encourage you to use Ancestry.com carefully along with the free site, FamilySearch.org to build your family tree. You will be astonished at how much is available online. I did a program through Road Scholar at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City a few years ago and was shocked at the amount of microfilmed church records available. Not Ireland but I found microfilmed church records from a small town in Germany dating back to 1700.

You can get to a lot of this stuff on the FamilySearch website but you can get even more if you go to a local FamilyHistory location. This would be a library located in a local LDS church. I'm not LDS but anyone is apparently welcomed to come do family research. Some centers are better than others with being able to help you look.

Here is a link to a page that might help you get started. Put in Irish Resources and see what comes up.

https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Main_Page

A really good place to start your research is this official Irish government site: www.irishgenealogy.ie. Has lots of information and it's free.

I'd start at your library. They likely have an Ancestry.com subscription you can use for free. Put in the names of people you know so you can start with the most accurate information possible when connecting that information with records from Ireland.

Which two last names would you be researching?

McInerney and, Martin (but the Martins aren't from Clare.)

Marian,
I was hoping you might be looking for names about which I knew a bit or could connect you with people in Ireland....but sorry no immediate name matches.

But, that said, do you know when and how your ancestors came to the US. Do you know what city/townsland they lived in in Clare?

One of my sisters and I researched with a lot of deadends (on ancestry.com, also when she went to the place in Salt Lake City that has the extensive geneology records) and then just some random searching on line, knowing only the original family name of my grandmother, the town in which she lived as a child, and then the first name of a third cousin and the city in which she lives (but no last name).

But the most amazing thing happened....when we were planning a trip to Ireland, I just happened to email a B&B owner in the city where the cousin lives, just randomly asking if he might have any idea who they are, based on the original old family name and the first names (with unknown different last name now).................you can only imagine the delight when he emailed back that he knew exactly who I was asking about, that their daughter taught his grandchildren in the local school..........wow. Anyway, it turned into a fabulous meeting of my cousin, who met us at our final stop (Ashford Castle) and then spent an entire day taking us around to the old cottage (no longer lived in) where my grandmother was raised....just like the little black/white photo I had from my childhood, then to the family church, graves, showed us where my greatgrandparents had lived, etc. Pretty amazing.

So, long way of saying, just ask around.........roots are very deep in Ireland, and a lot of people know a lot of people who know a lot of people. In fact, we hired a driver to take us around on many days, and he told us that the Post Office delivers mail just based on name and city.......no street addresses. If the wrong person gets it (with the same name) that person just figures out for whom it was intended and passes it along.

The same driver took friends of ours around a few years later and he helped them connect with a likely relative on the Aran Islands...turned out he was probably not of the same immediate bloodline, but likely related in some way. Unfortunately the older man on the island died shortly after they returned to the states, so someday my friend may go back and try to dig more.

But, if you have the village/city, you can look up old census records (handwritten) that might show when your grandparents were born. I found that for my grandmother and her 12 siblings...pretty amazing. Ditto for ship records thru Ellis Island. Church records in Ireland are supposed to be fabulous sources, too. So, if you know the specific little city or townsland, maybe pop into the local church and ask around, or email in advance. Or just randomly Google people in County Clare with the same last name and see where it goes.

Good luck with it all.