Ernesto Ryan from South America is searching for his Irish roots, a guy in the Arctic wants to know more about a female ancestor who was transported to Australia for stealing a loaf of bread and a Russian who believes she is a reincarnated Murphy wants proof of her Irish forebears to help her in knitting Irish designs. Tracing ancestors becomes compulsive, says Fiona Fitzsimons of the newly-established genealogical and historical research company, Eneclann. "We have clients who come back for more and more and our turnover has trebled in the last three months. St Patrick's Day for us is like toy manufacturers at Christmas: we're really busy. Everyone wants to find some Irish ancestry. Summer is peak season: it can be hard to find a seat in the National Library because of all the tourists consulting the records." Fiona and her partner, Brian Donovan, are post-graduate history students at Trinity College Dublin, who put their PhDs on hold when the "sideline" of tracing ancestors took over their lives. Working from a tiny (subsidised) office in Trinity's Innovation Centre, they hope to be recognised as a campus company and to employ more historians.
"We have an advantage over most genealogists," explains Fiona. "Because we are trained historians, we don't just give people the dry facts - Mary Murphy emigrated in 1848. We put it into context and can explain how she lived, what kind of person she was, what life was like then and the probable reasons for emigration." Genealogy is big business, and getting bigger. The number of "roots tourists" has more than doubled in the last 10 years and in 1996 over 70,000 visitors spent £30 million in Ireland while tracing their family history. Ciara Gallagher of Bord Failte believes that with 70 million people of Irish origin around the world, there is huge potential for growth, particularly in Australia.
"It's fashionable to have a sheep stealer in the family," says Bernard Devaney, who provides ancestor hunters with free advice through the National Library's genealogy service. "We point people in the right direction so they can go to the correct source. We get lots of Americans of all ages whose parents have refused to tell them anything about the family because they are ashamed of the poverty or the fact that their great-great-grandfather married beneath him," says Bernard.
At Eneclann, they find that clients are only too happy to acquire disreputable forebears. "We traced a Hadley to Westmeath in 1695 for an American client, who was delighted when we found out that he was known as `disorderly Hadley'. He was a Quaker who was also a womaniser, a drinker and involved in the arms trade," says Brian. "Prosperous families in the US often want to know how their ancestors lived and are extremely pleased to hear they were famine emigrants living in extreme poverty with lots of children, because it shows how far they have come."
Canadians Marion and Grant Goodebrand contacted Eneclann on the Internet when they decided to trace Marion's ancestors. "It has unfolded like a story," says Marion, who is third-generation Irish, with the maiden name of Malone. "Brian and Fiona have traced my family back eight generations to 1751. We have a marvellous spectrum of family life. "The Dowsleys of New Ross, Wexford were quite wealthy, urban professionals, and we're going to see the Church of Ireland records which show the death of a Dowsley in 1803. The Leggs from Co Tipperary, on the other hand, were rural labourers who all died out by 1856, except for one man and his daughter who made it to Canada. We're going to visit the one acre which they farmed." "It really brings Ireland alive," says Grant. "We're delighted to have the information for our daughter and the rest of the family. And we're going to keep on, to go back as far as we can."
Ancestor hunting is becoming increasingly popular with native Irish too. The Dun Laoghaire Genealogical Society holds meetings, collects documents and exchanges information on family history. Ambitious plans for expansion include the development of a non-profitmaking research centre and archive in a Martello tower at Seapoint, Co Dublin. Many people begin their search on the Internet but the majority of records are not yet on-line, although there is contact information for professional genealogists and sources in Ireland, the US and Australia. The Irish Times genealogy website, which conducts searches for Web surfers, receives almost 5,000 visits a week and tracing ancestors is, apparently, the second biggest use of the Web. One fascinating historical source searchable on the Internet is the series of transportation records from Ireland to Australia. Presented as a gift from the Irish government to the people of Australia to mark the Australian bicentenary in 1988, the list enables you to hunt for ancestors who were transported as convicts between 1788 and 1868.
