My Story - continued.

Dear Readers,

Those who are still reading, may have noticed a slight tangential deviation in the angle of this blog. What began as an experiment, became in the fullness of digital time, a combination of media commentary, and perhaps less obviously, mining of the soul of yours truly in an unfolding of the journey to find my motherline. This is no easy task psychologically, or in terms of logistics, but the internet connection helps and this is how I did find my long lost motherline, in combination with some concerted research via the NSW Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages.
As I do know that there are readers around the world reading this blog, and in Australia, including good and old friends, I feel it is only fair to share here what I have found.
I have found out that my mother's family was- is- Irish. Our family name on my mother's side is Doyle.

Her- and my-  ancestors, were Irish rebels, exiled for life from Ireland following the Irish Uprisings of 1798 against the British colonisers.

Most recently I have found out that on my mother’s side I am descended from Irish political exiles, Irish Rebels and artists and musicians, Andrew Doyle* “who was exiled for life for his part in the 1798-1801 Irish uprising”  and who came to Australia on the sailing ship Rolla, with brother (also exiled) and with his wife Sophia (as a free settler) and their young children, so were able to move swiftly into the position of free settler. A notable ancestor, on this side of the family, was the celebrated violinist Eileen O’Moore (stage name of Lydia Elizabeth Doyle) born in NSW who the digitised press clippings reveal was  famous in Australia and Europe playing with the “world’s best orchestras” at the turn of the twentieth century  just before the era of mass sound recordings; and became a violin professor at Stanford University, outside San Francisco.

And that is only the start.

More to follow.


Ruth Skilbeck 

* “Doyle, Cyrus Matthew (1793-1855)” by Alec B. Doyle, Australian Dictionary of Biography.

http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/doyle-cyrus-matthew-1990

Kinloch Castle Friends Association (Eileen O'Moore)
http://www.kinlochcastlefriends.org/core04i/default.aspx?pageid=47