Fourteen-year-old Marcus Daly sat staring into the hearth of his family’s stone cottage in Derrylea, just outside the town of Ballyjamesduff in County Cavan. Closing his eyes he could still imagine his grandfather, who seemed to be 100 years old when Marcus was a boy, sitting across from…

1928: Killenkere, County Cavan Ireland

The following article regarding the author’s grandfather is from a 1928 Anglo Celt newspaper published in County Cavan, Ireland.

… Mr. Matthew Smith, Beagh Upper, Parish of Upr. Killinkere. Mr. Smith resided in Philadelphia until a few years ago, when he returned…

If you have seen seen the movie "Gettysburg," you might notice that during the climatic Pickett's Charge, behind the Union line at the Bloody Angle are two flags, the Regimental stars and stripes, and the state flag--green with a gold trim. This green flag was the only Pennsylvania flag not…

(First published on 2/10/12) Seattle-based author James Francis Smith, 78, found his current calling after he retired from a career in industry and finance.  He has been writing historical fiction for the past 10 years, starting with “Western…

Irish families traditionally revere their mothers, and the Smith clan was no different. My Kindle book The O’Donnells of Philadelphia, however, was set in Port Richmond to preserve the essence of my father’s boyhood before it fades from memory. An Irish section situated in northeast…

My father's uncle, Sgt. Lawrence Condon, died of shrapnel wounds in France two months before the Armistice ending World War I, "The War to End All Wars." His division, the U.S. Army's 27th, was known as "O'Ryan's Roughnecks." He was third generation American. One of his grandfathers was an Irwin, reputedly from Ballyjamesduff,…