Our Last Day in Ireland - Ballybay to Dublin

11 June 2019
Europe, Ireland

Taking the advice of the librarian in Ballybay, we headed across to see Catriona at the library in Clones. I walked into the library quite excitedly only to find that Catriona was off sick for the day. There was nothing I could do except leave my contact details and accept the librarian's assurance that she would get back to me (which she did).

A Little of the Draffin History

I learnt from the librarian that my best bet for information was the Genealogy centre above the Cavan library, 23km from Clones. On the way, we stopped to look for Draffin graves at a couple of cemeteries but no luck. I discovered in Cavan the reason why I had so much trouble finding graves. The Draffins were from Perth in Scotland and sent to Ireland by the British in the 1600s as 'Plantation' people. The British wanted to take over Ireland and get rid of the Irish by moving entire villages from England and Scotland across the Irish Sea, hoping the immigrants would have many children and multiply in number. David Draffin, my great-great-great grandfather, certainly did his bit. Twelve children by his first wife then another twelve by his second!!! But I digress. The Catholic Irish would not allow the Presbyterian Scots to be buried in their Catholic graveyards so the Scots sometimes just had to be buried anywhere.

Our next stop was the large general cemetery next to the crematorium in Cavan. In all the graveyards we had walked through, there were many headstones which were so weathered that the writing had all but disappeared. Amongst those we could read though, we didn't find any Draffin tombstones. I had a chat to the man behind the desk at the crematorium. He directed me to what he said was the oldest cemetery in Cavan, up the top of the lane next to CGPower. It really was old with the headstones that we could see weathered beyond recognition . It was impossible to walk through though, as it was completely overgrown with blackberries. While I didn't find any graves related to my Draffins ancestors, I'm very glad to have visited where my grandma's family lived. There are no Draffins in Ireland now, but there are dairy farmers by the name of Draffin just across the border in Northern Ireland. I will return and next time, I will track down the living Draffins and see what information I can glean!

After all our grave searching, it was getting quite late and we were hungry. We found a little coffee shop called the Hard Boiled Egg and enjoyed soup and bread before driving to Dublin airport. We spent our last night in Ireland at the Holiday Inn Express. I loved our travels around Ireland. Three weeks was just not long enough and I definitely want to return. Stunning scenery, fascinating history, music nights in the pubs, Irish food............. I've already started mapping out an itinerary for another three weeks!!