My family comes from Avoca in County Wicklow, where three brothers, Edward, Myles and James D'ARCY, were born in the late 1700s or early 1800s. Edward married Jane CARTY (aka CARTIN or CARTON) of Dublin and they had four children: Mary, Catherine, Myles and Peter. Edward died young and left Jane alone to raise the children; his two brothers assisted for many years. Although there is evidence (en route from the Wicklow Family History Centre) that Edward's brother Myles did marry, his descendants didn't long outlive him as lawyers wanting to settle his estate came to Canada looking for Edward's family in the early 1900s.

Jane and the children lived for a time in Arklow where Myles can be found in Griffith's Valuation. I have no idea what happened to the other brother, just that he was supposed to be a butcher.

In 1850 Jane and her children set off for Canada with the FARDON family of the same village. It is possible they were accompanied at this time by Samuel SHAW, also from their village. Jane would marry Sam in Toronto later that year. Although the family history says he was from Wicklow as well, the town where he lived was said to be Ballymafad, which doesn't exist. It is more likely he was living in Ballinafad, Ontario, near where the D'ARCYs would settle. He was from Ireland, but may have arrived in Canada before Jane and the children.

Three of the D'ARCY children married in Ontario and had families; the fourth, Catherine, was visiting their farms in Grey County in 1862 and acted as sponsor at a baptism, but after that nobody knows what happened to her.

Please visit my home page to see more about the D'ARCY family. A researcher in Wicklow has found the name of the parents of Edward, Myles and James, and the information is somewhere over the Atlantic, but I will post it as soon as it arrives.

Holly McKenzie
voila@netcom.ca