Customer Testimonials

Although not able to go back as far as we had hoped, there is so much information there and it has cleared up a lot of questions. I really appreciate the time and effort involved in gathering it all together. I have other branches of the Family from Ireland and if I can gather some more information together I am sure I will be using your services again in the future. Thanking you once again

Carol Welbourne

Everything I have read online has pointed me in your direction as a safe investment for the $ I am saving towards commissioning research. I can see from these exchanges that I have decided correctly. My money will be well spent on good and thorough researchers who are indeed professionals and genuinely interested in helping people like me

Anonymous Client

It wouldn't have been possible without her hard work, support and dedication in researching the Finnegan family for me these past two years. I can't tell you how wonderful it was to make these connections. I owe you a debt of thanks. A heartfelt thank you!!!

Tim Finnegan

I cannot imagine the time and effort that was put into this but I can assure you that it is very much appreciated by my family. You have filled in a lot of gaps that we thought would never be filled. We are eternally grateful. I can assure you that I will be spreading your good name around to all my friends letting them know that this is the place to go to get any family research done. Thank you again from the bottom of my heart. God Bless you all. Kindest Regards

Ray Judge

Valerie and her father had been trying to trace his family history for a while when they came to Eneclann. 'We'd been doing bits of research on and off for a good few years,' says Valerie. 'He could find his father's family to a degree, but when he looked for his mother's he came up against a brick wall every time. We weren't really sure how to go about things, and would get so far and then get stuck.'

They talked to locals to see if they knew more. 'People would say 'I knew the family' but it was all hearsay really. My father had been told the family came from Meath and had done a lot of research around that area. But we found out that a lot of the stories he was told weren't right really!'

Valerie decided to approach a professional. 'I thought it would be terrible if he never got to find out about his family,' she says, 'so I just started searching on the internet to see what was available in Ireland and came across Eneclann.' After she had completed an assessment form, the research team started investigating the case for her. She decided not to tell her father that she had commissioned them, in case the research team were also unable to find much information.

Eneclann's research team started by tracing the civil marriage certificate of Nicholas' parents, Nicholas and Kate. The internal evidence in this document gave them a paper trail to follow, and they soon found that Nicholas (his father) had been born in 1889 in Dublin and that his father (also Nicholas) worked there as a coachman. By the time of the 1901 census the family had moved back to Mullingar, Co. Westmeath, their place of origin. However, within the year Nicholas' grandfather had died from heart disease at the age of 46.

While Valerie's father's paternal line was relatively straightforward to trace, his mother, Kate McDonnell, remained elusive. Valerie's family believed that Kate was born ca. 1893 and the marriage record proved that Kate's father was called Michael. Working from this scant information, the Eneclann team found some possible civil birth records for Kate and entries in the 1901 and 1911 census, but the information didn't add up. None of the birth records were for the right child, and they didn't have enough evidence to clearly pick out Kate and her family from their dopplegängers in the census. It was frustrating to say the least.

'Eneclann's researchers said they needed a good deal more research in order to be sure of finding the right Kate,' says Valerie. 'So at that stage I decided I would tell my father and see if he wanted to go further – once he knew there was a possibility of getting the end product he was definitely going to keep going!'

Helen Moss, Eneclann's principal researcher, picks up the story. 'On a hunch I decided to contact the parish office of Mullingar Cathedral to see if there were any further details about the couple because sometimes, but not always, the register may contain more information than the civil record,' she explains. 'The office staff were very helpful and the register had additional information including Kate's mother's maiden name, which was the breakthrough we needed.'

The researchers were then able to locate the family in both the 1901 and 1911 census returns. The additional information contained in the census showed that Kate was born in 1900 – so she was actually 7 years younger than her family believed. Knowing Kate's mother's maiden name enabled the researchers to locate her parents' civil marriage certificate, which gave the names of their fathers. At each generational step, Eneclann's researchers corroborated the evidence they had to ensure they were on the right track. They eventually brought the search back to Nicholas' maternal great-grandparents in 1861.

'Once they found Kate, it was amazing,' says Valerie. 'There was so much they found – not just her, but her parents and grandparents. One of the things that surprised us was the size of Kate's family; my father and his siblings had no idea that there was a big family out there at the time they were orphaned. We were fascinated to discover that my father's maternal grandfather was a farmer and a miller.'

So, how did Nicholas feel to finally have this information about his family? 'To actually have it all there in black and white was amazing. The report was very clear, and shows where all the information came from as well', says Valerie.

'When it arrived, there was an awful lot for him to take in – there was just so much information, all of a sudden,' Valerie comments. 'But he is delighted with it. At this stage it wasn't so much an emotional journey, as he's been trying to do it for so long; he just felt, 'at last we have it!''

'His siblings all have copies of the report and are thrilled to have all the information there', Valerie continues. 'The fact of just realising there was this big family out there that they didn't know at all, was amazing. One of his brothers was here in Donegal when the final report came in – they went through it together – he was just delighted he couldn't believe he had all that information.

'Dad was an Irish and Mathematics teacher but has always had a big love of history – something he has passed on to all four of his children,' explains Niav. 'At the time Dad was trying to put together his family tree himself. He was off meeting relatives, trying to get as much information as he could about the extended family and seeing what memories people had of the various aunts and uncles. But you can only go so far with people's memories.'

'Although I'm an historian, I'm not a local historian or a genealogist,' explains Niav. 'I had come across Eneclann before through work and knew that family history research was one of their areas of expertise, so I had the idea of commissioning them to research Dad's family history for him as his seventieth birthday present,' she says. 'When I suggested it to him he said it would be absolutely fantastic.'

Niav's Dad did not know a huge amount about his extended family prior to the research. 'He had no recollection of his paternal grandfather and very little information regarding his father's family,' says Niav. He gave Eneclann the information he had gathered so far, so that they could then take on the research for him.

'There were a few surprises uncovered,' says Niav. 'Eneclann's researchers found out that there was an extended family living in Dad's family house in Cornmarket Row, Limerick – a widowed aunt and her two daughters – we had known nothing about them really as Dad was too young to remember.' The research team also revealed that the family had not always lived on the same street: ten years previously they had been living further from the city centre. 'The family owned a clothing store,' explains Niav, 'and I think they probably moved to the centre of town to be closer to their business or possibly to find a bigger house to accommodate the larger family.'

Niav also discovered some interesting facts about her families' names. 'I would have always known one of my great aunts as Auntie Gertie, but it turns out her first name was Madeline,' she laughs. 'Another thing that sticks in my mind is a little boy that was stillborn, or died soon after, and the next son born was given the same name.'

Niav thinks that getting your family history traced is a great idea as a present. 'The gift of the history of your family is certainly a unique seventieth birthday gift,' she says. 'While it was not something tangible, for someone like Dad it was the best gift we could have given him, and it's now inspired him to have a family tree drawn up!'

Niav, Ireland

Ron and his cousin had managed to trace his family back to the first half of the nineteenth century. 'My great-great-grandfather and great-great-grandmother were both born in Ireland,' he explains, 'but they left Ireland during the Potato Famine, around 1846. My earliest paper record is their marriage in Cork in 1846, and of course the problem is it doesn't say where they were born on that document.'

Tracing your Irish family history can be difficult when you live far away from Ireland. 'The paper trail is not that great and not many of the Irish records have been digitised yet,' says Ron. 'We've got one professional genealogist in New Zealand and she says it's not worth going to Ireland and England to find out more unless you've done plenty of research beforehand, because when you've over there you often don't have the time to do all the research.'

He decided the best course of action was to find a researcher in Ireland to help. 'I looked on the net under researchers in Ireland,' Ron explains. 'Eneclann came up and I had a look at the website which looked very professionally done and I thought 'this looks like a good starting point'.

Through some careful detective-work, the genealogists at Eneclann were able to help Ron. Using Griffith's Valuation and the tithe applotment books for Cork, they were able to narrow down the search for his great-great-grandfather to just five civil parishes. The genealogists then searched the parish records for the area. Ron wasn't sure what religion his ancestors were. The researchers did not find Ron's ancestors in the Roman Catholic records, and unfortunately the Church of Ireland records had been destroyed by fire in 1922. However, since Church of Ireland marriages were recorded from 1845 onwards, it was possible to search for Ron's forebears in the civil records. Ron was delighted when Eneclann were able to locate his direct ancestor's marriage which showed it took place in St. Finbarr's Church of Ireland Cathedral, Cork and gave the names of his great-great-great-grandparents.

Looking back on the research, Ron explains that what attracted him most to the Eneclann service was the assessment service. 'The great thing about Eneclann's service is that you provide them with information and they put together an assessment, and in that they will put suggestions for further research.'

He likes the no-nonsense approach of the assessment service: 'I've heard that some companies will do whatever research the customer suggests, even though they know that a particular line of research they are doing for you will not result in anything. In all my dealings with Eneclann, they have told me if in their opinion perhaps this is not the way to go with the research.'

He continues: 'I would definitely recommend Eneclann to anyone who needed a hand with their Irish research; their resources are huge. You can tell that from the newsletter – there's always a list of new publications, new CDs or DVDs that are coming out with information on them. There's always things happening and new things coming online.'

Ron, New Zealand