Family Historians - ancestry.com

My own Grandad came to England, from Co.Mayo in the late 40s and was into the road surfacing game. He and his friend, who he came across with, started out with Wards Surfacing, at Sheffield, before forming P.J.Burkes at Wombwell.
Same old story, could have been a wealthy man but for his taste for the drink and his typical Irish generosity.

 

As a member of the Irish

I often wonder just how many of the descendants of the Irish diaspora living around the town are aware of, or even care about, their roots In Ireland. I’m currently in a hotel in Portstewart in Northern Ireland, a few miles away from the town where my great-great-great grandmother was born. For me it brings a sense of belonging that supplements rather than replaces my Barnsley affiliations.

 

My grandads were both miners, during the war one stayed in the pits the other went to war with the Pioneer Corps. This weekend I was given his discharge papers, discharged in Bournemouth for some reason and not even allowed to keep his cap badge.

 

At the time he was laying the roadways at Edlington pit, he housed his family in a pit house in the
village. I recall one of my uncles once telling me, that they arrived back from the local Miners Welfare
one afternoon, after his old man had had and absolute skin full.

There must have been a public parade of some sort as the Salvation Army stopped to play on the
village green. For reasons better known to himself, at the interval, my Grandad approached the bands big drum
which was on the ground and proceeded to do a forward roll which pierced the drumskin. As he
carried out his action he apparently shouted " by Jaysus, that's the first time I've been up to my ass
in music."

He wasn't laughing the next day, when my grandmother made him go to the Sally Army's HQ to profusely
apologise and give them some money to buy a replacement drumskin.