The Lissan Bodkins
...and to begin a whole new life in a new world is not a decision rushed to quickly. It requires the finances to temporarily relocate and purchase transportation both intermediary and final. It requires an optimism for the future and the finances to get started in the new homeland. And it requires the will or necessity to leave family and home for the unknown and uncertain.
In the case of Henry Bodkin we can actually watch the entire emigration process evolve slowly in his thinking. His experience is a perfect example of "step emigration." The process which led from his home townland to his new country would involve three residences, numerous jobs, and a period of nearly 6 years. It appears to not have been a decision made from the outset, but one gradually arrived at. At the time Henry left his home in Derryganard he was 37 years old with a wife and four children, by the time Henry and family boarded ship to depart for Philadelphia in 1873 he now had six children. x
Richard Bodkin leased and farmed a small plot of land in Derryganard from -- -- with Patrick Bodkin for £10 (£1 was approximately £141.58 in 1836). As Richard and Patrick's business relations covered two separate lease agreements in 18-- and 18--, it is not too troublesome to conclude that Patrick appears to be a brother or other close family relation.x Richard appears to have had three children, Robert (b. 1821), Henry (b. 1828) and Ann Jane (b. 1834). The unavailability of official sources makes us rely to some degree on reliable oral histories and long family lifelines. In this case both are the sole support for Robert (b. 1821). Ann Jane on the other hand is included solely on the basis of original sources without which whom little more would be known.
At the time Henry decided to leave Derryganard in 1865, he had been very likely worked with his father and uncle for...
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