Day 4 Belfast Northern Ireland Monday 2nd July 2012

Today is one of the days I have been dreaming about for the past 3 years. We are visiting the PRONI - Public Records Office of Northern Ireland which is straight across the street from our apartment. It opens at 9 am so we will be there waiting to get inside and start looking for those family treasures buried deep within. As most of you already know we are first cousins to Lord Thomas OHagan, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Thomas was born in Belfast in 1812 and died in London in 1885. His career was very distinguished and he is an important person in Irish history. There is a despository of 5000 letters called the OHagan Papers at the PRONI. These letters and papers are not properly indexed or scanned so it is quite a job to actually find any that relate to our family. Our cousins here in Ireland, Mary and Adrian visited the PRONI 2 years ago and spent a day looking through hundreds of mictofiche, really its like finding a needle in a haystack and they didnt even scratch the surface. BUT miraculously they did find a letter from Henry McGuigan (my great great grandfather) to Lord O'Hagan but the first 5 pages were missing. Henry's letter was such a discovery and it was fantastic to hear in Henrys own words what life was like in Melbourne during the 1880's. Our quest today is to try and find the first four pages of Henrys letter and any other McGuigan letters written from Australia held in the depository. A daunting task indeed but please God we will be successful. I am also hoping to see and hold the original of Henry's letter - fingers crossed they know where to find it in amongst all those archives! Who knows what other discoveries we will make over the next 3 days at the PRONI...........will keep you posted..................