Blaskets to Springfield—Part 2

Máirtín Ó Cearnaigh

Transcription of interview by Caitlin Foley:

Máirtín Ó Cearnaigh is ainm dom… My name is Máirtín Ó Cearnaigh. I was born in the Blascaod Mór in 1931. My mother died—I don't hardly remember her. I was too young. My father brought us all up and my sister, the oldest sister, who was fifteen, her name was Céit.

I remember my younger brother when he died, Seamus, he was very young. He died and the people on the island made their own coffins and buried him on the island—they used to bury the young there all the time, on the island. Then I had an older brother who was two years old than me—Sean. He got sick around, after Christmas and we couldn’t get him to no doctor or nothing. He was there for a while suffering for a week and then all of a sudden he died. He stayed three days in the house dead. That turned me against it—I didn’t care about it anymore.

So after that, that’s when I guess Eamon de Valera came around to visit all the islands. He was trying to get 'em out of the islands or something; he didn’t have to wait for me. I left anyway and came to this country. I left in ’51.

(Living on the island was really hard?) Oh yeah…. But we didn’t know the difference. we didn’t know anything else. Everything had to be done in season. When you catch the mackerel, it had to be in season, the sheep, everything like that... and it lasts a lot longer when you cure it. It everything would have the same flavor.

I left and then my brother Tom left the year after me. My father moved out with my sister Céit in Ballydavid. We got rid of everything we had the sheep, whatever everything we had. That was the end of it.

(Did they move out before the official evacuation?) Yes in '51, they come back to Springfield.

I stayed with my Uncle. On Moorin Street and my Aunt. It took me 7 days to come over here. I came over on the Georgia, big boat out of Cork. And I had a few friends of mine who were back here on vacation, Mrs. Skaheen, Mrs. Crohan, Mrs. Kehoe. They were from Mystic street off of Carew Street, we had a lot of fun with them.

Coming to Canada first. And then we all coming down to New York. And it was late at night—it was after 5 o’clock. They wouldn’t let us land because it was too late. The tugs wouldn’t take the boat in, you know? Because they'd have double time or time and a half. And I was looking at that place I said, "America! Holy mackerel! All the lights." I said, “What am I going to do? I’ll be lost forever.”

I’m here on 70 Boylon Street since 1953, and I never stopped working and I didn’t leave my wife yet! She is still with me.

Go raibh míle maith agat go léir. Tóg go bragh bog é. Take it nice and easy.

ROXANNE’S NOTE: It was early 2008 — early days in phone video recording—little regard for portrait vs. landscape. Fixing these is beyond my edited abilities. These are archival only.