Irish Immigrants returning home

[MissCreant]

Update

I have just found out that my ancestor did quite well from the Victorian goldfields, and returned back to Ireland in 1900, where he purchased a farm and land in Ballyvaughan.

MC

[RobinBird]

The original query was about returning from Australia and I do not have any info on people who did that.  I have found many - hundreds of people who emigrated to the US and then returned to Ireland. 

Many of the returnees were children sent back to Ireland to be raised by their grandparents.  One of these children was Éamon de Valera.  After many years in Ireland the children got a passport to return to the US.  Several cases of siblings traveling together.

Most of the records I found were for the years 1907-1925 in the documents of the US consulates at Cork, Dublin, Belfast - for example passports applications.  I have extracted the data and published on this website http://sites.google.com/site/irishgleanings/

I am working on more but it will be several more months before I can do an update.  Hope someone finds a person of interest.

[RabbittIre]

Yes I have an assortment of relatives who emigrated and then returned. It was more common from the US and Canada than from Australia or NZ, presumably because of the cost and time issues.  My observations suggest that if you emigrated in the 1700s and early 1800s it was normally a one way journey, but by the late 1800s and early 1900s, the journey times must have been reducing, sailings become more reliable and a bit more comfortable, the fares becoming more affordable presumably reflecting increased prosperity, and I start to see people coming back, sometimes on more than one occasion.

Difficult to pinpoint any single reason. I have one relative whose wife died in the US when he was about 45 and who returned to Ireland shortly afterwards, where he too died soon after. Ill-health and no-one to look after him in the US? Another worked in Canada for 15 years, and made a 3 month visit home in the middle before returning for good around 1918, having made his fortune (not really, but he was perceived as better off by the rest of the family).  Homesick?

The older you are when you emigrate, it seems the harder it is to settle. Then there must have been issues to do with care for elderly parents, or inheriting the family farm and no-one else to run it. Whilst some emigrants obviously did very well when they emigrated, there must have been some who failed and who decided that going back was the answer, assuming they could afford it.


Elwyn

I think what may also have changed was the ability to read, write and keep in touch.
If you couldn't read and write and the people you wanted to contact couldn't read and write, then when you left, you completely disappeared. Sure you could go back, but you wouldn't have even known whether anyone was still alive or there.

By the late 1800s/early 1900s more people could read and write, and it was possible to post a letter and for it to arrive at its destination. Communication took a long time (post), or was extremely expensive (telegraph), but it was possible, and could be both written and read by those wishing to communicate.

Once people were able to stay in touch, even a little, it made it more likely that they would return.

[Billyblue]

My great grandfather Patrick Finn migrated to Australia (forcibly) in 1836.
His parents and younger brother came the same way the next year, all charged with the same crime on the same day.  Some wag suggested it was their way of getting a cheap passage here - they were apparently model prisoners because there was little documentation on them after landing, indeed we still haven't found Jane the mother, since.

Patrick, after he did his time, was cleared to leave the country and went back.  But a few years later we find him charged with some minor misdemeanour and sent out again. He went to VDL for his troubles this time but did his time and moved to New South Wales where he met and married Mary Fisher, an Irish orphan sent on the "Lady Peel"  and they raised a large family (between a few more jail stints for Patrick, mostly for brawling!).

So even in the early 1800s there was apparently quite a bit of cross migration.  People got homesick for their native land even when it had treated them harshly, just as people get homesick today.  What often brings them back is the better weather out here        

Dawn M

[scunscan]

Reading and writing problems were always overcome by getting letterwriters such as school teachers or scholars to do the job often for a fee.The letters in turn were read out by one who could read. People didnt lose contact through illiteracy but more by neglect or carelessness which could be sometimes deliberate if they werent successful in life.