7 Jul 2024, Sunday
7 Jul 2024, Sunday
Prioritized Daily Task
Church-Dublin—Fast Sunday
The Willows
Dublin 11
DUBLIN D11 YX68 Ireland
10:00 am - Bishop Michael Meehan of Finglas Ward Dublin Stake is located on Finglas Rd. across from Glasnevin Cementary
Rae Lynn called and family reunion in Newport Beach Jul 8-13
(parts of email copied from earlier journals) My name is James Leonard McAlpin. I was in Dublin 11 years (2009) ago and met a Sister Catherine Lamb at the Glasnevin Building who is a convert and understood much about the Early Irish Law, Brecon Law, and was very helpful. I think she worked in the Family History Center.
I need her or someone else’s help. I do not expect them to donate their time and will pay them. I need a copy of a deed at Register of Deed Office on Henrietta Street. The deed transfers from Robert McColpin (the name today is McAlpin) and his wife Janet to a person named, McKell. The deed is for the property on Mill Street that backs up to Mill Creek in Belfast and is dated about 1728. The property is next door to a tannery owned by John McAlpin. I assume John and Robert were brothers. I think the father’s name may have been John.
If possible I hope to find some primary information to tie my 4th great-grandfather, Alexander (McColpin) McAlpin, to his parents whom I am now only assuming is Robert and Janet.
8 Mar 2023
Dec. 10, 2009, I went to Dublin, Ireland. I stayed at the Maldron Hotel, it is now the Clayton Hotel Cardiff Lane. I stayed in room 406. The hotel was located on Said Ui Maricin Road (R813) across the Liffey River from the Convention Centre. I got acquainted with Jimmy Carrol one of the owners. He sold the land for the hotel and the company who purchased it provided Jimmy a penthouse with his own private elevator. His main home is a farm in Delgany about 25 miles from Dublin. His wife's name is Miriam and they have 7 children. I did some genealogy research while I was here. I went to several locations and found something very interesting in the Register of Deed Office on Henrietta St, Dublin. Looking through their rolls of index film I found Robert (McColpin) McAlpin and wife, Janet, selling land to McKell on December 2, 1728. The property was located just outside the city gate of Belfast on Mill Street. The property backed up to Mill Creek and was next to a tannery John (McColpin) McAlpin owned. I think John and Robert were brothers and the tannery was first owned by their father, John McColpin. At this time I do not have a primary source connecting Robert and Janet McAlpin connecting them to my 4th g grandfather, Alexander McAlpin. I attended Church on Sunday. There are two ward buildings in Dublin, the stake center and the Glasnevin now the Finglas Ward. I attended the Glasnevin Ward . The bishop's name was Bishop Green. He is a native Irish. I also talked or met Sister Burk who works in the mission office and is from Boise, Idaho, Elder and Sister Burten were from Island Park, ID. The sister that was the most interesting was Sister Catherine Lamb. She was the ward genealogist and worked at the Stake Family History Center. She and her husband are converts from the Catholic faith. He drives a bus and were married in the temple and have 3 children. I told her about my problem connecting Alexander McAlpin who came to America from Ireland. I do not know who his parents were. I found a Robert McAlpin (McColpin) living in Belfast with his wife Janet. She asked me if I knew the names and birth order of Alexander McAlpin's children. I shared with her that Alexander's oldest son was Robert and he had 4 daughters, Janet, Elizabeth Barbary, Sarah Mary and Sarah Temple McColpin. The youngest son, William Alexander McColpin, who was my 3rd g grandfather. Robert Alexander McAlpin, my grandfather, was the oldest son of Thomas Jefferson McAlpin. Sister Lamb told me about an early Irish Law called Brecon Law. It was never written down but was binding as if it were chiseled in stone. A man would name his first son after his father and his daughter after his mother. Even if his father was not honorable and a disgrace, he would still name his son after him but he may take his wife's family name and he and his son be known by his wife's family name from then on.
*****
I don’t think this record has yet been copied by the church. Any information you can find on this family that would help me to connect to my 5 g ancestor, Alexander McAlpin, whose oldest son was named Robert and one of his daughters was named Janet, to Robert and Janet McColpin (if they are actually parents) will be appreciated.
Thank you,
James Leonard McAlpin
My email is lenmcalpin@gmail.com (Leonard, Elain, Nancy, Mary, Catherine, Apple, Leo, Paul, Invest, Nancy @ gmail.com)
Alexander McAlpin was in South Carolina in the 1750s. He died in the 1790s in Georgia.
Respectfully your,
James L. McAlpin
I was up at 7 am; I showered last night, I started my fast yesterday evening, and had my personal prayer. Later when Debbie got up we had prayer together, thanking Heavenly Father for ALL His blessings.
*(Until I was able to see the Robert McCalpin December 2, 1928 deed, I thought his wife was Janet (in the Belfast deed the name is Sarah). I remembered his wife had the surname of one of Alexander McCalpin's daughters mentioned in his 1890 will.)
I walked to Q-park on Marlborough St. a mile from the hotel and got our car. I drove back to the Clayton Hotel and picked Debbie up and drove to the Church at 11 The Willows. We arrived just before the sacrament meeting started. We set behind Phil Green and his wife. (24 Moyclare Park, Baldoyle, Dublin 13) Phil was the bishop 15 years ago when I was here. I asked him about Catherine Lamb. He told me she has passed away but her husband is still living but not doing well. I learned there are two stakes in Ireland, Belfast and Dublin. Brother Tomy O'Connor, also a former bishop, taught the Gospel Doctrine Sunday School class. Another example of how the Lord helps me is I had planned to get Sister Catherine Lamb to read and translate the Old English deed from 2 December 1728 to Modern English. When Brother Phil Green told me she had passed away, I gave up on getting it translated, and Debbie and I met two sisters, L. Julia Arenhardt and Naiara Sadler. They have friends and know people who are very good at translating Old English into Modern English. I sent a picture of the deed to Debbie who was able to send it to them on Whatsapp. I took some pictures before driving back to the parking lot next to our hotel. It was not full today and I parked the car and we came back to our room. Debbie and I studied scriptures, made some phone calls back home to the family, and had prayer before going to bed. We will break our fast in the morning.
I went to the address of the Charles Albert Callis Memorial in Dublin. A stone plaque, with the photo and narrative of the life of Charles A. Callis, sits in St Audoen's Park near the center of Dublin. Elder Callis is the only person born in the Emerald Isle to become a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in this dispensation.
He was born 4 May 1865, in Dublin, Ireland. He became a member of Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, on 12 October 1933 at the age of 68. He Died: 21 January 1947 at the age of 81, in Jacksonville, Florida
One evening after dark two men approached a little boy standing on a bridge in Liverpool, England, and greeted him with smiles and a cheerful hello. The two strangers, guessing that the child was scarcely eight years old and thinking he should not be out so late, offered to walk him home. These gentlemen were Mormon missionaries, and this chance act of kindness brought them to the door of the boy’s mother, a widow who had four children and who was willing to listen to the elders’ message of the restored gospel. [1] The boy, Charles A. Callis, was baptized with the rest of his family, and soon afterward, in 1875, Sister Callis and her children immigrated to Utah. They settled in Davis County and then in Coalville, where young Charles grew to manhood. He had no opportunity for schooling because he labored twelve hours a day in the coal mines for a meager wage in order to support his widowed mother.
Despite his lack of education, a surprising thing happened to “Charlie.” He was elected to represent Summit County in the territorial legislature. A reputation for rugged honesty and his gift of oratory won him still another county appointment—district attorney. With the aid of a prominent lawyer friend, Charles mapped out a course of self-study in law, which he pursued with great discipline, and only eleven months later he passed the bar examination along with many law school graduates. While in the prime of a successful legal career, Brother Callis willingly interrupted his practice to accept a mission call to Wyoming. After spending five months there, he was called on a mission to Europe for three years, serving as president of the Irish Conference in the country where he was born, previous to the family’s move to Liverpool. In 1902 he married Grace E. Pack; they became the parents of eight sons and daughters.
Four years later he and his wife departed for a two-year mission to the southern states, but two years stretched to twenty-eight as this faithful man was chosen president of the mission and remained there until 1934. During this time some four thousand missionaries came under his wise and inspired leadership. He took occasion while in the southern states to pass the South Carolina and Florida bar examinations. Although he had no time to practice law, his status as an accredited attorney gave him access to circles of influence that would otherwise have been closed to him. He used his contact with governors, mayors, and men of prominence to further the gospel cause in the South.
In 1933, while still in the southern states, Elder Callis was called to be an apostle. Even after leaving the mission presidency one year later, he never lost his missionary zeal and always carried tracts with him wherever he went, taking every opportunity to engage nonmembers in religious conversations. His death occurred during the realization of a long-sought-for goal: the organization of the first stake in the South. As a general authority, Brother Callis was assigned to preside over the occasion. Following the historic event, he died quietly in Jacksonville, Florida.
His greatest inspiration in life was the mission and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. He once said, “From my earliest recollections to the present time I have always had an abiding and intense love for my Savior. I cannot read the story of His sufferings and crucifixion without shedding tears.” “Many years ago an elder who served a mission [for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints] in the British Isles said at the end of his labors, “I think my mission has been a failure. I have labored all my days as a missionary here and I have only baptized one dirty little Irish kid. That is all I baptized.” Years later, after his return to his home in Montana, he had a visitor come to his home who asked, “Are you the elder who served a mission in the British Isles in 1873?” “Yes.” Then the man went on, “And do you remember having said that you thought your mission was a failure because you had only baptized one dirty little Irish kid?” He said, “Yes.” The visitor put out his hand and said, “I would like to shake hands with you. My name is Charles A. Callis, of the Council of the Twelve of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I am that dirty little Irish kid that you baptized on your mission.”
From the story about Charles A. Callis, I was awed by how this young, supposedly orphaned, child was able to make such a religious commitment, immigrate to America, and rose among the ranks in church leadership. I was also disturbed from the first time I heard this story that the former missionary would profess failure or claim success based on statistics. Spiritual work is not a sales position. It’s not something that can be tallied. Spiritual work is intangible. The only measurement that would have, should have, counted is that this young boy’s life improved because of this missionary’s service. Somehow, somewhere, this missionary misunderstood. It wasn’t about him at all.
Not only that, when I finally decided I wanted to know a bit more about this Irish boy, I learned that I had it wrong. Charles Albert Callis was born on May 4, 1865, in South Dublin to English parents. This was true. But, when Charles’s father died in Dublin in 1867 at the age of 27, his widowed mother, with four children in tow, moved back to England. It was there on a Liverpool bridge that the missionaries noticed a little boy out after dark and offered to walk him home. It was at this boy’s home that they met Susannah Callis, the boy’s mother. The family was then taught, baptized, and, shortly thereafter, immigrated to Utah. Not quite the orphan I thought, even though the definition of “orphan” is dependent on time and place. To the missionary, this single mother and her children were forgotten or discounted except for “the dirty little Irish kid”—at least the way the story is told.
By age 16, Charles worked in the coal mines of Utah twelve hours a day to help support his family. I wonder if this is where the “dirty” descriptor was acquired.
Note: From this example, there are many lessons to be gleaned about how we tell our family stories and how we listen to the stories written or told we have lived.
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