Patrick Joseph (PJ) Medlar
Click on any image for a larger version
I have recently published an article on Patrick (PJ) Medlar in the Dublin Historical Record (DHR).
Patrick was married to my granny's sister, so I suppose he was a grand-uncle by marriage (or maybe a brother in law twice removed).
The article relates details and stories about the Medlar family which I have sussed out over more than a decade researching my family history.
I never met Patrick but his daughter Mai (a first cousin of my mother's and my godmother) was a lifelong contact and in the latter years of her life she told me titbits about the family which I followed through with some serious research.
In recent years, Mai's brother Paddy has been feeding me documents, artifacts and photos which have added immeasurably to my knowledge of the family. He gave me another lot the other day and they add some interesting angles to some of the information I had included in the article. So I thought it might be an idea to reproduce some of them here with comments.
The photo above is of a younger PJ than I had seen to date. It was very badly torn into two pieces. What you see above has undergone some degree of restoration.
The DHR article is available on my website (with the kind permission of the editor).
This is a scan of a (not too professional) studio photo of a framed address. There was a custom in those days (here May 1911) of organisations or groups of supporters drawing up an address to an honoured person to be presented on a specific occasion. Parnell, for example, was a multiple recipient of such effusions.
The one above was presented to PJ on the occasion of his marriage to Tess Burgess (my granny's sister) in May 1911. A few features caught my eye. It is from the Ancient Order of Hibernians.
And it contains interesting photos of the couple (?), PJ with his sash and all.
The text is, for the most part what you might expect, but it contains the following interesting reference:
When we look back through the many successful years of your Presidency we cannot but recognise the sincere regard you always evinced for every members welfare who came in contact with you, and which has made you a host of friends, and endeared you to all.So what was he president of? The local branch or the Order nationally. I'll have to follow this up at some stage, but if any reader has a view, comments are open below.
I mentioned in the article that his daughter Nell died of TB in 1929. She was sixteen years of age. TB was a scourge of the land at this period and in many cases attempts were made to hide the cause of death as there was huge stigma attached to it.
The receipt above is from Mount Jerome for the burial fee. Nell was buried in a newly opened grave which had not yet been purchased by the family.
The manuscript annotation in the top left corner is interesting. It says Massey the name of a rival funeral undertaker. It may be that in times of such grief, the funeral is outsourced, even by an undertaker himself.
This looks like the grave was bought the following year by Nell's mother Tess. As I said, TB was indeed a scourge and Nell was followed by her mother, who also died of TB, some five years later.
The third and final occupant, so far, of the four person grave, is PJ himself, who died in 1949.
It is interesting that the undertaker here is Claffey & Son. PJ had been in partnership with Charles Claffey from 1916 to 1927, when they presumably fell out. Claffey's business now appears to be in the hands of the son and whatever rift there had been had presumably been healed.
There are a few morsels of information resulting from the partnership which I did not mention in the article.
My godmothe Mai was born in the Usher's Island premises which had been and clearly remained at the Claffey end of the business.
Also, when I started in Coláiste Mhuire, in secondary school, there was a boy in my class called Paddy Carberry. It turned out my mother knew his mother. Mary Carberry had been born Mary Claffey.
And if you look carefully at the receipt you'll see that the odd 17/8d. was knocked off the bill. Full reconciliation or what?
This is a receipt for the funeral of Christopher Hanlon in 1915. I don't know why it was in PJ's papers.
Note, the line Late of A. O'NEILL & SON. The previous year, 1914, PJ had been living at 120 James's Street where his son John had been born. This was the premises of O'Neill's undertakers. I knew he had been living there, but it is clear from this document that he had been apprenticed to O'Neill. And now, by 1915 he had his own premises at 48 James's Street.
And 6/6d. for the habit. I wonder what sort of a habit that was? I know my granny was buried in a Third Order habit but I don't know if that was negotiated through the undertaker or if she already had it from the Franciscans.
The only other thing to note about this and previous receipts is the official stamp. I remember this practice from my own youth. I'm not sure if it made the receipt more legal but it was certainly a source of revenue for the government.
By 1924 we have the Medlar and Claffey partnership, with just the two addresses 48 James's Street and 17 Ushers Island. I'd better not leave James Joyce out of this; his short story The Dead in Dubliners is set only two doors away at 15 Ushers Island. That house is still there but the old undertakers has given way to flats (sorry apartments).
Note the more expensive habit than in the previous document. And don't ignore the glaring misprint in the name.
The dates in this document suggest a deposit may have been paid in February 1922 and the balance in February 1924, or maybe they just got their dates mixed up.
As mentioned in the article, PJ was a City Councillor during 1920/24 and 1930/42. I went through the Corporation minutes and reports for these years in DCLA in Pearse St. and fine handsomely bound volumes they are.
What I didn't realise was that Councillors, or was it only Aldermen, got personally inscribed copies of the volumes. This is PJ's copy
And this is just a close up of the embossment.
I love Ó Medlar.
I knew all about the Medlar Bridge references in this period. I also knew that PJ had been briefly suspended from the Council and co-opted back shortly afterwards. But I had no idea why and that did bug me.
Click on image for a readable version
Then along comes Paddy with the above volume for 1933 with page 317 marked, where all is apparently revealed.
I'm not sure about this on reflection though. Initially when I saw this entry I thought the mystery was solved. I thought PJ's simultaneous membership of the Council and the Asistance Board might have been a conflict of interest and that he was being suspended from the one because of his membership of the other. Now I wonder if the text means he was being suspended from both for some other reason. Anyway, it can't have been too serious as he was coopted back onto the Council some months later.
I must have missed this reference in my original extensive trawl of Corpo reports. To be fair to myself, it's not in the index/contents of the report and these reports had not been digitised at the time (and I don't think they are yet).
I also mentioned in the article that PJ had gone into the estate agent business. I had not known the name under which he was trading. It brings a smile to family members and if you look closely you'll see why.
This is a photo of PJ's wife Tess and their daughter Mai. I included a copy in the article but that was taken from a photo of a small photo on Mai's mantlepiece in Iveagh Trust in Patrick Street. Paddy turned up with a very clear monster copy and this is a detail from that.
Many thanks to Paddy for all these documents and for all the material he has supplied me with over the last decade or so.
Finally, a photo of PJ during (I think) his alderman period. Again, I had a version of this in the article from Mai's mantlepiece but Paddy's version is better.
