The Gallaghers of Ballinrobe

Aunt Ann sits with her dog Sam inside and
outside the Champlain Avenue home, where she
and Uncle Tom moved to around 1964.
Aunt Ann talks with Peggy Hoopes at their nephew Owen
Gallagher's 1993 wedding at St. Thomas Church in Wilmington.
With them are Pat Gallagher and Patsy DeAscanis.
then raised her voice slightly to quote Aunt Ann declaring,
“I want to straighten something out. Your mother died in
1975. I was looking at the calendar and the five looked like
a three.” Aunt Ann, as usual, was intent on setting the
record straight.
Years earlier, Aunt Ann and Uncle Tom had been
among the family members gathered at John O’Brien’s
home for the Baptism of one of his children. At some point,
one of his sister Patsy’s children picked up an unusual
ashtray and accidentally dropped it on the terrazzo floor,
where it shattered into pieces. Pat said that when John came
in the room he was furious. She said she knew John had a
temper and figured she would explain that later to her
children, but she was a little embarrassed, with Aunt Ann
and Uncle Tom sitting there. As John fumed, he let
everyone know that he had brought that favorite ashtray
back with him “all the way from Germany.” Patsy had
some trouble recounting the story – because she couldn’t
help laughing – but she gathered herself to tell how Aunt
Ann paused to look around at John’s wife, Cindy, and
Cindy’s family, before asking: “Where did you get it in
Germany, John?” John, who was not always on the same
wavelength with his aunt, looked at Aunt Ann with a little
sparkle in his eye, and said, “I stole it from the bar.” “Aha,”
Aunt Ann said. “You illegitimately got it.”
Patsy said she looked at the story as an insight
into the loyalty Aunt Ann felt for her family in general and
Patsy’s children specifically. Patsy said a box that Aunt Ann
kept included letters from her children when they were
younger, including Julianna, Ann’s god-daughter, but also
Colm and Michael. There was also correspondence from
around the time Father Michael went into the seminary.
Michael was always interested in the family history and
knew there was a cousin who was a priest. He reached out
to him – Father Tom Mullin in New York – but didn’t get a
response. A “sweet” letter in the box showed Aunt Ann had
taken it on her own to contact Father Mullin and remind
him how close the families were and give him “some
admonishing” for not getting back to her nephew.
Thomas Mullin, 64 at the time, was the son of the
former Bridget King, a cousin of the Gallaghers, who
moved from Ballinrobe to America in 1929 and married
Thomas Mullin Sr. Uncles Jim and Tom, probably with
Aunt Ann, attended the son’s ordination in 1965. Father
Mullin responded to Aunt Ann's letter with an apology,
explaining that he had misplaced Michael's letter and could
not get in touch with him. Father, working at the time at a
veterans hospital in Brooklyn, seemed very pleased to hear
from his cousin. “It's nice to know that you knew the King
family from Cornaroya, Ballinrobe,” he wrote. “It was fun
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