Family secrets

John Doe1

I just learned from my mother tonight that both my grandad and great-grandad were high up members in the old IRA in donegal. My great granda was a pretty wealthy farmer and stored large quantities of artillery for them in his house. One night the black and tans were coming for him, when his neighbour and friend a protestant farmer warned him and he got away to safety.

Funny thing is my mother married a protestant and my granda apparently called my father an orange bastard and refused to attend the wedding. Another interesting thing is I found out my best friend is a the great grandson of the farmer who warned my great grandad.:D

Anyhoo ever had any big revelations told to you that you never would have guessed?

Local-womanizer

My family have a lot of secrets,I dunno where to start tbh.

We keep trying to get my Dad to write a book about his family, It would have to be filed under fiction though because nobody would believe the shite that happened!

Colilfc

My dad is the Batman.

halpin17

It was revealed to me after 16 years of living in smallville that I was actually born on krypton and was sent to earth by my parents to save my life! And I can fly

Bobby Baccala

My da has voldemort on the back of his head.

Sticky_Fingers

Colilfc wrote: »

My dad is the Batman.

That makes me you grandfather. Don't tell Bruce though, he'll only be upset that his life is based on a lie

hondasam

I'm adopted, I think my uncle and aunt are my parents and they are brother and sister.

DjFlin

John Doe1 wrote: »

I just learned from my mother tonight that both my grandad and great-grandad were high up members in the old IRA in donegal. My great granda was a pretty wealthy farmer and stored large quantities of artillery for them in his house. One night the black and tans were coming for him, when his neighbour and friend a protestant farmer warned him and he got away to safety.

Funny thing is I dont have a family secret anymore because I just told the entire internet.

FYP...

mackg

hondasam wrote: »

I'm adopted, I think my uncle and aunt are my parents and they are brother and sister.

:eek:

Cill Dara Abu

I have no willy

sgb

OP you have a lot of issues get a shrink quick

John Doe1

sgb wrote: »

OP you have a lot of issues get a shrink quick

Qué?

Sticky_Fingers

John Doe1 wrote: »

Qué?

Nah don't bother, I think you can skip to the front of the emotional freakshow

Delancey

Honestly , if every person who claimed to have had relatives in the Old IRA was telling the truth then the IRA would have numbered in the hundreds of thousands !!
First time I've ever heard of them using artillery as well.

Son Of A Vidic

Delancey wrote: »

Honestly , if every person who claimed to have had relatives in the Old IRA was telling the truth then the IRA would have numbered in the hundreds of thousands !!
First time I've ever heard of them using artillery as well.

I was just thinking the same thing myself. The IRA used time/fused mines ect, but artillery pieces were not a practical option for flying columns or mobile guerrilla warfare.

OutlawPete

My real parents left me in the hospital and took a 'pretty' baby instead.

They were caught getting on a ferry and have never forgiven me since.

mikemac

Ah the family were in the IRA OP?
Just like there were ten thousand men claiming to be in the GPO.

Anyway family secret.
The grandad was a smuggler so I was told, I was so impressed, wow :cool:
When I was a child and hearing smuggler I was imagining nights on the beaches and hiding in caves

It was a lot less glamorous, used to hoard items like tea and flog them on the black market during the Emergency. Got a conviction too

Disappointed

3rdDegree

hondasam wrote: »

I'm adopted, I think my uncle and aunt are my parents and they are brother and sister.

Tipperary?
If so, nothing unusual with that.

Where To

mikemac wrote: »

Ah the family were in the IRA OP?
Just like there were ten thousand men claiming to be in the GPO.

Not to mention the thousands that bought their tickets for the titanic and missed the boat

3rdDegree

My parents were so horrified with my appearance and deformities, that they took me and my crib and dumped it into an old underground lake where an abandoned circus used to be. I was raised by penguins. I don't like to talk about it much.

Oh, and my sister is left handed. The threw her into a mental asylum when that was discovered.

Apart from that, we don't have any other secrets.

TheUsual

I am my own father.
Stupid "Back to the Future" movies.

x_Ellie_x

Secret No.1:
My dad's mother's father's family used to be really wealthy. We didn't know that they were until we looked up the 1901 census when it came out online. They had a huge farm in Galway (the farm is still in the family but its a LOT smaller now), and they employed half a dozen servants and lived in a this big manor house (my family don't live in it anymore. The house is part of their neighbours farm now). Sometime between 1901 and 1911 they lost the house and all their money somehow. It's a big mystery.



Secret No.2:
Where are my grandfather's (dad's dad) sisters and brothers?

My grandfather was 3 years old when his father died. Soon afterwards, the Catholic Church came and took my grandfather and his 7 siblings away from their mother. Apparently being a single mother was frowned upon in those days even if you were a widow. :mad: My grandfather never saw his mother again. All his brothers and sisters were sent to different orphanages so he lost touch with them too.

My grandfather has been searching for them his whole life. He's 84 now and has only managed to find 3 of the 7; an older sister in Wexford, an older brother in Cork, and his youngest sister who was sent to New York to be adopted. We think 2 of his brothers were sent to Australia. My aunts wrote to all the people with our surname in Melbourne (the city they were sent to) looking for them but we had no luck.

Dionysus

More to the point if you really had IRA grandparents, it would hardly be something that one keeps as a "secret".

For instance, before Michael D Higgins ever joined Fianna Fáil-The Republican Party, his father had been sentenced to death for IRA activity. It wasn't something Michael D. was prone to hiding while carving out a political career for himself as a radical. Likewise, people are well aware of the roles played by Ruairí Quinn's father, Malachí and his father's brothers Pádraig Ó Cuinn and Seán - all of whom were well-known anti-Treaty IRA figures in South Down, with Seán being killed towards the end of the Civil War.

RichieC

I'm adopted and my parents hated me for it

Dudess

My Nana's family genuinely were old 'Ra but it isn't a secret.

Dionysus

KaiserMc wrote: »

My gran aunt was a member of the INLA ,she done time for hoarding guns, an exceptionally intelligent woman who was writing a book on her experiences with the help of another woman from the North.This Northern woman was shot dead before the book was finished , although the book is completed, part of the family have buried the book and refuse to publish or let others of us in the family read the said book.
(my Gran Aunt died in her ninties and donated her body to science, we had to wait a number of years to bury her which was done with full military honour)

The INLA was founded on 8 December 1974. Just how old was your gran aunt when she joined them and spent time in prison?

brummytom

Yeah my family use the old 'Uncle Paddy was in the RA, he couldn't come to England else he'd be arrested' line too.

My granddad was English, apparently he was hated by my nan's family (despite him identifying himself as Irish). Stupid really, oh and I'm very drunk.

Son Of A Vidic

Dionysus wrote: »

The INLA was founded on 8 December 1974. Just how old was your gran aunt when she joined them and spent time in prison?

Indeed and they became the most fragmented, divisive and criminally connected of all the armed Republican groups.

KaiserMc wrote: »

My gran aunt was a member of the INLA

So which INLA was she a member of?

longshanks

I have a mutant, psychic siamese twin who pops out of my belly every now and again. He does this to give information and advice to the resistance, in order to help them win the battle for Mars.

John Doe1

Delancey wrote: »

Honestly , if every person who claimed to have had relatives in the Old IRA was telling the truth then the IRA would have numbered in the hundreds of thousands !!
First time I've ever heard of them using artillery as well.

Sorry i meant ammunition, my bad:cool:

Chuck Stone

I'm drunk and fighting all sorts of battles for Oireland in my head. Does that count?

longshanks

Years ago I worked a field (that I rented) from a rocky barren patch into a fertile and productive plot from which I could make a decent living. However the woman who owned this field decided to auction it off. This was my field. I killed a yank who had the cheek to bid for it (hit him with me shtick I did). Keeps me awake at night so it does.

haydar

My family used to have a big secret until my father/uncle josef was caught.

http://www.eurocriticsmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/fritzl-300x276.jpg

OneArt

I didn't think the IRA thing was a secret really. My great granddad was in the old IRA and everyone knew.

I mean he's in a book and everything...

mattjack

My grandfather was caught trapping goldfinch's ...the shame.

phasers

i'm fairly sure that my sister is actually my half-sister, seeing as my Mam and Dad didn't get together until she was 7. The dates have just never made sense. I've never queried it though, I don't think it matters all that much.

Capt'n Midnight

Sticky_Fingers wrote: »

That makes me you grandfather. Don't tell Bruce though, he'll only be upset that his life is based on a lie

you're a joker

Batman has no father !

Elliemental

My dear old granny, the one in the rocking chair with the pissy smelling shawl wrapped around her shoulders and the blue rinse, once had a scandalous affair. An affair that resulted in my youngest uncle. See, we were all young once!
OK so this was my families worst kept secret. It's just that I always thought it was a joke. It wasn't until a few years following her death that they told me it was true.

Poor Uncle Tom

Elliemental wrote: »

My dear old granny, the one in the rocking chair with the pissy smelling shawl wrapped around her shoulders and the blue rinse, once had a scandalous affair. An affair that resulted in my youngest uncle. See, we were all young once!
OK so this was my families worst kept secret. It's just that I always thought it was a joke. It wasn't until a few years following her death that they told me it was true.

Isn't it about time you took her out of the rocking chair?

stoneill

Dammit - just found out than none of my grandads were in the old IRA.
Stupid family secrets.

Capt'n Midnight

Poor Uncle Tom wrote: »

Isn't it about time you took her out of the rocking chair?

No that's the way they do things at the Bates Motel.

Poor Uncle Tom

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

No that's the way they do things at the Bates Motel.

In your scenario who plays Master Bates?.........:p

Capt'n Midnight

Poor Uncle Tom wrote: »

In your scenario who plays Master Bates?.........:p

Anthony Perkins.

Poor Uncle Tom

Conventional and straight laced, I see.....hmmmm....

kumate_champ07

It's big.

hondasam

mackg wrote: »

:eek:

you do realise I was messing, don't you:D

mikom

I'll tell you something that nobody knows about my Joey.

Wherever he went, or wherever he played, he always sent me a postcard.

longshanks

I'm my own father, my mothers a virgin, I can do tricks with fish and bread, and loads of people follow my every word (although different people interpret those words in different ways, leading to strife). Shhhh

Da Shins Kelly

Didn't think the IRA thing was really that big a deal. My Dad's side of our family is very immersed in IRA stuff, and not just old IRA, but the IRA that it's not OK to be a part of, apparently.

4zn76tysfajdxp

I'm phasers' sister's father.

Solnskaya

my wifes grandad was the man who decided wether you were a spoofer or not when it came to membership of the Old IRA:cool: And wether you received a pension or not as a result. And not that many pensions were authorised....