City Of Cork

Source

A reference to a Power in Ireland:

The present Earl of Clancarty claims descent from Ellena McCarthy, daughter of Cormac Og, Lord Muskerry, who died in 1640, and who was married to David Power his ancestor. 

Le Poers (Powers)

From The Irishman in Canada (1877):

...we owe to the Normans the Clanrickards, the Butlers, the Le Poers (Powers), and many others who came afterwards....

Were my Powers ancestors originally Normans?  At my request, my brother submitted his DNA for genealogical purposes.  A partial explanation of the results:

Here are the results of my brother Dan's POWERS DNA test (37 markers).  Dan's results are most closely linked to...[brothers] both born in Ireland... .

Speculation about our Powers line is piggybacked on the research of  the Irish Power brothers:

"I think that all Waterford Powers go back to Blackborough, Devon, England, and to one of the six persons by name 'le Poher' who came as part of the Norman Invasion. They were the four brothers - Sir Robert, Sir Roger, Simon and William - and their two cousins, Henry and John. The four brothers were sons of Bartholomew, Lord of Blackborough." [It is believed that their line goes back to William].  

The Gaelic Songs

A book of Gaelic Songs that are in Gaelic!  I picked the one below because of the text in English; "Hail to the Chief."

In reissuing the songs of the late Dr. [John] MacLachlan (1804-1874)...[is] a desire to give their countrymen, in a handy form a measure of the pure mother tongue... .  Dr. Clerk, Kilmaillie says "as to his poetical powers and his exquisite ear for rhythm, there need be no reticence; he was a poet and a very sweet singer." 

Source

Annraoi de Paor (Gaelic for the surname Power) and my brother had an exact Y-DNA match at the 25 marker!  He lives in Ireland and is steeped in the Gaelic language and culture.  I thought of him when I found this book.

We (Mr. de Paor and his brother, Mr. Con Power) corresponded for quite a while (then discovered that the DNA deviated and while still a match at the 37 marker, was not as close as originally thought).

Irish Perception

The Irishman in Canada was written in 1877; my Irish Powers family was living in Canada then.  Michael and Mary (McGovern) Powers were born in Ireland (1801 and 1812 respectively) and moved to Canada circa 1834. What was their perception of their ethnicity?  Was it different for their son John who was born in Canada*?

"...as somebody has said whenever an Irishman is to be roasted another is always at hand to turn the spit.

'My grandmother,' says the Earl of Beaconsfield, 'the beautiful daughter of a family who had suffered much from persecution had imbibed that dislike for her race which the vain are apt to adopt when they find they are born to public contempt.  The indignant feeling which should be reserved for the persecutor in the mortification of their disturbed sensibility is too often visited on the victim.'"

"Something like this process has taken place in the minds of Irishmen of a certain class.  But let any Irishman who reads these lines ponder what I say. You can never lose your own respect and keep the respect of others; you can never be happy and dress yourself solely in the glass of other men's approval--you may as well seek to fly from your shadow as to escape from your nationality. If you find any men mistaken or low down in type or in popular esteem, it is your duty to raise them, especially if they have on you national or family claims... ."

John and Mary Agnes (Kennedy) Powers

Whether or not they embraced their ethnicity is something I cannot answer.  The "Irish" identity was diluted; John Powers married Mary Agnes Kennedy (perhaps of Scots or English heritage).  Their son, William, married Addie More, whose father was native born Scots and whose mother was a Mayflower descendant.  My grandfather Ralph, son of William and Addie, married Beatrice Cameron, whose ethnicity was Scots except for one Irish interloper into those clannish Camerons.  

*According to this piece of Powers family lore, John was born in Ireland instead of Canada, which would strengthen rather than diminish our "Irish-ness."

Tainter Genealogy

From History And Genealogy Of The Descendants Of Joseph Taynter:

33. Ada R. Tainter (D. Benjamin Tainter4, Loren Tainter3, Jonathan Tainter2, Benjamin Tainter1) was born Jul 1864 in Lapeer Co., Michigan. She married Alec Shepard 20 Oct 1887 in Lapeer Co., Michigan, son of Alexander P. Shepard and Catherine Snyder. 

Alec Shepard's sister, Emily, married William Smith Allen.  Their son, William Roy Allen, married my great-aunt, Addie Mae Powers, making their son, Marion George Allen, my father's cousin.