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I was born, 1930, in Moy, Co Tyrone -- literally 1,000 yards from the Armagh/Tyrone border -- so that considering the proximity and the relatively rare Laverty name, we may well be related to the 1800s Laverty immigrant. I must say I have never known Lavertys in Armagh, and but two separate Laverty families (no known relationship) in Tyrone. Moy is about 800 population, located on the Blackwater River, close to the southwest corner of Ireland's largest lake, Lough Neagh -- and about 25 miles west of Belfast.
A professional search was done for me about five yrs ago, but they came up with little family detail earlier than about 1850. What they did add is that the Lavertys were, in the 11th/12th Century, the heriditary Speakers of the House of McDonald (or McDonnell -- I don't have access to the file at this time) on the isle of Skye (west coast of Scotland). [Which does not make us "Scots-Irish," incidentally, since the term is an 1840s concoction of historian Geo Bancroft who apparently knew little of the pre-1500s Irish settlements in western Scotland. "Scots-Irish" is a term of bigotry, not genealogy or history -- it suggests that "north" Irish are somehow superior to "southern" Irish, and therefore deserve to be segregated from those "mere" Irish from the south. Sheer nonsense...One of my favorite topics!]
As for recent Laverty emigrants to America not related to the Moy Lavertys (say, since 1900), in 50 years of "looking out" for them, I've found none whatsoever.
Regarding family history: My g/father farmed and trained hunters and jumpers (horses!) just outside Dungannon (a prehistoric site, seat of the ancient O'Neills). His three sons, incl my father, also trained horses. My father sold horses to Americans, incl Andrew Mellon, Sect'y of the US Treasury, Gene Autry (movies), others. He also trained "Master Robert," which later (with a new owner/trainer) won the English Grand National, 1924. My bro, Bob, was captain of the US soccer team in the mid-late 1940s -- playing against seven national teams, incl. Mexico, Israel, Sweden, etc and against Liverpool, at the time the world's #1 club team. We expect Bob (who died in 1956) to be inducted into the US Soccer Hall of Fame later this yr (at Oneonta NY, close to Cooperstown). At Dublin Horse Show, between them, my dad, Bob, and two uncles won over a dozen Championships/Reserve Champ/1st-2nd-3rd prizes - 1910 thru 1950. All three families exported horses worldwide, many to the armies of Europe, Irish hunters being especially sought after. My father, Bernard
and his brother, Robert, became financial victims of the Revolution of 1926 in Greece, so that my father had to sue in the London High Court for recovery of quite a fortune for the 1,700 cavalry mounts they sold to the royal govt. This gov't was overthrown just as the horses arrived in Piraeus, Greece! [Who said the Irish had luck??]
These horses are the subject of a poem ("Dancers at The Moy," by renowned Irish poet, Paul Muldoon, now teaching at Princeton Univ); and the village (and its horses) were the subject of a BBC document-ary about the village ("No Poor Parish," about 1993).
During WWII, the village was "occupied" by very many troops -- English, Scots then Americans (also Belgians and Dutch in the lands surrounding). All these, preparing for invasions of North Africa, and later, Normandy. Four miles west of Moy and three miles south are two of Ireland's great battlefields, Benburb and Yellowford. Seven miles south, Armagh (town), has been the ancient capital of Ulster and scene of many pre-Christian historic events (all well documented in period literature).
Gen. George Patton was in Armagh about 1943 and took to task the young men in his audience (a huge public event in the Mall) for not being in the war...These were the local "crown loyalists" who knew better: Why should the sons of the well-connected loyalists and Anglos go to war when those eager young Yanks would fight it for them! True! [My bro, Hugh, died to save England from their German cousins in WWII; my cousin, Robert (in the RAF) likewise. And for what? Armagh and Tyrone still occupied by the British Army (and hotly contested by a handful of locals, you can be sure!)].
We ought to do an Armagh/Tyrone reunion -- over there or over here!
Charles Laverty 973/694-7792 (Wayne NJ)
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