‘Familial, open and warm feeling’ when meeting distant relatives during trip

‘ This week has meant so much to me and my family, and that’s not hyperbole,’ said Vice President Joe Biden.

Speaking at Carlingford Heritage centre as he accepted the ‘Freedom of Louth’ the Vice President spoke about the ancestry which had brought him to Cooley.

‘In 1849 my great, great grandfather Owen Finnegan set out from his home very near here, down the very tip of the peninsula.

He headed for a new life in the United States of America, but I don’t think he could have known, nor could any of the immigrants like him, what awaited them.’

The Vice President spoke with pride of his Louth ancestor who a year after his arrival in America arranged for his wife Jane and their children to travel over to be with him.

‘He had such hope, courage and resilience, and you know they really are the American story. That’s who we are. We are a nation of immigrants.’

He added that in Cooley the Finnegan’s made their living on the land, but when they reached the US Owen became a shoemaker, and his son Ambrose, who was the Vice President’s great grandfather was listed in the census as ‘a blind fiddler.’

He spoke too of the difficulties faced by immigrants in the era of ‘no Irish need apply’ signs which appeared across America.

‘ They left Ireland, but they never left being Irish. The pride they felt in their homeland, and the family at home was passed down through the generations, down through my family.’

He added that passing down that pride in his Irish ancestry was one of the key reasons why he had taken all of his grandchildren with him on the trip.

‘One of the main reasons I am here with my five grandchildren and my daughter, and my niece is to pass it on to them, so that they can feel it, taste it, and know what it means.’

The reception across the country, from Mayo to Dublin, to Meath and Louth had been ‘incredible’ said Mr. Biden.

‘ This past week has meant so much to me and my family, and that is not hyperbole.’

He also spoke of meeting the distant cousins who shared ancestral roots with, saying it was ‘ a familial, open and warm feeling’ to sit down and share a meal with them.

And as he made his way to the Kilwirra cemetery at Templetown, where many of the Finnegan’s had been buried, he said: ‘ To see where our forebearers were buried, the place near where they were baptised and got married is particularly meaningful for me.’

The Vice President said he had heard many stories growing up about the place of his ancestors birth, a place called Cooley that he knew nothing of.

‘It’s one thing to hear all those stories, but it’s another to come out and see this place. And I’ve found out that all those stories were true!’