I am looking for any information on my great grandfather Michael Bernard O'Connor and his older brother John Thomas who emigrated from Castle Connell Limerick Ireland circa 1866 to 1870. Michael Bernard married Alice Elizabeth O'Donague in South Africa on 26 June 1883. They left their Trading store in Tsitsa's Drift near Tsolo in the Eastern Cape South Africa on 16 May 1887 to join the gold rush to Johannesburg with their son John Henry Joseph and twin girls still in utero, who were born on 28 October 1887, in the new township of Johannesburg. My grandmother Veronica Mary Agnes, was born on 12 June 1889.
Her father never realised his ambition to strike it rich and died on 15 March 1915 in the humble employ as night watchman at the Johannesburg Law Courts. The family narrative is that her parents were swindled out of their claim by the Randlord JB Robinson, but that could just be a rationalisation or myth to make sense of the hardship they endured.
I know that the family joined the rush out of Johannesburg as things headed toward the outbreak of the Anglo Boer war in 1899, and headed back to Pondoland for refuge, only returning some time after Johannesburg was surrendered to the British on 30 May 1900. I dont know when. Did they only return after the war was over? There is plenty written about Johannesburg but I am eager to try and reflect a perspective from the 'bottom up'. Any information, guidance or advice would be greatly valued. Despite my grandmother having mothered 11 children she never wanted to talk about her childhood, perhaps because it was traumatic. She created a fantasy that she was born in Spain of Spanish aristocracy, which was entertaining when I was a child, but I now want to know the truth. Busy writing a book on my ancestral roots in the South African mining industry. Many thanks
