Biden explores family history in penultimate stop of Irish visit

US president Joe Biden spent more than an hour on Friday evening at a heritage centre in north Mayo learning more about his Blewitt family roots in north Mayo, where he was presented with a 200-year-old brick handmade made by one of his direct forbears around the 1820s.

On the penultimate leg of his trip to Co Mayo, in advance of Friday night’s public speech in Ballina, President Biden visited the North Mayo Heritage Centre on the Enniscoe estate near Crossmolina.

The centre has earned a reputation for its genealogical research on the diaspora from north Mayo, and has access to more than 1.2 million records.

The president arrived by helicopter from Castlebar after 6.30pm. He was accompanied during the visit by former taoiseach Enda Kenny and Mr Kenny’s wife, Fionnuala.

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In the heritage centre, Mr Biden met historian Sinéad McCoole, who showed him three artefacts from the Jackie Clarke Museum in Ballina, including the cockade which Theobald Wolfe Tone wore on his hat at the time of his capture by the British in 1798.

He also spoke to local historian and author Brendan Walsh about the history of north Mayo, the Irish-American connections and the background of the Blewitt family.

After spending 20 minutes in the centre, the president, his sister Valerie and his son Hunter Biden walked through the walled gardens and the woods of the Enniscoe estate.

In the walled garden he met former Fine Gael senator and councillor Ernie Caffrey, whose shop and gallery is located on the site of the Blewitt ancestral home.

Mr Caffrey and his daughter Miriam presented the president with a brick from the cottage where President Biden’s forebear Edward Blewitt once lived. The president, on hearing the brick was 200 years old, said it was “incredible”.

Mr Blewitt, who is in his 80s, said the president was delighted to receive the memento.

“We have a gift shop and a gallery,” he said afterwards. “Our family has been there for over 100 years.

“I extracted three bricks from the original fireplace and I presented one of them today to President Biden. He was delighted with it. He thanked me and he had a read of [the inscription] He made a few comments such as ‘amazing’.”

Edward Blewitt was a brick manufacturer who supplied 27,000 bricks to the building of St Muredach’s Cathedral in Ballina in 1828.

He lived in a cottage where Mr Caffrey’s shop is located. The only remaining part of the cottage was the fireplace, which contained the yellow-hued bricks.

In the cathedral’s minute book for 1928 it is noted that Mr Bluid was paid £21 for the bricks. They were used for the pillars in the nave of the cathedral to hold the roof.

Speaking after Mr Biden had spoken to him, Mr Caffrey said the minutes had spelled the Blewitt name phonetically, as ‘Bluit’.

He said he was very honoured to meet the president, even though it involved waiting for him outdoors for several hours on a cool April day with periodic showers.

“It was worth getting frozen for a few hours. We will thaw out now,” he said.

As President Biden and his entourage walked through the garden towards the centre, a group of young musicians from Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann played a selection of tunes including the slow air Planxty Brabazon; a barn dance, If There Weren’t Any Women in the World; and three reels including Paddy Mills Fancy and The Maids of Castlebar.

The musicians were: Conor Maheady (flute), David Calleary (uilleann pipes), Aileen Bourke (concertina), Alannah Thornberg (harp) and Caoimhe Kearns (fiddle).

The president met historian Sinéad McCoole, who described three artefacts from the Jackie Clarke collection.

The president concluded the public part of his visit to the Enniscoe estate by viewing a mural depicting him delivering a public speech in Ballina.