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The townland of Moyglass, in the Parish of Devenish in County Fermanagh is mentioned frequently in historical records going back to the plantation of Ulster in Elizabethan times. Three Spence brothers from came to Ulster from The East coast of Scotland in the Elizabethan plantations as some of the peasant free holders with the Hume Family a prominent plantation undertaker. In the original muster rolls from the 1630s three Spence brothers of Moyglass are listed John, Alexander and James, one with a sword, one with a Pike and one listed as having “no armes”.
The original house, has been added to many times, the original walls are of local sandstone & limestone. In the 1900 census Moyglass was listed as a single storied thatched farm house with outlying cattle sheds. In the first decade of the 20th century the thatch was removed and the house made into a respectable two storied farm house with a slated roof and on the South gable of the house a door connected to the dairy and then the byre with cattle.
The earliest photographs were taken by Sarah Armstrong nee Spence who had run away to marry a boyfriend in Arizona in the 1880’s and came on a return visit in the 1920,s. She had a camera and took pictures which show the two storied house with the family standing outside and a young Monkey Puzzle tree on the lawn to the West. This tree is now about 120 years old , she also refers to the old Chestnut tree that she played in in the 1870’s. That tree is still there and is over 200 years old.
She also kept a diary of her trip from California via Chicago , Niagara to Toronto and Montreal by train and then steam ship to Glasgow; and then to Belfast; and by train to Enniskillen.