Home ⋅ Published Books ⋅ In the Clouds of the Night: From southern Catholics to Northern Protestants, the story of my missing cousins

In the Clouds of the Night: From southern Catholics to Northern Protestants, the story of my missing cousins Share:

By: Donal Winters
Publisher: Orla Kelly Publishing
Published: May 2025
Pages: 310
Categories: Biography, History, Non-Fiction
Language: English
On sale at: amzn.to
ISBN-13: 9781917728096

In the Clouds of the Night,by Donal Winters from Bornacoola, tells the powerful and heart-wrenching true story of a family’s separation and survival in 1939 Ireland, torn apart by circumstance and time. The book follows the lives of the children of a mixed marriage between Catholic Ciss Beirne and her Protestant husband Thomas Pakenham in 1920s Ireland. The book is dedicated to Donal’s grandaunt, Kate Beirne (née Winters), who grew up on the same farm as Donal. Kate’s only daughter, Ciss, was one of ten children, and she tragically lost Ciss, whose children also disappeared from her life. Following Ciss's death after the birth of their fourth child, Thomas Pakenham and his four young children fled Dublin in the early hours of March 4, 1939. He packed the car and disappeared, taking his children with him to Northern Ireland, leaving no word behind. Kate went to her grave never knowing what happened to her grandchildren, having suffered the unimaginable loss of another four of her family of ten.

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