Derrinlough House

Derrinlough, near Birr in Co. Offaly, was the home of the Bulfin family. Offaly Archives records that William Bulfin was born at Derrinlough; the sources give his birth year as 1861, 1862, 1863 or 1864. He went to Argentina in the early 1880s (1884 by the Offaly History blog) to work as a gaucho, met his wife Annie O'Rourke on John Dowling's ranch, and rose from contributor to editor and owner of The Southern Cross, writing as "Che Buono". Offaly Archives says he returned to Derrinlough in 1902; other accounts, seen only in search summaries, give 1909 or 1910. He published Rambles in Eirinn in 1907 and died at Derrinlough House on 1 February 1910.

His son Eamon, born in Buenos Aires in 1892, was sent to Patrick Pearse's school St Enda's and raised the "Irish Republic" flag over the GPO in Easter Week 1916. Condemned to death and reprieved, he was interned at Frongoch in Wales and deported to Buenos Aires in 1917, where in 1919 he became the Irish Republic's first representative in Argentina. Edmundo Murray says he returned to Derrinlough in 1922; Offaly Archives gives 1923. He had been elected chairman of the Offaly county council in his absence in 1920, and he died in 1968.

Offaly's share of the emigration was small: McKenna's sending district took in only a small part of the north of the county. The research says nothing about whether the house survives or can be visited; it is described only as the family home.