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In the early 1800's, Peter Mythen and his wife Elizabeth built a small 2 bed-roomed marl farm house on the outskirts of Raheenduff. They had two children, a girl named Ellen, born 1857 and boy named John, born in 1870. In 1895 aged 25, John married Mary and two years later baby Maggie was born, the first of many children. They had 11 children in all, but lost 3 at birth. Lizzie born in 1899 and then twins Peter and Andrew were born in 1901. Unfortunately Andrew passed on . Patrick was born in |
1901, Nellie was born in 1904, John was born in 1906 (he became known as Jack), Nannie born in 1909 (she became known as Minnie), and finally Alice was born New Year's day 1911. In 1913 damp got to the small marl house and it started to sink, so they constructed a new larger farm house 200 feet away. Peter and Ellen remained in the old house for a couple years, whilst John and Mary made home in the new building. All the children attended Oulart School. Within a |
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few years, Peter passed away, just before Lizzy left Raheenduff to follow her destiny and become a Nun. She joined a Missionary in South Africa at Port Elizabeth. John and Mary died in the 1930's leaving the children, now grown up, to run the farm. Minnie married Robert Wafer and left the farm to become a farmer's wife in Ballycanew and Jack married Kitty in 1957, then moved to Bray, near Dublin where they had a daughter named Mary. At the beginning of the Second World War, Alice left |
| the Repuplic of Ireland to take up nursing in London, where she met Frederick Potts and got married. This left Patrick, Peter and Nellie to carry out the farming at Raheenduff. Fred and Alice (now Potts) had four children, Mary, John, David and Helen. They set up base in the south east corner of Wales. John Married Jennie Dooley and Mary married Malcolm Montgomery. David married Margaret Maggs, and in the July of 1967 they had a boy called Andrew, which is me. In 1970 my sister Elaine |
arrived. My first visit to the farm was in the spring of 1968, when Grandma
Alice, Grandad Fred, Mum, Dad, Aunt Helen and me all crammed into Grandad Fred's Triumph and set off from
Newport in South East Wales. I don't remember my first visit to the farm, but I vividly recollect my visit
in 1974 with mum, dad and my sister. We met up with Uncle Johns family at the farmhouse and here are some
photos of the visit which was to be the last time we stayed at the farmhouse.
In 1974, the farm became too much work for Peter, Patrick and Nellie. Hence they had a bungalow built a
few hundred yards east of Raheenduff Crossroads and sold the farm lock, stock and barrel. Within their
first year of living at the bungalow, Peter became ill and died in the October of 1975. The following
week, Dad, Mum, Elaine and myself set sail from Fishguard, aboard the Sealink car ferry "MV Avalon", for a
fortnights holiday. We were hoping to see everyone, but Peter passed away a couple days prior to our
arrival, and we arrived just after the funeral. Here are a few photos of our 1975 visit.
In 1981 most of the Raheenduff residents purchased aerial shots of their patches and below is a shrunken version of Mountain View. We visited the derelict old farm on our 1981 visit to Raheenduff. 
In the October of 1987 we stayed in Auntie Minnie's House in Gorey (pictured below on the right), whilst
she stayed with her brother and sister at Mountain View bungalow in Raheenduff. We spent the days in
Raheenduff and only went to Gorey to sleep. Dad and I put up a UHF TV aerial on the bungalow, pointing
towards Wales, to receive the UK channels, as Nellie had a craving for Coronation Street and Eastenders.
Uncle Pat always wanted a doorbell, so we installed a ding dong whilst we had our tools with us.
Again in the Summer of 1988, we trundled across the Irish sea for a week and stayed at Auntie Minnie's house. Here are a few photographs of us all together at Raheenduff. 
Uncle Pat at the age of 87, suddenly became ill and died in June 1989. The following year Auntie Nellie was taken ill and died in the August of 1990, aged 85. This would mark the end of Mountain View bungalow and the last of Mythen's living in Raheenduff. The Bungalow was sold to the Cooneys. In Newport, Grandad Fred became ill and slowly deteriorated until he passed away in the October of 1996. Minnie continued to live a healthy life in Esmonde Street, Gorey, until she peacefully passed away in 1997 aged 89 and was buried just outside Courtown. This just left my Grandmother Alice as the last Mythen, who reached a good age of 92 before passing away one morning in November 2003. Unfortunately my dad, David Potts, passed away November 20th 2009, aged 64, after a year long battle against lung cancer. God rest the Mythen souls. 
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