Hi , can anyone help with this place name? Its given as a birthplace on Scottish Census but I haven't been able to establish which county it is in. Possibly a transcription error but the original document is very hard to read. Any insights would be great.
Many thanks.
Marlyn
I don’t know of anywhere like that in Ireland. It has obviously got a bit scrambled. Can you post a scanned copy of the relevant bit of the census so we can have a closer look? Also what are the names of the family, as they may assist in narrowing the search area. Did they marry in Ireland or Scotland? If so, when?
The surnames are Mary Boyd and James Monaghan married in Scotland 1866. She was previously married to a James Kelly. I found a marriage in Rashkarin, Down and Conner on 26 Nov 1853.
James Monaghan appears in the 1851 Ireland census place is Dunnamore.
I'm not sure how to post an image on here
Rasharkin RC parish is in Co. Antrim. It’s just north of Ballymena. The RC parish takes in parts of the civil parishes of Ahoghill, Finvoy, Rasharkin & Newtown Crommelin. Tradition was to marry in the bride’s church so you can probably assume Mary came from that area.
You can use the attached site to search for all the townland names in those 4 parishes. Unfortunately I can’t see anything that resembles Canter Bilanter.
Rasharkin’s RC baptism records only start around 1848 so if that was where she was born, you won’t find Mary’s as she was evidently born long before that.
I see from the 1866 marriage certificate that James Monaghan’s father Michael was still alive. His occupation of schoolteacher should help identify him. You could search the Irish deaths 1866 onwards to see if you can find him. Those for 1878 onwards are viewable free on this site:
https://www.irishgenealogy.ie/en/
I see that Mary Boyd’s father Peter was still alive and was working as a pithead labourer. So presumably he was in Scotland too. His death certificate should give you his parents names.
A small portion of the 1851 census of Rasharkin has survived. I searched it for the Boyd family. There are Boyds there but not this family.
Mary died in 1879 and her father is not marked as deceased ,so I checked after that date but haven't found a death. Maybe it would be worth checking before her death.
Should I look at Tyrone for Michael's death?
The census date says 1841/1851 and his age is 35. Of course I could have the wrong family altogether.
Thank you for your help Elwyn
Yes I would search the death records. If you are going to focus on Tyrone then deaths in that county will have been registered in one of the following:
Armagh city, Castlederg, Clogher, Cookstown, Dungannon, Enniskillen, Gortin, Lowtherstown (sometimes listed as Irvinestown), Omagh & Strabane.
I would also check Co Antrim. The registration towns there are: Ballycastle, Ballymena, Ballymoney, Belfast, Coleraine, Larne, Lisburn & Lurgan. (Ballymena & Ballymoney are the two that cover Rasharkin)
Dunnamore does exist and it is in Tyrone. It’s in the parish of Kildress which falls within the Cookstown civil registration area. Griffiths Valuation for 1859 lists 2 Michael Monaghans there (senior & junior, so probably father & son). Both were apparently farmers though, not schoolmasters.
In the 1901 census there are about 6 Monaghan households in the townland with about 50 people of that name. I did spot 2 school teachers though:
http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Tyrone/Ballynasollus/Dunnamore/1730521/
http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Tyrone/Ballynasollus/Dunnamore/1730531/
Here’s one of the Michaels (he died in 1906):
http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Tyrone/Ballynasollus/Dunnamore/1730534/
Another Michael died in 1892. His death cert describes him as a farmer.
https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/images/deaths_retu…
A third Michael died in Dunnamore in 1891. Again a farmer.
John Monaghan school teacher married Mary Monaghan (same maiden name) in 1892. His father was another John Monaghan, also a school teacher.
So there were 3 Michaels in Dunnamore in the mid 1800s, but none was a school teacher, so far as I can see. What’s the source of your 1851 census extract? If I can have a look at it, I might be able to give it a bit of thought.
Hi hope that I've managed to send that successfully. It's from Ancestry and says it's from details of old age pension records.
Marlyn
Marlyn,
The link to the 1851 census doesn’t work but I found the information in Josephine Masterson’s book on census extracts. That family appears to fit some of your information. There’s a difference of 2 years between Daniel’s age on his marriage certificate and the census but 2 years is not significant in a time when people often didn’t know exactly when they were born.
The 1851 census doesn’t tell us what Brigid's maiden name was though. I had a look at the public trees on Ancestry to see if the family is shown there. There’s a Marlyn Bridges tree which I suspect may be yours. The tree has Ann’s baptism in September 1851, though the parish record it links to is for September 1853. Given that the 1851 census was taken in April 1851, that baptism can’t be the same family because the Ann in the census was 3 months old in April 1851, so born around January 1851. (Catholics in Ireland have always been meticulous in baptizing within a few days of birth and would never leave it 9 months or a couple of years). In addition, the baptism it’s linked to is for a couple where the father was Michael Monaghan and the mother was Bridget Monaghan (ie maiden name Monaghan), not Connolly. So I don’t think it’s the right baptism. Given that there were 3 Michael Monaghans in Dunnamore at the time, my guess is the baptism is for one of the other two couples (I think all 3 were married to women named Bridget so easy to get confused). Nor do I see anything that shows that any of the Michael Monaghans there were married to a Bridget Connolly. Their maiden names appear to have been Monaghan, McEvoy & Loughran.
I searched the Irish baptism records on Ancestry for births to Michael Monaghan & Bridget Connolly (anywhere in Ireland) but without success. That suggests to me that Daniel (and any siblings he may have had) were all born in a parish with no records for around 1842. (Not uncommon). Tracing him will therefore be difficult, unless you find his father’s death certificate in the records post 1866. The death records from 1878 onwards are free to view on the irishgenealogy site but those for 1866 – 1877 are still pay to view. If searching the pay to view records in Northern Ireland use the GRONI site as it’s cheaper and you can see the records straight away, as opposed to having to order them in.
In addition there is the problem that I can’t find any evidence that any of the 3 Michael Monaghans in Dunnamore was a school teacher. All appear to have been farmers. So I don’t think the family in the 1851 census is the right one. (Wrong mother’s maiden name and wrong father’s occupation).
