Caroline Rice

walkerflsue:

There are a number of Ballyclare townlands in Ireland. The most prominent is the town in Co. Antrim  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballyclare

Was your Caroline from Co. Antrim?

You likely know that civil registration of births started in 1864. I searched on the free site www.irishgenealogy.ie and there was a May 1864 civil brith record for a Caroline Rice in Co. Tipperary. The parents names were different than the names you provided so I assume this is a different Caroline.

Prior to 1864, we rely on available church records. Do you know the religious denomination of the Rice family? I did not find a record on the subscription site Roots Ireland using the parents names provided.

Roger McDonnell

walkerflsue:

I tried another subscription site (FindMyPast.ie) and did not find a record for your Caroline Rice. In looking at the Roots Ireland list of RC parishes in Co. Antrim on their database most of them have records starting well before 1864. There are about thirteen parishes where Roots Ireland does not have baptismal records or the records start after 1864.  Likely your Caroline was baptized in one of those parishes. Civil registration of births started in 1864 but the "takeup" rate initially was well less than 100% as people got use to the bureaucratic process so if Caroline was born in 1864 perhaps her parents did not get around to registering the birth.

Roger