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Catherine Burke born about 1811

Galway

I am looking for the marriage of Catherine Burke of Galway to Roger Moraghan from Roscommmon about 1832. Catherine and Roger's first child, Mary, was baptised at Birmingham's St. Chad's Cathedral on the 8th August 1833 and her godparents were John and Marie Moraghan. I have checked all the marriage records at St. Chads from 1815 to 1850 with no luck. The only other Roman Catholic church in Birmingham at that time was St. Peters but they have no marriage records between 1804 and 1847 (prior to 1836 Catholic marriages in England were not legally valid unless the rites were performed in a Protestand church). Catherine could have had a sister(?), Maria, who was the godmother of their child, Sarah, in 1843. I have checked the parish records for Roscommon with no luck but I was informed that it was usual for any weddings to be held in the bride's family town.

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Kevin Moore

kgmoore@mail.com

3 replies

Kevin:

Welcome to Ireland Reaching Out!

I searched the subscription site Roots Ireland and did not locate a marriage record for Catherine Burke and Roger Moraghan anywhere in Ireland. Many RC parishes do not have records back to 1833 and before.

Looking at the Tithe data, most Moraghans were found in parishes in North Roscommon and not on the border with Co. Galway. My guess is that the couple likely met and married in Birmingham.

http://titheapplotmentbooks.nationalarchives.ie/search/tab/results.jsp?…

You may want to add Catherine and Roger's emigration story to our XO Chronicles site and possibly someone will see a connection  https://www.irelandxo.com/ireland-xo/history-and-genealogy/ancestor-dat…

Have you considered DNA testing?

Roger McDonnell

Castlemore RoscommonIrelandXO Volunteer

Hi Roger

Many thanks for your welcome and kind response. The answer you gave was one that I was (sadly) expecting. As I mentioned in my post, I have exhausted the Catholic church records in Birmingham and I have found no other records elsewhere in the U.K. It is a case of now trying other avenues of research.

The reason I was interested in Roger and Catherine's marriage was to see who Roger's father might have been in Roscommon so as to identify his relationship with my 2x great grandfather, James Moraghan of Roscommon and James' father (my 3x great grandfather), Owen Moraghan, farmer (see posting here https://www.irelandxo.com/ireland/roscommon/message-board/carrick-shannon-workhouse). I will look at your suggestion regarding posting to the XO Chronicles.

Re: DNA testing .. I have had my DNA tested through ancestry.co.uk and the results were ...

59% Connacht (North Connacht, West Roscommon and East Mayo)
37% Northern England and the Midlands*
2% Norway
2% Sweden

*I was born in the Midlands (Staffordshire) and my mother's family were from Sunderland (north east of England). My mother's maiden name was Kelly (she was born in Sunderland in 1927) but I have only been able to trace the Kelly family back to John Kelly (born about 1832, place unknown so far). John married Hannah McHale in Pontefract in Yorkshire in 1852. My mother's mother was Mary Alice Ganley and I have been able to trace her family back to Bartholomew Ganley who was born about 1825 in either Sligo or Roscommon (I still have work to do here).

Kevin

kgmoore@mail.com

Kevin:

All the best with your family research. You may want to add your Ancestry DNA data to a volunteer run site called Genesis Gedmatch  www.genesis.gedmatch.com ; You will get matches with people who tested with other companies and also loaded their data to Genesis Gedmatch.

Roger

Castlemore RoscommonIrelandXO Volunteer

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