Ireland XO
Back to Message Board

Looking for mysterious County Kerry birthplace of great-grandmother!

Kerry

Hi all,

I shared this once before but I'm hoping to try to solve a mystery. I can't seem to find a location for my great-grandmother's place of birth. Maiden name is Mary Ann Hartnett, and on the 1911 Liverpool, England census (where she emigrated) her birthplace is listed as "Heensherryness, County Kerry." I think this may be a transcription error, but I've tried to decipher the handwriting and can't seem to figure it out! There are few records of her in England, as she married my great-grandfather in 1904 (I believe shortly after immigrating) and then passed at in 1919.

I attached a photo of the census, and a link to County Kerry births of Mary Hartnett in 1871-1872 (likely hers was in 1871 if the other records I've looked through were correct). My father knew his grandmother was born in Ireland but sadly not the exact location (she died when my grandfather was quite young). I'm awaiting a marriage cert in hopes that will shed some light, but any help would be appreciated in trying to solve this mystery!

Thanks!
Pat

https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/civil-perform-search.jsp?namefm=Mary&namel=Hartnett&location=&yyfrom=1871&yyto=1872&type=B&submit=Search&sort=&pageSize=100¢ury=&decade=&exact=&ddBfrom=&ddMfrom=&ddDfrom=&ddPfrom=&mmBfrom=&mmMfrom=&mmDfrom=&mmPfrom=&yyBfrom=&yyMfrom=&yyDfrom=&yyPfrom=&ddBto=&ddMto=&ddDto=&ddPto=&mmBto=&mmMto=&mmDto=&mmPto=&yyBto=&yyMto=&yyDto=&yyPto=&locationB=&locationM=&locationD=&locationP=&keywordb=&keywordm=&keywordd=&keywordp=&event=&district=

patrickjlee01@…

5 replies

Dear Pat:

Thank you for your post.  The Mary Anne from 1871 has an address of Curraheen, and the Mary Anne from 1872 has an address of Church Street in Listowel.  I have only looked at the Listowel and Tralee districts as they are located in Kerry.  

I am going to forward this post to a Kerry volunteer who may be able to decipher the townland or area name for you.  To my eye it looks like "Keensheenypass", but as you said it is very difficult to decipher!

Please get back to us if you have any further questions.

All the best,

 

Jane

jhalloranryan@…

Hi Pat, lovely to hear from you and thank you so much for all the information you sent us. I think the father's name from the marriage cert. will assist us greatly and I look forward to hearing from you again when you have it.

If you go to the Church records on irishgenealogy.ie you will see that HarTnett is used interchangeably with HarNet/t. It's a good idea to check there because not every birth was registered in the Civil Registration office. Also if Mary Anne was born on the Kerry border there is a small chance that her birth was registered either in Cork or Limerick although she was born in a Kerry Church Parish.

I am not familiar with the townland name as spelled on the Census.

As to the spelling of your townland I think the 'H' might be a K or even an R, If it is a K then that could mean C in the Irish language so we could be looking at Rennsheenguess or Coomsheenges or Kee/ansheenga/us. Spellings were not standardised until after 1930/40 or in some cases later. The list that is most helpful is at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_townlands_of_County_Kerry

I have gone through 600 entries in the Church records for Hartnett and Harnett and can't see any that  seem to fit. It may be that the townland name was shortened in those records or indeed that the name you have was the name used by people in the local area and not the official placename.

There are 100 entries for County Kerry for Hartnett in Griffith's Valuation c 1853 either as a tenant or a landlord at askaboutireland.ie and 170 for Harnett. Depending on Mary Ann's father's age, he might be listed there.

I will take another look at the lists of townland names over the next week and let you know if anything jumps out at me. Hopefully another reader may be familiar with the name and get in touch.

In the meantime, can you remember anyone talking about the nearest big town where her family went to do their shopping ot to go to school? Sometimes that can help.

I look forward to hearing from you again.

Warm wishes

Martine

mbrennankerry@…IrelandXO Volunteer

Thanks very much, Martine for your reply!

 

All the best,

 

Jane

jhalloranryan@…

Thanks very much, Martine for your reply!

 

All the best,

 

Jane

jhalloranryan@…

Thank you both for your replies!

Unfortunately, I don't have much information on my great-grandmother. She died when my grandfather was very young, and my grandfather has since passed away. My father was born in Liverpool to a predominantly Irish-Catholic family (at least ancestrally) and came to the states at a young age. From my research, Liverpool was (and is still) quite Irish, and this was particularly true in the 1800's-early 1900's. I have some documents on my Irish ancestors in Liverpool, but sometimes the place of birth (for example the first Lee who came to Liverpool from Ireland in the early 1800's) is just listed as "Ireland." There are also no emigration records I can find, presumably since Ireland was part of UK at that time. 

I had heard when I was young that my great-grandmother had relatives in the Galway area, but my dad's grandfather on the other side was from County Roscommon, so I don't know if the story was mixed since Roscommon is adjacent to Galway. As you can see, I'm on the front end of finding my Irish ancestry on my dad's side (mom's side I have much more detail!) but this would be huge if I can find out where Mary Ann Hartnett came from!

Thanks again,

Pat

patrickjlee01@…

Reply

Reply
One image file up to 2 MB.