My family ancestry I do know/looking 4 more info with my dream of visiting my Calhoun ancestor's Ireland

Tammy,

You ask what a parish is. Ireland is divided up into thousands of townlands. These are a uniquely Irish method of measuring and distributing land and go back a thousand years or more. A group of townlands constitutes a parish. Parishes were used for civil and religious administrative purposes. So, for example, if you were RC or Church of Ireland, your parish normally determined where your baptism would be recorded and often where you would marry. Prior to the 1830s it also determined which church was responsible for supporting the poor in that area. 

You say your ancestors lived in Newton Stewart, Ardstraw. Ardstraw is a parish so that answers your question about which is the right parish for this enquiry. (There are 2 townlands called Crosh in Co. Tyrone. One is in the parish of Ardstraw, the other in Cappagh).

You say your ancestors lived at “Crosh House”. Crosh House is in the townland of Crosh. It’s off the modern Plumbridge Rd just outside Newton Stewart. As far as I can tell it’s agricultural land. So still farmed today. It’s set back off the road and had a gate house so would have been well to do for the time.

I looked at Griffiths Valuation for Crosh for 1859 but did not see any Calhoun (and variant spellings eg Colhoun, Colhoan, Colhun) listed then. Crosh House was occupied then by Clarke Mathewson who had a 62 acre farm. I assume that your ancestors must have left or died before that.

I also checked the tithe applotment records for 1833 (listing people with land at that time). Alexander and William Colhoun each had a farm in Crosh at that time. So that confirms that there were Calhoun/Colhoun households in the townland at that time. Both gone by 1859, as we can tell from Griffiths Valuation.  

http://www.cotyroneireland.com/tithe/ardstraw.html

The name tends to be spelled Calhoun in Ireland and Colquhoun in Scotland (though it’s the same name and pronounced more or less the same in both places). It’s a Scottish name and chances are your ancestors arrived in Ireland in the 1600s as a part of the Plantation of Ulster. Some 100,000 Scots moved to Ireland in that century, representing something like 10% of the entire Scottish population of the time.

You didn’t say what denomination your Calhoun ancestor was. Do you know? There are 3 Church of Ireland churches in Ardstraw. Unfortunately all their early records were lost in the 1922 fire in Dublin where ironically they had been sent for safe keeping. There are several Methodist meeting houses, with baptism records starting in 1822 (the start of Methodism in Ireland). There are 9 Presbyterian churches in the parish but none has any records earlier than 1823 (1st Castlederg). I don’t know if that will be early enough for you, since you haven’t given us any dates yet. (I assume your family were not RC since the Rev Calhoun fathered some children!).

You say that Audley’s father was the Rev Alexander Colhoun. If you think he was Presbyterian, you could contact the Presbyterian Historical Society in Belfast. They have a book called “Fasti” which lists the lives and careers of all their Ministers. So you could easily check if he was a Presbyterian Minister in Ireland, and if so, when he was born and died, whom he married, where he served as a Minister and probably where he was buried. It should also tell you about where he was educated (probably got his degree in Glasgow University, they mostly did).

http://www.presbyterianhistoryireland.com

From what you have added, Rev Calhoun must have been a Church of Ireland minister. So don't bother checking the Presbyterian Historical society. Crockfords clerical derical directory should list his career. That's on-line but pay to view.You might find the Rev Calhoun's garev in Templecarn but the chruch itself has no burial records for the 1700s. Indeed there are very few records for the 1700s generally so research at that period can be very hard.