Antrim-Lynn/McCulloch family

Margaret,

Statutory birth registration only began in Ireland in 1864. William & Ellen?s births were long before that and so you won?t get a birth certificate for either. That?s why Roscommon has no record of them.

You might find their baptisms. To do that you need to know what precise denomination they both were. Do you know that? I may then be able to direct you to any likely baptism records. (Not all the baptism records for Co Antrim are on-line).

Also, what townland was given on Samuel?s birth certificate in 1873, and what was his father?s occupation? (It may be possible to locate exactly where they were living, for you).

Elwyn

Margaret,

Griffiths Valuation, and the subsequent revaluation records show William Lynn on plot 9a in Caddy townland. He was there when the initial valuation was done in 1862 and remained there till 1883, after which the property appears to have been empty or just used for storage. He might have died, or maybe just moved to another cottage. Difficult to say and difficult to find without knowing where. Plot 9a in Caddy was a small cottage with 15 perches of land, as used by agricultural labourers and weavers. The small plot of land would be for him to grow a few vegetables and keep some chickens. It was one of several small cottages on a larger farm. Rent was occasionally paid in cash but more usually by an agreed number of days labour on the farm, after which he was free to take any other work that came along. I would guess that his occupation, as shown on Samuel?s marriage certificate, is agricultural labourer, or weaver. Is that right?

That property today is on the Caddy Rd just a mile or two north out of Randalstown. (The cottage itself is likely to have been demolished now but it was on farm owned by the Hughes family which should still be there today).

http://www.askaboutireland.ie/griffith-valuation/index.xml?action=nameSearch

http://applications.proni.gov.uk/dcal_proni_val12b/RelatedVolume.aspx?2857

Ellen is shown as a widow in the 1891 census, so you know William was dead by  April 1891. I have looked for his death in the Ballymena area, in the period 1875 to 1891. There are only 2 that could fit. One was a man who died in Jan ? Mar 1882, with an estimated year of birth of 1812. He seems too old. The other was William John Lynn who died in 1890 and was estimated to be born in 1837. (The age is just the informant?s best guess). That seems more likely. It was registered in Ballymena Jan ? Mar 1890 Vol 1, page 120.

You can order a photocopy from GRO Roscommon for ?4 per certificate. Put the place, year, quarter (where there is one), volume & page number on the application form (anywhere). Don?t worry about leaving some boxes blank. You don?t need to fill them all in if you have the reference details. http://www.groireland.ie/ You have to post or fax the form to them but they will e-mail the copy certificate to you if you wish. Tick the relevant box on the form.

William doesn?t seem to have left a will in Ireland, or if he did, it wasn?t probated.

I can?t see a marriage between William Lynn and Ellen McCulloch around the 1850s or 1860s in Co Antrim. There is one between William Lynn and Ellen Bell registered in Ballymena in 1861 (Vol 2, page 6). Could Ellen have been married before? (I note she was older than William). You might want to order that cert to see if it fits your William Lynn eg if the residence is Caddy.

You have Robert & Samuel both born in 1873 (July 1873 for Robert). Are they twins? If not, it?d be tricky for her to have had 2 children in the same year, if one was born in July. Are you sure that information is accurate? Robert is 12 in the 1891 census, so born c 1878/79, I reckon.

You haven?t said what denomination the family were, so that I can suggest which church records to look at.  In Scotland were they Church of Scotland, do you know?

Elwyn

Margaret,

From what you are saying, I would guess that William Lynn was Presbyterian. It sounds as though the last church in Clarkston was ?Wee Free? (ie Free Church of Scotland), so that points to the family perhaps being secession Presbyterians at that point. There were some secession churches in Ireland too but many amalgamated back with the mainstream Presbyterian church. So William?s more likely to have been mainstream Presbyterian in Ireland, I would say.

If you want to locate which church William and family attended (and presumably where he is buried), I?d say it was either one of the 3 Presbyterian churches in Randalstown, or possibly Grange Presbyterian Church at Taylorstown. They are all within about 2 miles of Caddy.

None of those churches records are on-line, as far as I am aware, though there are copies of all their baptism and marriage records held in PRONI, Belfast (the Public Record Office). However that involves a personal visit to see them.

If you buy the possible death certificate, and it proves to be correct, let me know the townland where William was living when he died, and I?ll see if I can locate his home for you. It?s likely to be another wee cottage.

Huge numbers of people from Co Antrim went to Scotland to work in the 1800s, because there were loads of new and better paid jobs there. I would guess that William?s death was the trigger that led to the family move there. (Ireland has no natural resources eg coal, iron ore etc, and so didn?t really experience the industrial revolution that created hundreds of thousands of new jobs on Clydeside in ship building, steel making, railways and all the support industries that went with that. Much better than a subsistence life as a farm labourer. That?s why people moved there).

In case you are interested in a description, Caddy is 309 acres of rural agricultural land. That?s still the case today. In 1901 there were 136 people living there spread across 31 households:

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Antrim/Drumanaway/Caddy/

The Hughes farm where William had his cottage is property no 2 on the census.

If William was Presbyterian, lived in Co Antrim and had a surname commonly found in Scotland, you can probably safely assume that his ancestors came to Co Antrim from Scotland some time in the 1600s as a part of the settlement of the county. Probably from Ayrshire or Galloway. (If you look at the other surnames in Caddy townland in the 1901 census, you?ll probably recognise most of them as Scottish, and that background reflects the general position across the county. 75 or 80% of the population are of Scottish origins).

Elwyn