William Corrigan Jane Proctor County Tyrone

Velda,

You haven’t said what denomination your Corrigan ancestor was but looking at the 1901 census of Co. Tyrone, there were 255. Without exception all were Roman Catholic.  So I would think he was likely baptised in a Catholic church. The problem you face is that many of the 20 or so RC parishes in Tyrone don’t have any records for 1820 (or earlier). They hadn’t started keeping them. So there may be no record of his birth to find.

Proctor is less common than Corrigan. There were just 17 in the 1901 Tyrone census. All were Church of Ireland (Episcopalian). So I’d guess this was probably a mixed marriage.  The RC church in the 1830s wouldn’t marry someone who was not RC, so unless Jane converted, they likely married in the Church of Ireland which being the state church would marry anyone. In addition, tradition was to marry in the bride’s church anyway so that also points to the Church of Ireland.

Not all Church of Ireland records have survived, and of those that have, not all are on-line. You would have to go through all the Church of Ireland records for Tyrone in PRONI. 43 parishes. Not all will have records for the 1830s as quite a lot were destroyed in the 1922 fire in Dublin but you might get lucky and find their marriage. If you did it would tell you which parish they lived in, who their witnesses were and possibly their townlands. But not much more. 

There are very few records for the 1830s that would be relevant. The 1821 - 1851 censuses were lost in the 1922 fire, and Griffiths is of no use as it dates to 1848 onwards.

Possibly DNA testing may be a way of matching with others who have additional information about where the family originate. Family Tree DNA reportedly has more people with Ulster roots than any other company. That obviously increases the chances of finding a match. You might want to try them or, if you have already tested, you can transfer your results to them for no fee.

The North of Ireland Family History Society is running an Ulster DNA project and can offer FTDNA testing kits at a reduced price.  http://www.nifhs.org (Go to DNA project on the website)

Velda,

In general, people in Ireland in the 1800s didn’t celebrate birthdays, didn’t have birth certificates or passports (though they might sometimes have had a baptismal cert) and often had little accurate idea of their ages. Most ages on official documents were just a guess, especially if the person was illiterate, as in your ancestor’s case..

Alexander Irvine was born in 1863 in Antrim town and became a Minister living in the US. This extract from his book “The Chimney Corner revisited” perhaps explains why people often had to guess their ages:

“My mother kept a mental record of the twelve births. None of us ever knew, or cared to know, when we were born. When I heard of anybody in the more fortunate class celebrating a birthday I considered it a foolish imitation of the Queen’s birthday, which rankled in our little minds with 25^th December or 12^th July. In manhood there were times when I had to prove I was born somewhere, somewhen, and then it was that I discovered that I also had a birthday. The clerk of the parish informed me.”

I have attached a letter which I found in parish records in PRONI (the public record office) in Belfast from someone in Pettigoe, Co. Donegal in 1908 writing to his Minister, asking for proof of age (ie a baptismal certificate). All he knew was that he was between “70 and 78 years of age.” He clearly had only the vaguest idea and couldn’t narrow it down to within 9 years. (The likely reason for the letter was that the old age pension was being introduced in 1909 for people aged 70 and over. Documentary proof of age was required. Thus, probably for the first time in his life, establishing his age accurately became relevant to him).

I note what you say about William's second marriage being in the Presbyterian church but perhaps Canada was like Ireland in that tradition was to marry in the bride’s denomination? So he might have been of a different denomination (at birth anyway)? There isn’t a single protestant Corrigan in Tyrone in 1901. That seems to be certain.