Tracing your ancestors: Beginning your family history

Killaloe-Ballina Local History Society

7:00pm Wednesday 20 December 2017

Killaloe Public Library

by Paddy Waldron

WWW version:

http://pwaldron.info/Killaloe/

YouTube version:

TBA

Outline:

Where do I start?

Tracing ancestors in Ireland has never been easier.

• The first sources to consult are the family elders.
• Then check the family papers:
• memorial cards;
• newscuttings;
• tombstone inscriptions including Killaloe;
• letters;
• diaries;
• wills and title deeds, etc.
• Armed with the basic information from these, one can go online, and go back through the generations using the various free websites made available by the authorities in recent years.  These contain:
• census returns;
• birth, marriage and death records;
• church records;
• land records; etc.
• The latest state-of-the-art tool for identifying long-lost cousins and shared ancestors is DNA comparison, now available for as little as USD49.
• The family folklore is re-told in many Irish families at Christmas time.  This talk will help you to ask the right questions and take the right notes whenever your extended family gets together.
• Soon you will be well on your way to recording the histories of all 16 of your greatgreatgrandparents and beyond in your favourite genealogy software.

Principles

• Remember Larry Brennan's mantra when establishing the Clare Roots Society:

  Genealogy is about names, dates and places.
  These are the bones; family history is the flesh on those bones.

• For most genealogical events, there are up to four different associated places:
  • the place where the event happened;
  • the place where the event was originally recorded;
  • the place where the original record is stored today; and
  • the place(s) or website(s) where a manual, photographic or digital copy (or copies) of the record can be seen.
• In rural areas of Ireland, we can typically identify the townland in which the event happened.
• In urban areas, we can typically identify the street address at which the event happened.
• The administrative division(s) in which the genealogical event is or was recorded and stored depend on
  • the townland where the event actually happened;
  • the nature of the event; and
  • the general time period.
• Ireland has been partitioned many times for many non-genealogical purposes, but the genealogist needs to become familiar with some of these repartitionings.
• Depending on the record, there may be an all-Ireland index, a 26-county index, county-by-county indexes, or indexes for subdivisions of counties or areas crossing county boundaries.
• Unless a person's name is extremely rare, narrow down the search by place before you begin.
• Once we know the townland, we generally need maps and/or lookup tables to figure out where to look for the record; for a summary, see this table.
• In your genealogy software, document the source of every name, date and place that you find, whether it be a family source, a local source or a national source.

National sources

Free online sources

The most basic source is Google, which is great for more unusual names or combinations of names, but Google, by accident or design, does not harvest many genealogy sites.

The major free online sources for Irish ancestry include:

genealogy.nationalarchives.ie

• The National Archives of Ireland 1901 and 1911 Census of Ireland website and search form can be used to look for your parents, grandparents, greatgrandparents, greatgreatgrandparents, or more distant ancestors and relatives.
• The census is just the first in a series of stepping stones through the past.
• Maps of DEDs courtesy of logainm.ie
• National Archives of Ireland GENEALOGY website has more than just the census:
  • Census of Ireland, 1901 and 1911
  • Tithe Applotment Books, 1823 – 37
  • Soldiers’ Wills, 1914 – 1917
  • Calendars of Wills and Administrations, 1858 – 1920/1922
• National Archives of Ireland main website has more again, e.g. more recent Calendars of Wills and Administrations (Guide from Council of Irish Genealogical Organisations)
• There are many other websites where you can start your research before you visit libraries and archives.

IrishGenealogy.ie

Home page is rather out-of-date.
Current status reported at November 2017 lecture to Genealogical Society of Ireland (see Ireland's Genealogical Gazette)
Birth records 1864-1916.
Marriage records 1870-1941 (Catholic marriages for 1864-1869 and non-Catholic marriages for 1 Apr 1845-1869 to be added).
Data protection arguments relating to data on living persons are used to explain why more recent birth and marriage records are available offline only.
Death records 1878-1966 (1864-1877 to be added).
Data protection arguments relating to data on living persons are also used to explain why more recent records related to deceased persons are available offline only.
Births over 100 years ago, marriages over 75 years ago and deaths over 50 years ago due to be added in annual increments.
Basic civil records search form
Advanced civil records search form
The one-size-fits-all search form can mislead beginners.
The birth index includes mother's maiden name only from Abt 1900-1916.
Sometimes the groom is Party 1 and the bride is Party 2, sometimes the numbering is reversed.
Search separately for Kelly, O'Kelly, O Kelly and OKelly to cover all angles.
Similarly for Mc Namara and McNamara.

Church records for only about four counties, mostly pre-1900.

Alternative search form.

The results from the main search form provide links to other free government-backed online databases.

registers.nli.ie (Killaloe, Ballina)

Catholic parish registers up to Abt 1880.
Killaloe Catholic parish "Contains the old cathedral parish of Killaloe with the addition of the old parish of O'Briensbridge save the detached western portion of it (Truagh) now in Clonlara parish.  The Baptismal Register commences 24 May 1828.  The Marriage Register commences 26 February 1829.  No gaps are noted."
John Grenham confirms that all Killaloe records up to 1880 were microfilmed and are online and that the commercial Clare Heritage and Genealogical Centre has indexed the originals up to 1900 (not available to researchers).
The National Library of Ireland microfilms are transcribed (badly!) on other commercial websites.

Maps

First edition 6"/mile OSi maps, later 25"/mile maps, live street maps, five-yearly aerial views

Example: where are we?

Here in the townland of Shantraud ...

... in Killaloe civil parish in the barony of Tulla Lower in the county of Clare in the province of Munster.
Not to be confused with Shantraud in Adare civil parish in the barony of Kenry in the county of Limerick.

In the 1911 census, the more rural part of Shantraud was enumerated separately from the streets in Killaloe DED. 

We are in the Poor Law Union of Scariff (sometimes spelt Scarriff) (both pre- and post-Famine).
Part of the pre-Famine Scariff PLU became part of the post-Famine Tulla PLU from 1852.
From 18 Apr 1899, the county boundary was moved to bring part of Scariff PLU from Galway into Clare.
Tulla and Scariff PLUs were amalgamated again in 1907.

Julius Caesar: Divide and conquer - divide et impera

FamilySearch.org --- Irish Civil Registration Indexes 1845-1958

Includes more recent births and marriages than the official website.
See sample page from original index (1866)

Registration districts in this index are:

• the pre-Famine Poor Law Unions for non-Catholic marriages 1 Apr 1845 to 31 Dec 1863
• the post-Famine Poor Law Unions for all births, marriages and deaths from 1 Jan 1864.

The indexes don't include spouse or parents, apart from the birth index from c1928-1958, which includes mother's maiden surname only. To narrow the search, you can fill in one of (a) birth date and/or place (b) marriage date and/or place or (c) death date and/or place. Filling in fields which are blank in the record you want will prevent you from finding it.

FamilySearch.org --- Ireland Births and Baptisms mostly 1864-1881

Searchable by parents' names, unlike the official website.
See sample birth record

To narrow the search, you can fill in both parents' first and/or last names and/or birth date and/or place. The appropriate placename to use varies from year to year and from record to record. Try townland or dispensary district or Poor Law Union or county.

FamilySearch.org --- Ireland Marriages mostly 1845-1870

These years are not yet on the official website.
See sample page from marriage register

To narrow the search, you can fill in spouse's and/or father's first and/or last names and/or marriage date and/or place. Irish marriage certificates did not until relatively recently include the name of either the groom's mother or the bride's mother.

FamilySearch.org --- Ireland Deaths mostly 1864-1870

These years are not yet on the official website.

See sample death record

To narrow the search, you can fill in death date and/or death place and/or residence place. Irish death certificates did not include the name of any relative until c2004, unless the informant happened to be a relative, and even then the relationship may not have been specified. The appropriate placename to use is generally the townland.

Full familysearch.org search

In some non-Irish records the familysearch.org transcriptions may include father's first name, mother's first name and mother's last name, but not father's last name! See, for example, many entries in New Jersey, Marriages, 1678-1985. You must leave the father's last name blank if you want to find these records.

Griffith's Valuation (askaboutireland Family Name Search or Place Name Search - free)

Beware that Tipperary, Tipperary North Riding and Tipperary South Riding all appear on the drop down menu!
It is apparently not possible to hyperlink to specific map locations - see discussion. It is possible to link to the occupiers of a specific location using the PlaceID, e.g. Ballina (PlaceID=1223328). Results are stupidly broken into pages of 20 occupiers at a time. To view Original Page or Map View, right click on icon and select "Open Link in New Tab".
Try lining up the OSi maps, Griffith maps and Google Street View - details here.

Offline sources

• General Register Office, Werburgh Street, Dublin - for BMD records not yet online 
• Valuation Office - for revisions of Griffith's Valuation.

Local sources

Free online sources

IGP's County Clare Ireland Genealogy group and IGP's County Tipperary Ireland Genealogy group at facebook.com

3,989 people tracing their Clare roots and 2,061 people tracing their Tipperary roots (as of 20 December 2017) 

Ireland Reaching Out

Offline sources

• Local Studies Centre, Ennis
• Tipperary Studies, Thurles
• archive of material in digital format in relation to burial grounds in North Tipperary

DNA sources

Where does our DNA come from?

• When a sperm fertilises an egg, each brings DNA, which is replicated in every cell of the resulting person.

• autosome is short for autosomal chromosome.

Inheritance paths

Y chromosome

Only males have a Y chromosome.
The Y chromosome comes down the patrilineal line - from father, father's father, father's father's father, etc.
This is the same inheritance path as followed by surnames, grants of arms, peerages, etc.

X chromosome

Males have one X chromosome, females have two.
X DNA may come through any ancestral line that does not contain two consecutive males.
Blaine Bettinger's nice colour-coded blank fan-style pedigree charts show the ancestors from whom men and women can potentially inherit X-DNA.

Autosomes

Exactly 50% of autosomal DNA comes from the father and exactly 50% comes from the mother.
Due to recombination, on average 25% comes from each grandparent, on average 12.5% comes from each greatgrandparent, and so on.
Siblings each inherit 50% of their parents' autosomal DNA, but not the same 50% (except for identical twins).
Similarly, siblings each inherit 50% of their mother's X DNA, but not the same 50% (except for identical twins).
Sisters each inherit 100% of their father's X DNA.

Mitochondria

Everyone has mitochondrial DNA.

Mitochondrial DNA comes down the matrilineal line - from mother, mother's mother, mother's mother's mother, etc.
The surname typically changes with every generation in this line.

• all those closer than third cousins in the DNA database;
• about half of all fourth cousins in the database;
• about 10% of all fifth cousins in the database;
• small proportions of the very many more distant relatives in the database.

The Autosomal DNA and Genetic Genealogy Websites

• GEDmatch.com
• FamilyTreeDNA.com (FTDNA)
• AncestryDNA