Are you searching for your Irish ancestors? 

 

Perhaps you would like to find out which county and townland in Ireland they came from,  their family members, their work, when and why they left Ireland. Maybe you would like to locate the ancestral home.

 

Navigating Irish family history records can be time-consuming, complicated and frustrating at the best of times. This is in part due to numerous Irish name spelling variants and family naming practices meaning that there may be cousins sharing the same christian and surname and born in the same or adjoining parish in the same year - all adding to the confusion

 

There are likely to be date discrepancies and errors in transcription to navigate too. In Ireland the registration of non-Roman Catholic marriages began in 1845, but the full civil registration system only came into operation in 1864 requiring every birth, marriage and death to be recorded with the registrar within a given time-frame, usually twenty one days or a fine was imposed. 

 

In rural areas particularly, it was not always easy to reach the nearest district civil registration office.  This led to some births being recorded later than the actual date of birth in order to avoid the fine. So, it is not unusual to come across births that, seemingly, occurred days or weeks after the church baptism date recorded in the parish registers. It is estimated that up to ten percent of births were never recorded.

 

It should be noted that due to a fire at the Public Records Office on 30 June 1922 during the Irish Civil War, many irreplaceable genealogical records were destroyed. Thankfully for us, nearly all civil records were nowhere near the flames and Roman Catholic, Presbyterian and Methodist baptism, marriage and burial records were not housed at the Public Records Office, leaving us with plenty of available research resources.

 

We are experienced at navigating the maze and wealth of Irish resources in order to create or reconstruct your family tree taking the information you have provided to enable us to piece together your Irish family lines (as far as records will allow) and to help solve family mysteries whilst unlocking the secrets of your Irish past. 

 

For further information and for a quotation, please contact wendy@probateresearch.ie