From Ballyboyle to Corglass... a Boyle family's story
Part 2 - Corglass
The Boyles of Corglass
This section seeks to document the lives and times of our immediate ancestors, the three or four generations that preceded us and who lived mainly in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The world they inhabited was a world of peasant farmers struggling to reach above subsistence level, trying to put back together a society that had been sundered and seeking to regain a sense of dignity and self-respect. Though they had lost the connection to the Gaelic culture that defined them for centuries, they forged a new identity through religion, through gaining ownership of the land they farmed and by winning back control over the political decisions that shaped their lives.
Contents
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When did the Boyles come to Corglass?
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Terence Boyle - the Successful Immigrant
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Hugh Brady - the Struggling Immigrant
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The Family of John and Bridget
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Terence Brady - Lord of the Manor?
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Why are there no Boyle cousins?
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Which Terence, John, or Bridget?
Our ancestors were not very adventurous when it came to giving names to their children. Giving a name to a child was a way of honouring grandparents, uncles and aunts, so the same names recur in each generation. And in the 19th century, with the change in language from Irish to English many of the old Gaelic names were no longer used. It's farewell to Toirdhealbhach, Domhnall, Eoghain and Aibhlin, and hello to Terence, Catherine, Patrick, Bridget, John and Peter.
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As a result, the same names crop up in every generation, and it becomes quite confusing to work out which Terence or John is being referred to. To make this a bit clearer, I have added a generation number to forenames when necessary.
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Thus our earliest know ancestor Terence, born about 1775 is designated at Terence1. His children are Terence2, John2, Ellen2 etc.
Their children have number 3 added, and so on.
Not very elegant, but unfortunately necessary!
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Here is a summary of what we know. The following sections will elaborate on these 'bare bones', and set them in their historical and geographical context.
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Corglass was the home of the family for at least a century – from at least the 1850s, and possibly much earlier, up to the late 1940s.
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The earliest Boyle ancestors we can name were Terence Boyle and his wife Nelly McNamee, who were probably born in the 1770s and had died sometime before 1851. We don’t know where Terence was born; it may have been Corglass, but there is also a possibility that he was born in Cloone, just across the county border in County Leitrim.
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A hundred years before Terence was born, most Boyles were living in their traditional homeland of Donegal. Unfortunately, there is no way of tracing back through the .missing' three or four generations to link him to those ancestors.
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Terence and Nelly had four children who survived into adulthood: Terence, Ellen and Bridget who emigrated to the United States and John, who remained in Corglass.
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Of these children, Terence married Mary Keagan and had one daughter who died in childhood, Ellen married Hugh Brady and had seven children before emigrating to the US in 1851 and has many descendants. Bridget married Matthew Ryan and had a daughter Mary who it seems did not marry. John stayed in Ireland, marrying Bridget Harte, and had five children, of whom only one had descendants.
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John and Bridget’s children were Catherine, Terence and Patrick who all died in early adulthood and unmarried; Peter became a priest and went to Australia where he died in 1909, and John stayed in Corglass, married Bridget Brady and had four sons – Terence, Peter, John and Patrick, all of whom emigrated to the US. John died young, following an accident and Patrick returned to Corglass.
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Terence, Peter and Patrick had between them 15 children and the few who are still with us are in their 90th year or above.
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Confused? With a Terence, John, Ellen and Bridget in just about every generation, it’s difficult to keep track of who was who. The simplified tree below should help to clarify things. Also note that there are only two distinct branches, since not everyone had descendants. Terence’s daughter Ellen Boyle Brady had six children, most of whom had descendants. These are all in the USA, and of course none of them now carry the Boyle name. The other branch stems from Terence’s grandson John, the only one of Terence’s grandchildren to stay in Ireland and have descendants. And of that John’s grandchildren, only one (James, son of Patrick) has descendants in Ireland with the Boyle name.
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Now, only a handful of Terence’s descendants are named Boyle AND live in Ireland. Another twenty or so Boyles live in England or the USA, but the vast majority of the original Terence’s descendants, which now run into the hundreds, are not Boyles, and may not even be aware of their Boyle heritage. Hopefully this account will reach them too.
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Where are we?
Corglass and its adjoining townlands are the location of the Boyles and their relations from at least the late 18th century. Situated in the very north of county Longford, it is a liminal place - a few steps will bring you into County Leitrim, which is in the province of Connacht, and just a few miles away is the border with County Cavan, which is in the province of Ulster. It is in the Catholic parish of Dromard, but borders the parishes of Drumlish, Aughavas, Cloone and Gortletteragh. There are no large centres of population within a 25km radius; it's a rural area of small farms and a few villages, and though it once supported a large number of families, it is now thinly populated.
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The Boyles' relations - the Hartes of Clooncose, the Bradys of Gaigue and the Higginses of Aughamore - all lived in the surrounding areas, within walking distance in those pre-motorised days. These are underlined in the map below.
