Comber/Comer Family Search

Hi Carolyn,

Thank you for your message.

Do you know where Mary Ryder was from? Generally, weddings took place in the bride?s parish of origin so this is where you will probably need to be looking for their marriage record.

With regards to what records may or may not be available, a very useful website is the Irish Times where they give an overview of what records are available in specific parishes. For Moylough parish follow this link:

http://www.irishtimes.com/ancestor/fuses/rcparishmaps/index.cfm?fuseaction=showidrecords&CityCounty=Galway&CityCounty=East%20Galway&parish=Moylough&churchid=1078

For St.Nicholas:

http://www.irishtimes.com/ancestor/fuses/rcparishmaps/index.cfm?fuseaction=showlikerecords&CityCounty=Galway%20city&parish=Galway

For Castlegar:

http://www.irishtimes.com/ancestor/fuses/rcparishmaps/index.cfm?fuseaction=showidrecords&churchid=616&CityCounty=Galway&CityCounty=West%20Galway&parish=Castlegar

It may be an idea to contact Galway Family History Society West for some assistance however a fee may apply. Here is their email: galwaywestroots@eircom.net

Kind regards,

Genalogy Support  

Hello Carolyn,

Not sure if this is of any assistance but it may cast some light on your efforts as there are a few other avenues you could explore.

 There is a townland named Castlegar which is just on the outskirts of Galway city today and might even be considered a suburb of the city. It is in the civil parish of St. Nicholas but it is also a catholic church parish and has its own church. There is a very distinct difference between civil and catholic parishes here in Ireland. As civil records only came into being here in Ireland in 1864 then your dates indicate that you should be looking in the catholic church records for you information and such records do exist in Castlegar (I have accessed them myself for another search) but as you know they may be incomplete or indeed some years may be missing. There is an area called Menlo close to Castlegar and this is sometimes spelled Menlough (sometimes also confused with Moylough!)  so this may have some significance. The barony for these areas is Galway.

Also and maybe even more significantly there is a townland called Castlegar in the civil parish of Killeeneen and this region is considered the home of the name “Ryder” here in county Galway. This townland is located right beside a townland named Roevehagh and there is a catholic church here in this latter townland. These are all in the barony of Dunkellin.

The tradition in Ireland around that period that you are looking for was that marriages were arranged as a result of matchmaking and thus both partners would probably have known each other or certainly their families would have and thus both husband and wife were often born quite close to each other. The name Comer is most associated with the Dunmore area of county Galway and it very interesting to note that both the name Comer and Ryder appear quite frequently in that very Dunmore area also. These are all in the barony of Dunmore also.

Hope these are of some assistance and feel free to get back if you have any other queries. The best of luck with your efforts.

Regards,

Jimmy Laffey.