Martha Campbell 1822 Ballymoney, Co. Antrim

Lori,

I may possibly have found your family in the townland of Greenshields on the outskirts of Ballymoney.

In 1817 a new Minister took over at Ballymoney 1st Presbyterian church. Rev Parkes decided to conduct a full census of everyone in the parish (of any denomination). No privacy or data protection laws then but we are indebted to him for asking people for their private information.

In Greenshields in 1817 there is a family consisting of Andrew Campbell (head), Charles (son), Margaret (daughter in law) and 3 grandchildren Andrew, John & Mary. This appears to match your information pretty well perfectly. There were several other Campbell families in the parish but no other Charles, never mind one with a wife named Margaret. I feel it’s probably your family. Parkes census, as it’s called, is on Bill McAfee’s website:

http://billmacafee.com/19centurydatabases.htm

There was also a Lamont family in Greenshields at the same time, headed by Richard Lamont. However he had an unmarried daughter called Margaret in 1817 so it can’t really be your Lamont family, as your Margaret was evidently married and had several children by that year. The surname is fairly common in the area though and Margaret’s family likely lived nearby. At that period when most courting was done on foot, you often married the girl next door.

In the tithe applotment records for 1825 Charles Campbell is listed as farming Greenshields. No mention of Andrew, suggesting he had died and Charles had taken the farm over.

http://www.irishgenealogyhub.com/antrim/tithe-applotments/ballymoney-parish.php

No Campbells in Greenshields in Griffiths Valuation of 1861 indicating they had either died out or moved away.

You haven’t said what denomination the Campbell & Lamont families were, though I’d hazard a guess they were Presbyterian. In which case you might want to search church records for baptisms for the other children, as that ought to confirm you have the right family. If Martha was born c 1822 and baptised in that church, the record may exist.

Ballymoney 1st Presbyterian church has records of Baptisms, 1751-71, with gaps, and 1817-1926; & marriages, 1817-1926. (Presbyterians generally don’t keep burial records).  There’s a copy of the records from 1817 onward in PRONI (the public record office) in Belfast.  The Minister has the baptism records for 1751 -71 (which are fire damaged).

Ballymoney was heavily involved in the 1798 United Irishmen’s uprising and the town was burned as a reprisal. Most of the Ballymoney Presbyterian church records were lost in the fire, though a few years baptisms were saved.

If you are unable to go to PRONI yourself, you could employ a researcher. Researchers in the PRONI area: http://sgni.net

Turning now to the question of whether Margaret Lamont was born in Scotland, the general background here is that most of the population of Ballymoney and the surrounding area are descendants of Scots who arrived in Ireland in the 1600s or sometimes, especially around north east Antrim, in the late 1500s. In North America these are generally referred to as Scotch-Irish. Here in Ireland we tend to call them Ulster-Scots. Researchers in other countries are often aware their Irish born ancestors may have come from Scotland and start searching for births in Scotland etc. It’s perfectly possible that Margaret Lamont was born in Scotland in the late 1700s but I think it unlikely.  I think she was probably born in Ireland to a family whose ancestors arrived in the 1600s. By the 1700s and early 1800s, the Scots settlers were dissatisfied with life in Ireland and were leaving again. That’s not to say the odd Scot didn’t arrive then but it would be very much against the prevailing flow. 

The Campbells may also have arrived at that time or perhaps even earlier.  The Campbells ancestral home is Inveraray in Argyll. (The clan chief the Duke of Argyll still lives there to this day). From the Mull of Kintyre in Scotland to Torr Head in Antrim is about 9 miles. These are not big distances.  The Campbells came to Ireland for various different reasons. Some in the 1300s and 1400s as galloglass (mercenaries) but later arrivals were often from Kintyre (and were often Presbyterian) and were part of the settlement of the area.

There are no records for the Scots settlers who arrived in the 1600s, nor any baptism or marriage records for their early years in Ireland. In fact few churches in Ireland have many records before 1800, if that. What folk sometimes start doing is search the internet for likely events for the names they are looking for, and find records of people with those names in Scotland from parishes that do have some records for that period. With common names like Campbell & Lamont/Lamond, this can lead to errors. (There were a couple of hundred Margaret Lamonts in the 1841 Scottish census. There would have been just as many in 1790. Easy to latch on to the wrong one). You mention that you have not been able to find any documentation showing place of birth. To me that suggests someone somewhere has perhaps been guessing or accepting Ancestry’s hints.

Thank you so much for the information. I did find Andrew and his son Charles and daughter in law Margaret, but as I did not know for sure, did not want to add them. However it makes sense this is my family. The names all match, including the kids and ages. Margaret was married in Ontario Canada in 1838 and the family came over to Canada just before that. She was married when she turned 16 and had her first living child when she was 19. Her husband was a doctor graduated from the university of edinburgh. He came over to Canada from Montrose Scotland in 1836-37. He was 25 when they married. Her parents lived near the newly married couple for a while and the families remained close.
I know we have been told that we descend from Ulster-Scots. In several census of Canada, it lists their religion as Methodist. That could have been Horatio's (Martha's husband) religion.
As for going, that won't be possible, at least currently, as I live in Canada.
The information you have given is going to be a great place to start.
Any other info is always welcome.
Thank you once again

Methodism hadn’t really got going by the time your ancestors left for Canada. Methodists broke away from the Church of England/Ireland. In Ireland they were very reluctant to break and continued to use the Church of Ireland for marriages and baptisms long after Methodism had become established as a separate denomination elsewhere. The first Methodist baptism in Ballymoney was only in 1831 and they didn’t marry anyone till the 1870s. So if your family were Methodists (and I don’t think it’s all that likely myself, from their surnames) they would have been attending the Church of Ireland. Ballymoney Church of Ireland’s records start in 1807. They are not on-line anywhere so far as I know. There is a copy in PRONI in Belfast.

I looked at the 1901 census of Co Antrim. The vast majority of both Campbells & Lamonts were Presbyterian, with small numbers of Reformed Presbyterian (Covenanters), Church of Ireland and a few Roman Catholic. No Methodist Campbells around Ballymoney at all and just 108 Methodists out of 3600 Campbells in the county. Most of them were in Belfast.

Scottish surnames, Presbyterian religion and living in north east Antrim are all very strong pointers to Ulster-Scots origins. (75% of the population around Ballymoney have the same roots). Here's a couple of descriptions of the people around Ballymoney in the 1820s:

A Presbyterian Minister brought up in Aghadowey, Co Derry wrote this of his childhood in the 1820s: “Aghadowey had originally been settled by a Scotch immigration and I found that my new neighbours spoke as pure Scotch as a man might hear in any part of Ayrshire.”[1]

Describing his youth in Ballycahan, parish of Dunboe, a local farmer said: “Over a space of 15 to 20 miles from east to west, and about the same from north to south, Scottish surnames, a broad Scottish dialect and an almost universally diffused Presbyterianism indicated the title of the people to call themselves “Scotch”. Episcopalians were few and a Roman Catholic as rare as a black swan.”[2]

The accent in Ballymoney (and much of Antrim generally) remains essentially very Scottish, with many Scottish words and phrases still in everyday use.  People here go for "wee messages" and "look after weans or bairns". Phrases you would never hear anywhere else in Ireland, only in Ulster, which is where the Scots mostly settled.

[1] Autobiography of Thomas Witherow 1824 – 1890 Page 25. Ballinascreen Historical Society 1990

[2] A Kennedy chronicle – Biography of Alexander Kennedy of Ballycahan 1818 – 1885 by Hugh Alexander Hezlett (Coleraine library)

All of this information is very fascinating. The methodist listing was the census in Canada in 1851. Many of their neighbours at that time were either Methodist or Church of Ireland. They settled in the Romney township area of Essex, Ontario, Canada. Where a pile of my relatives still live and I grew up in Essex County, Ontario. I did find some census of Horatio Mills (Martha's husband), from when he was still growing up and living in Montrose Scotland and their religion in the area was Methodist/Church of England, so I'm guessing that's why the religion is listed as Methodist in the Canada census because they more times than not listed the fathers religion for everyone and since he was a doctor, school and post master, his would have had preference. I do have other documents listing the religion as Presbyterian for some of Martha's siblings and even some of their children later on, so that's my guess, the Methodist came from her Scotland born, raised and educated husband. I am trying to find Charles and Margaret Campbell in the Canada census, but so far have had no luck. I have found some of her siblings. It is said the whole family, except the kids that were already married (and even some of them came with their families), came to Canada, including Charles and Margaret, but could they have stayed back in Ireland for a while, then come over? However they are listed as witnesses on Martha (their daughter) and Horatio's marriage license and they were married in Essex county, Ontario, Canada in 1838. The census before 1841 only list head of house, so if they happened to live with someone else or one of their children's families, it will be hard to find them. We just know from family information and pictures that they stayed in the area of Romney, at least for a while, where their kids and grandkids were. It's finding out about them during and before they came to Canada that has been difficult. The family stories say Charles' family had been in Ireland for a couple generations or more by the time he was born, but his wife Margaret had come from Scotland or her parents did and hers was the first generation born in Ireland. By the time their kids were grown, they had come to Canada,at least that's the family stories! I'm trying to find out if they did come to live in Canada or just visited and had stayed back in Ireland to live. I can find a (Charles and Margaret Campbell) in Ireland years after, but nothing in Canada, other than pictures of them with family that are for sure here living in Canada and the pictures are taken here in Canada (farms and homesteads can be seen in the background that are the same ones in the Romney township area.) This has given me a good start as to where to look. And some good references.
Thank you so much once again and any other information I will gladly take.
Lori

Lori,

In Ireland, tradition was to marry in the bride’s church after which she’d usually attend her husband’s, so if a Presbyterian woman here married a Methodist, she’d usually switch to Methodism. It looks as though that may have happened in Canada too in your family’s case. 

There are very few records in Ireland for the period between the tithes and Griffiths Valuation. (1825 – 1861). Birth & death registration didn’t start till 1864. Tracing someone who may have stayed in Ireland or returned here in that period is tricky. If any of the children married in Ballymoney 1st Presbyterian you might find that in the church records, but they are not on-line so you would need to get someone to look them up for you in PRONI.