McCoy - Horan

You don?t say what denomination your family were. However for Rathlin there are no RC records earlier than 1856 and no Church of Ireland before 1845, so that will make it difficult to trace the family through those records.

There were no McCoy/McKay or Horan households on Rathlin in Griffiths Valuation in 1861.

They were RC, I was told McCay (McCoy) was RC and McKay was Church of Ireland.

No, the information regarding the spelling of the names is a bit of an urban myth. It is not really a reliable way of determining a person?s denomination. Spelling varied all the time according to the whim of the person gathering the information, and will also vary within each family from generation to generation. Taking the 1901 census of Ireland, there are 68 people named McCoy, 126 McCay & 84 Mackay. All of them, without exception, were Presbyterian (ie strongly indicative of Scottish ancestry). There were 2015 named McKay. Of those 803 were RC, 435 Church of Ireland and 570 Presbyterian. So the RC element is completely mixed in with other denominations. The spelling tells you nothing.

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/

If your ancestors came from Rathlin, the majority of the population there were RC, so that information fits fine.

Rathlin was part of the kingdom of Dalriada from 495AD onwards. That was established by the Scoti tribe from Co Antrim who moved over to Scotland and set up their capital in Dunadd, near modern Oban. They ruled part of the Western Isles of Scotland, the Kintyre peninsula, Rathlin and a bit of Co Antrim for about 400 years. Over the years the kingdom was broken up and by the 1800s, Rathlin was pretty much under the control of the McDonnells of Antrim (originally Scots) but the population of Rathlin by then would probably have regarded themselves as Irish more than Scots. Hard to say really.  Perhaps your McCoys only lived in Rathlin for a short while, and had come much more recently from some part of Scotland. McCoy/McKay etc doesn?t appear to have been a common name on Rathlin. That could be explained by them being Scots incomers. (If they were of Scottish origin, we also have to account for them being RC and not Presbyterian, but not all Scots were Presbyterian, or they might possibly have converted, given that Rathlin was pretty much exclusively RC).

McCoys were on Rathlin Island in late 1700s and 1800s. Neil McCoy, farmer on Rathlin Island married Isabella Black from the Glens. Their daughter Alicia, married Michael McQuaig in St Thomas' Church (various spellings abound  McCuaig, McCouaig, McQuigg and immigrants to America McQuaig, McQuaigge and McCuaig none of which seem to relate to religious denomination) 

Michael (1806 - 19/8/1896) was the island inn keeper and a farmer. His father and mother were Henry McCouaig and Annie Horan - Henry being church of Scotland and Annie being Catholic. It is believed the McCouaigs were  ousted crofters from the Scottish Highlands who made their way to the western islands settling on Islay before some leaving for Rathlin. The Islanders saw themselves as Scottish and spoke Gaelic as well as English. Between 1840 and 1850 some 500 Rathlin Islanders left for America. They first settled in Lubec, Maine. A  number of McCouaigs, Horans and McCoys also left Rathlin at this time.  I have not noticed any McCoys on Islay records so I suspect they have come to Rathlin via one of the other islands or perhaps from Northern Ireland. 

Griffiths Valuation1861-1862  shows Neal <b1820 (Carravinally), Isabella (Demesne).  Other random Rathlin McCoy names I have come across are  Catherine McCoy   c1836 - c1909  (Ballycarry)   Donald McCoy c1825, Michael, Neal, Angus, Margaret, Jane (possibly siblings to Alicia)

Co-incidentally one of my more recent family links is to one Leon Wheeler McCoy who  married an Elizabeth McCuaig ( Elizabeth's father born in London but family from Rathlin). Haven't followed this line back but suspect an Irish origin. 

Chris McCouaig

Chris

My McCay's / Horan had left Rathlin by 1830. It could be possible that Neil was a brother to John McCay and he stayed in Rathlin after John and his family left. John Horan, son of Alexander Horan, first ventured to Maine around the mid 1820's and then sent word for his, and his sister's Nancy McCay nee Horan, family to cone to the US. He went down to NYC to greet them, but they came to New Brunswich, Canada.

In the Chain of Occupancy 1803 - 1860

Neil McCay only appears in the Townland of Roonivoolin in 1834 together with McCormick, McKinlay, Morrison and Weir.

In 1803 there was William McCay in Townland of Ballynoe, together with Blacks, McCarter and Morrison

Also in 1803 there was John McCay in Township of Churchquarter with Anderson, Bradley, Gage, Grimes, Hunter, McCarter, McCurdy, McDonell, McFall, McQuik, McQuikan and Moore.

In the Townland of Roonivoolin in 1803 there were Anderson, McCurdy and Wier.

In 1860 the only McCoy was Isabella in the township of Demesne

There was a John M'Quaig in Roonivoolin in 1860

I assume we are distant cousins!

duplicate entry

see attached

Griffith's Valuation does have McCoys.

Neal McCoy - Carravinally

Isabella McCoy - Demense

And

William McCoy, son of Donald McCoy was also on the Island in the 1860's. He married Catherine McArthur 3/01/1860 and had seven children on the Island from 1861 to 1876.

John (Iain) McKay, son of Donald, married Margaret (Peggy) McCoy 20/05/1857, they had 12 children between 1857 and 1878, all in Ballyconagan

Tithe Applotment 1834

1. McCay, Danl. Townland : Coolnagrock
2. McCay, Neal Townland : Runavoolin
3. McKey, Danl. Townland : Ballycarry
4. McKey, Danl. Townland : South Shanerd
5. McKey, Hugh Townland : Corvanally
6. McKey, John Townland : Kinrammer North

Cheers,

Andy

Hi All

It appears that our branch of the McCoy family came from Scotland to Northern Ireland likely via the western Isles. I had thought that they might have come through Islay but there are no McCoy's listed or buriied in the cemetary on Islay. I saw the post related to Rathlan and wondered if this is our McCoy's? Our McCoy would have come through in the mid 1700 or earlier. They can be found living in Antrim and Tyrone By the begining of the 1800. We believe they may have come initially from Innverness to the Western Isles and then to Ireland. Is there any records from that period or have other  McCoy researched this route?

Cheers

Ron McCoy

Ron,

MacLysaght’s “The Surnames of Ireland” says McCoy is: “One of several anglicized forms of Mac Aodha (son of Hugh). Woulfe says it is almost peculiar to Co. Limerick, but in fact it is mainly found in north Ulster, where it is a galloglass family.”

(Galloglass were Scots mercenaries invited down from the western isles, mainly in the 1300s – 1500s, and given land by local Irish tribes in return for their fighting skills. When they were not fighting the English they were fighting each other and having skilled warriors was very important to them). 

According to Brian S Turner’s book: “Family names in the Glens of Antrim,”

McCoy is a variant of McKay. Other common versions found in that area (which includes Rathlin in his book) are Magee, McKee, McCay or McHugh. Turner says the McKays & McCoys found in the Glens came from Kintyre, notably around Ugadale. “The McKays were always associated with the McDonnells, and through this association are now found in the Glens of Antrim. The family dominated the 1541 Rental for north Kintyre and was also strong in Islay.” (Turner pp 112 & 113).

So I’d say the McCoys in Tyrone are a different line to those in Rathlin and the Glens who were not galloglass arrivals, but McDonnell tenants.

Hi Elwyn

According to my  YDNA we where McGillivray some time around the early to mid 1700 from Inverness. The name changed or McCoy was was adopted and the family seemd to make their way to Ireland. One branch of the family who were sailors tells that they came from so far North in Ireland that they were Scottish. Could that be Rathlain Island? I speculate that they may have come to Rathlin to find pertection and the family then spread out through Antrim to Tyrone and beyond. Don't know if that makes sense or not? It is a theory after all? I would like to find other peoples from Rathlin to compare DNA with especially McCoy's.

Thanks for your help

cheers

Ron McCoy

Ron,

My x4 grandfather was Henry McCouaig (then commonly spelt McQuig, sometimes McQuaig) of Rathlin Island. He married Annie Horan. One of their sons, Michael, married Alicia McCoy, daughter of Neil McCoy.

In the 1700`s and 1800`s there were many McCouaig and McCoy families on Rathlin. McCoy is, I believe, a variant spelling of McKay.

I believe that my ancestors came to Rathlin from Northern Antrim c 1750, likely from around Bushmills, and that before that they had fled from the McLeod estates in Glenelg, Invernesshire along with many others c1660`s as a result of religious persecution.

You might find the following account given by Rathlin resident Mickey Joe  Anderson in I think 1954 of interest....

   "McKays were known here as McKagues-the Gaelic form. They came here at the time of the Reformation.It appears as the story was told that whatever had happened McCuaig and Anderson were ordered into this shed, this was in Scotland but what part I don`t know. They were put into the shed in turn (alternately and alone) to swear loyalty to the king and the new Protestant religion. Anderson some way managed to get a squink (a peep as through a slit or crevice or aperature)through some vent and went to McCuaig and told him what was going on. So they decided not to go in. They didn`t know what was going to be asked of them til Anderson seen what it was.  On the way (when escaping) they met McKague. He was a Presbyterian and they were being punished as severely as the Catholics, and they told him what was going on. So he came with them and they came to Rackery (Rathlin). Thats all I ever heard."

Michael Murphy interviewed Anderson and this account is recorded in his great book on Rathlin.

Hope this helps

Bob McCouaig

Ron,

Genealogy on Rathlin is complicated by the fact that there were at least 3 major massacres of the population and, in some versions, nearly everyone on the island was killed which meant that those living there later must theoretically have all relocated to the island. (Tradition has it that many came from Scotland and others from mainland Antrim). I can’t say whether your McCoy family came from Scotland for protection. It’s certainly possible though as I say Turner seems to think the Rathlin group are different to those in Tyrone. But he’s only a very highly respected professor at Queens University. What does he know?

I have put a few extracts below to give a sense of the connections between Rathlin and Scotland and a flavour of the obvious constant movement and links across the centuries. There was massive interaction with Scotland and your ancestors might well have been a part of that. Hopefully some of this will be of interest to Bob as well.

I have attached the 1669 Hearth Roll for Rathlin (again taken from Turner), in case they are of interest.

Turner “Family names in the Glens of Antrim” (pp 139 - 141) says: 

“Black is locally regarded as being one of the oldest names on Rathlin and our seventeenth century sources record it there in that English form. This is after at least three massacres on the island in 1557, 1575 & 1642 which are supposed to have cleared its population. The McCurdys and Blacks appear in tradition as sole survivors of the massacres, but this may be affected by later rationalization based on the fact that these were the most numerous and firmly established families for as long as we have record. George Hill mentions a family tradition that the only person left alive after the 1575 massacre by the forces of the Earl of Essex, was a woman named McCurdy. He also records the tradition that after the Campbell massacre of 1642, a young woman who survived was carried off to Islay, but returning in old age discovered that her son had survived and was farming on the island. O’Laverty repeats this and adds that it was said that a man named Black survived by hiding on a sea rock near Bull Point and living on seaweed and shellfish.

But traditionally the connection of the Blacks with the island goes back beyond the sixteenth century. Although the name has long been anglicised, there is evidence that it does derive from Mac Giolla Dhuidh. One of Rathlin’s many stories of Scots invasion, which may or may not be modern but which is represented as happening before the arrival of Robert Bruce in 1306[1], tells of the defeat of the invaders by the Rathlin men under the leadership of Turlough MacIlieve, whose name in English is given as Charles Black. O’Laverty has recorded that the Rathlin Blacks of his time said their name was “Maelduv” which looks like a contraction of the Gaelic form. So the old Rathlin Blacks therefore seem to be identified with the family of Mac Giolla Dhuidh found in various parts of the west and south Highlands. This family may have had a connection with the clan Lamont, although it’s precise nature is not known. They may have been broken or landless people forced at an early period to make their way in places as far apart as Perthshire and Rathlin and other parts of the Antrim coast.”

Turner (pp 150/151):

“McCurdy is a well known Rathlin name and, with Black, is traditionally regarded as one of the oldest. It has long been the most common name in the island and remains strong to this day despite the great decline in population since 1800. For instance, in 1766, according to the reports present to the House of Lords that year by the clergy of the Established church, there were 35 McCurdy families in the island. The Blacks were second with 14 families. From Griffiths Valuation of 1861, after the Great Famine, I estimate that there were then about 12 McCurdy families, with the McQuaigs (now spelled McCouaig or McCuaig) second with seven. On the survey date in 1963 there were 16 McCurdy electors in Rathlin and the second name was McQuilken with 13 electors. The McCouaigs and McQuilkens are not numerous on the island now but the McCurdys hold their own.”

Turner p 151:

“Although identified with Rathlin for centuries, there was also an appreciable number of McCurdys settled along the mainland coast of north Antrim in the seventeenth century. With ten representatives they are tenth on the Hearth Money Roll for the survey area. Two are on Rathlin but five are in Culfeightrin and many others are to be found westward towards Portrush, and the name is still much more numerous in the Route than it is in the Glens, including Rathlin. In 1641/42 the murder of a young McCurdy boy, with other men, women and children, by the O’Cahans of Dunseverick was part of a dramatic and tragic story in the Depositions, told by Neil Mor McNeill, who incidentally demonstrated the close Scottish connections of north Antrim by casually mentioning that in his pursuit of the murderers of his Lowland Scots neighbours, the Spences, he had carried his Lochaber axe, a weapon almost exclusively identified with Highland Scotland.”

Turner p 169:

“Names formed from Christian or personal names are subject to the same process. An anglicised form has become standardized in the case of the Andersons from Rathlin. These are different from the “sons of Andrew” who are common in the Scottish lowlands and many of whom arrived in Ireland in the seventeenth century. The Rathlin Andersons are of the Argyll family of MacIllandrais, Mac Giolla Andreis, the devotees of St Andrew, whom in both Islay & Kintyre have also so anglicised their name.”

Of the island of Rathlin, Nils Homer observed in 1942:

“….the population used to be fishermen and sailors (and) a considerable intermarriage with Mainland Irish & Scots may be expected. Thus of the nineteen person listed as Irish speakers, three have mentioned Scottish parents or grandparents, three have supposed their ancestors came from Scotland, while the rest know of no other than their Irish. As for those who believe their ancestors were Scots, it must be remembered that there is a common theory in the island that every single family of those living there now are descended from Scots settlers who came to the island after the complete massacres in the sixteenth and seventeenth century.”

(Source Antrim & Argyll – Some aspects of the connection edited by William Roulston. Pp 99/100).

You mention that your ancestors “came from so far North in Ireland that they were Scottish”.  Yes that’s a description anyone in this part of Ireland would recognise, even today.  Ulster was very heavily settled by Scots, so much so they outnumbered the native population. (Today Presbyterianism is still the dominant denomination in Antrim, far outnumbering the Churhc of Ireland and the Roman Catholic church). Here’s a couple of quotes that might give a flavour of how Scottish this area was in the 1700s and 1800s:

Speaking of his youth in Aghadowey in the 1830s, page 25 of Autobiography of Thomas Witherow 1824 – 1890, pub 1990 by the Ballynacree Historical Society:

“Aghadowey had originally been settled by a Scotch migration and I found that my new neighbours spoke as pure Scotch as a man might hear in any part of Ayrshire.”

Talking of the district around Killaig and Ballycahan in the 1820s, Dr Bruce the local Minister 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.” Episcopalian protestants ie Church of Ireland were few and a Roman Catholic was almost as rare as a black swan.”

P13 of “A Kennedy Chronicle - Alexander Kennedy of Ballycahan”, by Hugh Alexander Hezlettt.

[1] Robert the Bruce is supposed to have taken refuge in a cave on Rathlin after getting a biffing from Edward I. It’s supposedly where he was inspired by a spider to resume the battle. There’s now a blue plaque on the island to commemorate the fact that he lived there in 1306.  (It’s probably fair to say that at least 2 caves in Scotland also lay claim to having been where he laid low. Who knows?).

Thanks, Elwyn

Ron, your mention of the name McGillivray rung a bell and on checking my stuff I can say that the McGilivrays, McCuaigs, McLeods and other families left Glenelg/Invernesshire on the ship Argyll in 1794 and settled in what became called Glengarry in Canada. The area was also called Glenelg. To date I have found only limited records for the families of Glenelg, Scotland. Maybe some Canadian or American descendants have done some searching there.

My descendants left Glenelg, Scotland well before 1794......I believe in the 1660`s. But later, ofcourse , many of those who had initially fled to North Antrim in turn emmigrated to Canada and America in search of a better life. Some of my descendants were amongst these. But my direct descendants, at that time, went only so far as Rathlin! I haven`t come across any McGillivrays on Rathlin...yet.

I wonder if you have any info to associate your Scottish ancestors with the Glenelg  estates of Clan McLeod. It seems conceivable that our ancestors back in the mid 1600`s may have been neighbours!

regards, Bob

Got my descendants mixed up with my ancestors, but I think you will get what I meant to say

Bob

Hi All

Thank you so much for all your information. I do share DNA with many McGillivray families and I live not to far from Glengary. My family origianlly planned to settle in the Scottish settlement near Montreal and Glengary but moved on to near Ottawa. I have a friend from Glengary who passed away recently in his ninties. He tells the family story of their families leaving Glenig. They all stood on the boats saying good by, with the families who stayed up on the rocks on shore and a piper played until they were out of sight never to see them again.

I find McGillivray in  the graveyard of severl cemeteries in Islay but have found none in Rathlin or Northern Ireland. I have also found the McCoy name at Inverness. I am told that there was a migration of miners who moved from Inverness to Islay. Possibly my family was amongst them or possibly they moved for religious reasons.Thank you all for your help an I look forward to further research in this area.

Cheers

Ron McCoy

JMinot in the first item of this thread noted that his x3 grandmother was Nancy Horan who married John McCoy and , following her husband`s death emigrated to Maine. USA. My x4 grandmother was Annie Horan (1787-1893) who married Henry McCouaig (then spelt McQuig) of Rathlin Island. Henry and Annie did not emigrate.

Several Horan families lived on Rathlin Island and I believe Nancy and Annie were nieces (Annie being a daughter of probably Alexander`s brother Martin). Other sisters or nieces of Nancy were Esther Horan and Margaret Horan, the latter marrying another McQuig, Moses McQuig (born c1783 0n Rathlin).

Henry McQuig`s son Michael married Alicia McCoy on Rathlin Island and they too stayed on Rathlin.

If anyone can shed light on the relationship between Nancy, Annie, Esther and Margeret Horan, or have any information on Moses McQuig  I would be very grateful

Bob McCouaig

The aforementioned Moses McQuig was related to the following

Michael McQuig Snr b before 1767 in or around Ballintoy or possibly on Rathlin

Michael McQuig Jnr b before 1794 probably on Rathlin

I strongly suspect that these Michaels were my x6 and x5 grandfathers and if anyone can give me any info re either and their families I would be elated beyond words

Bob McCouaig

Hi Bob

I reread your message of Dec 22 2020 about the McGillivray family who moved to Glengary Canada. I have recently found a family of McGillivray I share DNA with  who we have no know connection with. It is possible that the family from Glenig and our families are a connected branch of the same families. With out YDNA it would be hard to prove the connection as records aren't available.

Cheers

Ron