The PAYNEs/PAINEs of Dromore, Co. Down

P.S. Growell is a Townland in Dromore Parish.

Thanks,
Camille in Aberdeen, Maryland, USA

Hi Camille,

I apologize for the delay in responding. I've just become the Parish Liaison and am developing our Parish page and making sure all messages have been answered.

Have you made any progress in you search since this post? Hope so! If not, and you know the religion of the family, I suggest you try the following for some leads:

Births/Baptisms/Marriages/Deaths ? pre1790-1800 ? The reality of finding documentation pertaining to births/baptisms/marriages/deaths in Ireland prior to 1800 ? particularly in rural areas ? is that they simply may not exist. Some registers for urban areas pre-dating 1800 may exist ? though often these can be fragmented- as there was an increased need in cities or larger towns to document the population. Please also note that the Church of Ireland was the official church of the country and therefore the bulk of information that does survive for earlier periods is often from these registers.
ROMAN CATHOLIC: Most Catholic records are held locally - One site which might be of use is - http://www.irishtimes.com/ancestor/browse/ - where you can ?browse? an overview of available records per county. If you have any difficulty, you could try writing to the parish priest for possible assistance.
CHURCH OF IRELAND: Church of Ireland parish registers for the period up to 1870-are public records. Registers are available for about one third of the parishes, however many were destroyed in the Public Records Office in Dublin in 1922. Most are still held by the local clergy, although some are in the National Archives of Ireland and others are in the Representative Church Body Library in Dublin. A list of all surviving registers is available in the National Archives. http://ireland.anglican.org/about/42 and http://www.nationalarchives.ie/ The Anglican Record Project is has created an index to their records: http://ireland.anglican.org/cmsfiles/pdf/AboutUs/library/AngRecord/bunc…
PRESBYTERIAN: Presbyterian registers are held in three main locations: in local custody, in the Public Records of Northern Ireland (PRONI) http://www.proni.gov.uk/index/family_history.htm and at the Presbyterian Historical Society http://www.presbyterianhistoryireland.com in Belfast. PRONI has microfilm copies of almost all registers in Northern Ireland and also lists of records held by the Presbyterian Historical Society. For the rest of Ireland, almost all records are in local custody. It can difficult to locate these as many congregations in the South have moved, amalgamated, or simply disappeared over the last sixty years.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Beth