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My great-grandfather was Daniel O'Sullivan, born in Kilgarvan in 1836, the son of Florence and Julia Sullivan. He married Honora Dinneen and my grandmother, Catherine, was born in 1872. Daniel was killed in 1873. Honora Dinneen Sullivan subsequently married Jeremiah Donovan and had several more children. In 1884, the family, including Catherine, emigrated to Chicago, Illinois. My aunt, Delores Boyle, said that Daniel O'Sullivan was the parish clerk and died trying to defend the parish priest from a mob angered by the priest's support of a Protestant. The mob started throwing stones and my grandfather, Daniel, was struck and died. I would like to be able to document this history. Does anyone know if there was a local newspaper or record of some sort that I might investigate? Also, I have been able to determine from  various online records that my Sullivan ancestors lived at Gortnaskeigh. The 1911 census showed that there were still Sullivans living at Gortnaskeigh. Are there Sullivans living there now? I would be grateful for any information. By the way, Catherine later went on to marry Thomas Boyle from Fedamore, County Limerick and have 13 children, living in Chicago. I am the daughter of her second youngest child, Emmet Jeremiah Boyle.

 

Mary Catherine

Thursday 24th May 2012, 03:16AM
Kilgarvan (Kerry)
Kerry

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  • Hi there,

    There are Roman Catholic church records available for the diocese of Kilgarvan. These date from 1818 for baptismal and marriage records. You can find these at the National Library of Ireland, Pos. 4290. If you have any difficulty, you could try writing to the parish priest for more assistance.

    Could you please post your message on the Fedamore parish page here: http://www.irelandxo.com/group/fedamore-limerick

    There are Roman Catholic church records available for the diocese of Fedamore. These date from 1806 for baptismal records and 1814 for marriage records. You can find these at the National Library of Ireland, Pos. 2409, 2429, and 2430. If you have any difficulty, you could try writing to the parish priest for more assistance.

    I would suggest that you contact the Kerry County Library for more assistance regarding Daniel O'Sullivan. You can find more information here: http://www.kerrycolib.ie/local.asp

    Civil registration records are available from the General Register Office (GRO). These start from 1864 however. You can access the website here: http://www.groireland.ie/research.htm

    You could also try checking the land records called the Tithe Applotment Books (1823-38) or the Church of Latter Day Saints (LDS). or the later Griffith's Valuation (1848-64). Griffith's is freely available here: www.askaboutireland.com or here: www.failteromhat.com Failte Romhat has lots of other useful links you could try looking at. Tithe Applotment Books (1823-38). Microfilm copies of the books for all of Ireland are available at the National Archives of Ireland (NAI) http://www.nationalarchives.ie/genealogy1/genealogy-records/tithe-applotment-books-and-the-primary-griffith-valuation

    Please make sure you link anyone else in your family who is interested in their Irish heritage to our site - and indeed anyone else you know of Irish heritage.

    Kind regards,

    Sinead Cooney

    Genealogist (Ireland XO)

    Wednesday 6th June 2012, 03:25PM

  • Dear Mary Catherine
    I am very familiar with Gortnaskiegh, Kilgarvan and I was very interested to happen upon your post while researching family history for my husband's family.
    I can confirm that there is nobody living in Gortnaskiegh since the 1970s approximately.
    My husband's family came from Gortnaskiegh too. They were originally Sullivan's too changing to Healy through marriage but I don't think they were the same family as you have identified. In the 1850s there were 5 Sullivan families living in the townland. 4 Daniel Sullivans and one florance Sullivan.
    I tried to unearth information on the incident of the killing of your great-grandfather in the newspaper archives but no luck so far.
    Please let me know if you have any other information on these sullivans etc
    Kind regards
    Niamh Healy

    Niamh Healy

    Friday 11th August 2017, 10:22PM
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