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Hello from Australia.

I am so pleased to have found your website. What a breath of fresh air for people tracing their Irish roots! I visited Enniscorthy briefly in 2004 and absolutely loved it. I hope to be able to come back and stay longer one day.

I am a descendant of Samuel and Esther BENNETT through their son, Thomas Samuel BENNETT who I believe was born in Enniscorthy about 1832-35. Samuel and Esther BENNETT and their 6 children sailed for Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania, Australia) on the ship "William Metcalfe" in October 1836 and arrived in Hobart Town on 24 Jan 1837. They were partly sponsored by the British government because they had daughters who were of a marriageable age, and at the time there was a great shortage of women in Van Diemen's Land! Their referee was the minister of St Mary's, Enniscorthy.

I believe Esther BENNETT was formerly Esther CARROLL and that the couple were married in 1815 (This information from the Marriage Bonds for the Diocese of Ossory).

The only one of their children I have found a birth record for was Jane, the eldest, born/baptised 12 April 1816 at St Mary's, Enniscorthy. Jane's birth information was found for me by the minister of St Mary's many years ago, probably 1980s, but he couldn't find any other records at the time.

I have also found a record of Samuel Bennett in the Tithe Applotment Books for  Templeshannon in 1834.

I would love to know if the BENNETT or CARROLL families still have descendants in Enniscorthy today, or if anyone else is researching them.

Kind regards

Heather Minol

Wednesday 21st Sep 2016, 08:02AM

Message Board Replies

  • Heather:

    Welcome to Ireland Reaching Out!

    We do not have a parish liaison for Enniscorthy but I will provide some general info.

    The Church of Ireland records for St. Marys go back to 1798 but it appears they are held in the Representative Church Body Library in Dublin. See first link below. You may want to first see if you could contact the church in case the records are there. I could not locate an e-mail for St. Marys but the second link below is for the diocese and hopefully they can clarify where the records are.

    Since your ancestors left Ireland almost 180 years ago, it will be very difficult to determine if there are distant relations still in the Enniscorthy area. I did give you a link to the online phonebook. Make sure you use the Residential TAB.

    You may also want to consider autosomal DNA testing and maybe you will match someone who also has Bennett and Carroll ancestors.

    Roger McDonnell

    http://timeline.ie/finding-your-irish-roots/representative-church-body-…

    http://cashel.anglican.org/?page_id=1856

    https://www.eirphonebook.ie/

    Castlemore Roscommon, IrelandXO Volunteer ☘

    Wednesday 21st Sep 2016, 05:14PM

  • Hello Roger,

    Thanks so much for all the information, links and advice. I'll double check on the St Mary's records, though I do know that when I wrote to the church back in the 1980's, the records were still there. Unfortunately, the minister only found the birth of the first child (of 6) and nothing else. I certainly would like to have the records checked again, though, because I'm sure there should be some more records lurking there somewhere! They were still living in Enniscorthy 5 children later so I don't know why the records wouldn't be there.

    I had a DNA Autosomal test done earlier this year but no Bennett or Carroll links have turned up do far. It's still early days though, and I'm hoping I will eventually find some connections.

    Thanks so much for you kind welcome and help.

    Regards

    Heather Minol

    Sunday 9th Oct 2016, 11:20AM

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