Is anyone on here any good with Irish genealogy?

Hi all, (apologies if this is the wrong forum but this was closest I could find)
I would be hugely grateful if somebody could help me out with some genealogy research, My father recently passed away and something has come to light that may lead to nothing , basically it turns out my father was left land in Ireland in the late 70's early 80's by an aunt, as at the time he had no interest in returning to Ireland he just put it aside and forgot about it. I've managed to glean some details from my uncle but he is unable to help me any further,

If anyone can either help with searching for the info I need or point me in the right directions that would be amazing ! also if anyone could clarify whether there is anything in the law of Ireland that says he would have lost claim to the land by not using it? I want to find where it is either way, as it does form a part of my dad's history that I know little of?

If anyone is able to help please pm me and I will give you what info I have,

Kind Regards

a reply to: urbanfox

You will find the Mormons to be BIG into Genealogy.... all over the world. You might source them, Sorry, I don't have a link, but one ought to be real easy to find.

a reply to: urbanfox

Ancestry.com might help.
That's kind of the standard starting point for the UK but I'm not sure what coverage you'll find for Ireland.
More importantly, do you have access to the will?
A document which includes an inventory of property would be very helpful.

You may have to pay a search fee and there's a charge for copies. They would need to be certified for legal purposes.
See what assistance you can get from Ancestry.com first.
Failing that, you'd have to enquire with the County Record Office where your relatives were from.

Collect together as much information as you possibly can from family sources before contacting anyone official, though, because they'll need some basics before they start looking on your behalf.

Hope that's of some small help and good luck.

a reply to: urbanfox

I'd start by contacting either the Irish Embassy in DC or one of the consulates and see what they suggest.

Irish contact info

If you know the area where your family is from you can contact the local Parishes to see which your family belonged to and they could probably help you a lot.

a reply to: urbanfox

Probably compulsory purchased after all that time, due to an absent owner and not tending the land.

Eta try Ireland's equivilant of the land registry or department for agriculture or rural agencies.

Why genealogy???

What you would be looking for is Land/property registration. What part of Ireland, The Republic or Northern Ireland??...Two different countries. Would be a good strat to find out the county and possibly the address and take it from there.

a reply to: urbanfox

pm sent

a reply to: urbanfox

I'm of Irish descent and experiencing a similar problem, maybe the potato famine played a part. I recently found out my family owned a chateau (it looks more like a fort) but on the Irish side? no dice until...

If you suspect you are Irish then google your surname. I did and mine is Gaelic, as for the rest you can always try linking certain counties, villages or professions to names.

a reply to: urbanfox

Well... I used to work in Imaging at Ancestry's Corporate office, and my wife worked in the customer service department. Plotus is correct: Mormons have some seriously insane records. They had a representative that I worked with directly at Ancestry, and she told me stories about the vaults. Some of them were ghost stories, no joke. If records exist, they are probably here in Utah. Ancestry is certainly your best bet. I personally processed over a million records, and many of them were from Ireland. I was able to find out quite a bit from my family, including some of my Irish records. If it is important to you, I would give that a shot.

a reply to: urbanfox

I came into a similar issue in Scotland with a distant relative leaving me her estate. Get a lawyer.

a reply to: MisterMcKill

I worked in an archive here in the UK for a local authority.
We had some Mormons doing the microfilming of parish registers for us and they kept a copy of everything for themselves.
As far as I'm aware, that was the deal they had throughout the UK.
I'd love to see the extent of their total storage. It must be huge!!!

thanks, guys the land is in southern Ireland and I live in the UK. the problem I'm finding is all the online sites inc acestory.com don't have info that recent.

Ancestry site can help but Ireland is more difficult. On there I've been able to trace the census records down to the 1700's. Some provide house address relatives lived. Some don't. So you might be able to get the property details. Then proceed from there via other outlets.


Also if you know some ancestors names an approximate location they died, burial records often list house address. Back then, many just died at home too. Or the dates the next of kin was informed has the address. I used deceased online to search burial records but I knew approximate years of death.

www.prai.ie...

a reply to: urbanfox

If you knew which county it was in its possible that Land Registry might be able to help but I'm not sure how it works in the south or what details you need to start with.

Hey, I am Irish and suggest you start your search here:
www.citizensinformation.ie...
www.prai.ie...

I would be surprised if there were a statute of limitations on land ownership in Ireland, however, there may be local agreements about the use of such land, your grandaunt may have leased fields to local farmers for instance, that agreement may still be in effect today. One of the contributors earlier, mentioned taking legal council, probably not a bad idea. You won't find any relevant information free on those genealogy sites, as the 1911 census, is the latest record to be made public and these sites only cover up to that time.
Good luck on your search though, but beware of the dim and dark secrets you may uncover.

a reply to: urbanfox Was the land in the North Brittan part of Ireland or the Southern Part? I would fly over there for a week and go to the court house and find out, or call them. If the property taxes weren't paid it probably went back to the government and was resold at auction. It would in the USA after a period of time. I am guessing. How many years ago was the land left in a will/ trust to your father? The court house there would have a record they could find from his name. I would call over to the court house in that area and find out what can be done. Ask a realtor over there what to do. They would probably know. Get a real estate lawyer or a title lawyer. Do they have those over there? This sounds like the makings of a movie. Keep a journal of your journey. Exciting stuff here.

a reply to: feoil

Oh right it only goes back as far as 1911 Census. I didn't see the OP said around the 70's.
I still thought though if his aunt lived on that property in 1911 or earlier ( 1901) he might get the house address or this aunts burial Record might say



OP the census records show siblings and all who lived in the house, how many rooms it has and if you create a tree you can add in the siblings and their descendants likely have trees to use as clues ( only ever use them as clues as many people just go around adding whoever and can mess up your tree if you copy), but you can make as many trees as you like and I have one I put the iffy clues in. One I made had my grandmothers name spelt wrong, so I deleted it, only to go on a mad hunt for it later and it was indeed correct. Some people spell names incorrectly amd the year of birth is a guess if you keep in mind they took the census in April and the child's age is provided on it and they ( a transcriber who did it in our timeline) just guesses at the year of birth ( being month of birth can screw that up)

Religion helps too. Catholics are going to be buried in a catholic cemetery.

As many clues you can get on your aunt, start with that you can put about 1904 ( abt 1904) if you think she might have been born that year give or take one or two. Where you think she was born , where you think she lived, died, who her spouse & children were etc. Soon you get clues ( leafs) and you scrutinize all the details to see if they jive.

Im no expert at it, but I spent some time trying to find out more on my grandmother. Her father was Irish, last name Murphy. I was told I'd have no luck with that name! He filled it out and spelt my grandmothers name wrong. Anyways I got his place of birth in county Galway Ireland, got his burial Record ( died at home and address matched up to that census). Most births were at home too. I got his middle name from my grandmothers birth record. I ignore other clues since his name is all too common. One day I might find more. I did get his year of birth and death though. Got their home address. I found his missing son's ( my grt uncle) army records.

a reply to: urbanfox

The thing is that Ancestry has all kinds of records that have not gone through Imaging yet. They have an acquisition department, but deals on records can take years to get through various governments or religious or educational institutions, etc. Even when they get them, it takes a serious team of people (there are four shifts!) to make sure that they are properly scanned and formatted so that you can search them. I no longer work there, since they moved their Corporate office out of Provo, but I can say that the amount of material they process is amazing, and that there is always more on the way. Sadly, that may not help you now, but you never know what will come down the pike in the future. I would estimate that Imaging handles close to one million records a day between all shifts. I wish you the best in your search!