Margaret Ann Stewart, born 1858, Ballyhome, Dunluce, Antrim

Jane:

Welcome to Ireland Reaching Out!

Our Co. Antrim expert is on holidays for a couple weeks but I will leave him your message for when he returns.

I located a civil marriage record in 1851 in the Belfast registration district which presumably is for your ancestors since one of the potential spouses was Jane Brown. See below. You could get a copy of the civil record from  PRONI for I believe two pounds.

https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/proni

The record should show where the bride and groom were living in 1851 and the names of their fathers. Eventually the marriage record will be free online at www.irishgenealogy.ie  Currently the images are available from 1882-1940 and there are plans to go back to 1845 but I don't know the implementation date for adding the earlier records.

I notice that you posted in Dunluce parish. The Presbyterian records for Dunluce appear to start in 1865.

Roger McDonnell

First name(s)John AlexanderLast nameStewartRegistration year1851Registered Quarter/Year1851Registration districtBelfastVolume3Page130 MarriageFinder™John Alexander Stewart married one of these people
Jane Lyle, Elizabeth Burrowes, Jane Hood, Jane Brown

Hi Roger,

Thanks for responding so promptly to my posting and for the search tips, which gave me a moment or two of excitement.  I've cross-referenced the marriage record you identified for John Alexander Stewart and the four potential spouses using the search indexes at nidirect.gov.uk.  It appears that he married Elizabeth Burrows.  Jane Brown married a Hugh Dugan.  So unfortunately not the marriage record I'm hoping to find.

I'll await the return of your Dunluce expert and hope has some further ideas.  I'd welcome suggestions from anyone reading this board.

Thanks, Jane

Jane,

I cannot find the marriage between John Stewart and Jane Brown either. That tends to suggest it took place before April 1845 when civil registration began. In which case you would need to search the records of the church where they married. And those may not have survived. As Roger has commented, if it was Dunluce Presbyterian church, then they have no marriages prior to 1845 and no baptism records earlier than 1865. The church has been there since the 1700s so if there were any earlier records then sadly they are lost. There’s the possibility that Jane Brown might have been Church of Ireland. Tradition was to marry in the bride’s church. Dunluce COI marriage records start in 1826, baptisms in 1809. Might be worth checking them. There’s a copy in PRONI in Belfast. A personal visit is required to view them.

I looked in Griffiths Valuation for 1859 for the townland of Ballyhome. There’s one Stewart household in the townland. That was Robert who had plot 10 which was a 25 acre farm. He might be related to your John Stewart. (It’s not a very big townland with only 37 houses in 1901). The farm today is on the west side of the Ballyhome Rd.

The farm remained in Robert Stewart’s name till 1877 when it changed to Jane & Eliza Stewart. In 1895 it changed to Mary Shaw. No Stewarts in the townland in the 1901 census. Family seem to have died out or moved away.

http://apps.proni.gov.uk/Val12B/ImageResult.aspx

The change of tenant c 1877 suggests Robert may have died around then. Searching Coleraine area deaths 1875 – 1879, I found just one, who died on 18.7.1876 aged 75. You might want to look at that death cert to see if it’s this family.

I looked for a will for him but did not find one.

In 1828 the Ballyhome farm was tenanted by James Stewart:

http://www.irishgenealogyhub.com/antrim/tithe-applotments/dunluce-parish.php#.WAiF7RR9eg0

So Robert Stewart, poss born c 1801 is old enough to be John Stewart’s father. James Stewart might be his father but difficult to confirm that without further evidence. Searching the local graveyards for gravestones might provide a link but there’s no guarantee.

Difficult to research the Brown family without knowing where they came from. There is a Browne family in Ballyhome in the 1901 census (Presbyterian) but it’s such a common surname that without some other evidence it wouldn’t be worth researching them, in my opinion.

Hello Elwyn,

Thank you for your very thoughtful response to my query and for your suggestions, research and information - there's nothing like local knowledge.  I have continued to work away on this since Roger's initial reply and have found a marriage between John Stewart and Jane Brown in 1837 in the Diocesan and Prerogative Marriage License Bond Indexes for the Diocese of Down, Connor and Drumore, which I believe encompassed County Antrim at the time in question.  This fits with your speculation that Jane was Church of Ireland.  However, the date is somewhat earlier than the timeframe I'd been searching given Margaret Anne's birth allegedly in 1858 - that's 21 years after this potential marriage of James and Jane's, although it's certainly not impossible for Jane to have continued to have children for this length of time.  It does also call into question the hypothesis that Robert is John's father.

Looks like the Duncluce COI marriage records in Belfast are the next logical place to look - given I'm on the other side of the world, I'll retain a researcher to do this for me (not that I wouldn't love a trip to Ireland but it's not feasible in the immediate future).

Thanks again to you and Roger for your input - it's really spurred me on to dig deeper on this bit of research.

Jane