Moles Family

Hi,

Thank you for your message.

Unfortunately it may be difficult to find information as 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.

As you can see from the Irish TImes websites, Catholic records for Donaghcloney which is part of the Tullyish Catholic parish, only begin in 1833:

http://www.irishtimes.com/ancestor/fuses/rcparishmaps/index.cfm?fuseaction=showidrecords&CityCounty=Down&parish=Tullylish&churchid=440

Most surviving Church of Ireland records 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. Here are their websites: http://www.nationalarchives.ie/ and http://ireland.anglican.org/about/42

Lists of these surviving registers can also be found at the National Library of Ireland.

Some other websites that may be helpful are:

The National Library of Ireland http://www.nli.ie/en/family-history-introduction.aspx

The National Archives UK ? genealogy search: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/records/looking-for-person/

The Public Records Office of Northern Ireland http://www.proni.gov.uk/index/family_history.htm

Family Search: www.familysearch.org

Genealogy Links: http://www.genealogylinks.net/uk/ireland/down/index.html

It may also be an idea to contact the Ulster Historical Foundation for assistance, however a fee may apply.Here are their contact details:

Ulster Historical Foundation,

49 Malone Road,

Belfast,

BT9 6RY,

Northern Ireland.

Phone: +44 28 9066 1988 Email: enquiry@uhf.org.uk

Sorry I could not be of more help. Please be patient - as our programme has only begun to rollout across the island of Ireland and volunteers in some areas may not yet be organized.

Kind regards,

Genealogy Support

There are Moles in Donaghcloney, but the records I see do not cover the period you are interested in.  Are you sure your Moles are from Donaghcloney and do you know the names of siblings or parents?  Sometimes you can guess which family is involved if there are unusual names like Oliver in your family.  The last Mole entry in my church records is James having Margaret in 1698.  There is a gap and then there is John and Judith having John in 1830 in A'noon.  I don't know if all the church records were lost for that period, but it was common.