Carrolls in 18th & 19th Century Cork

Aims of this project

To identify all the descendants of Col Thomas O'Carroll who were living in Cork during the 19th century. When did they arrive there from Moira, where did they live and what were their occupations. Trace all their descendants.

Information available

John Carroll (b.1740) probably moved to Cork in his early years. In 1776 John married a Sarah Corfield (b1746) at Mallughmast, Kildare. They had four children, Samuel, Joshua (1781?-1831),Thomas (1784-1833) and John (1790-1804)

A potted history

The family history in Ireland can be split into three eras. The times when the O'Carrolls were pre-eminent in central Ireland up to the Battle of the Boyne; the sojourn in the Lagan valley (at Moira outside Belfast around Lisburn); and settlement in Cork until John (O)Carroll moved to England. There are very few dates known for these eras. We know of course that the Boyne was fought in 1690. The Cork Carrolls had left the homestead at Moira well before 1800 when Edward Carroll emigrated to America. Josuah was born in Cork in 1781(?). All known Carrolls had left Moira by the time an American cousin visited the old homestead in 1884.

We do not know when the Carrolls left Cork for England, let alone whether they moved en bloc or in dribs and drabs. Certainly Claude O'Carroll, my grandfather, moved to England as a boy (of about 12 in 1892) and was well established in England by the time he married Edith Bywater-Ward on 19 April 1911. I have a letter from John Carroll to his father dated 20 February 1892 from an address in Streatham which is now part of South London. I have assumed that this letter was sent to Cork but I have no proof of this. John's first wife, Annie, died in 1898 in Richmond. I don't know whether John's father ever moved to England but he died in Cork in 1905.

Joseph Hatton Carroll (John's younger brother) was married in Whitton, Middx, in 1892 (Rev.Thomas Carroll, his cousin was Vicar there from 1890, so I suppose he conducted the marriage). But his daughter Nesta was born in Cork in 1893. On the death of Joseph Hatton Carroll in 1929 he left property at Patricks Quay and MacCurtain Street, rent from Sidney Place and Carolina, which I have always assumed was his residence. This detail comes from a document prepared by J H Carroll & Sons of 80 South Mall, Cork. My grandfather was an executor of his will and paid out cheques to the Gosport District Gas Co and the Gosport electricity company. His wife Mary died in Gosport in 1941. It seems safe to assume that they lived in Gosport! They had two children Theodore and Nesta. Nesta married a Geoffrey Crick and the family ends there as far as I know.

John's elder brother was called Theodore and he had two children John (born 1867) and Joseph. Joseph had a daughter called Jocelyn who married a Richardson. She lived in Wimbledon at the same time as my part of the family but moved to Whitney near Oxford. I met her a couple times but alas I was not so interested in the family history as I am now. She had three sons, Brian, David and one other. She gave Brian O'Carroll (in Cornwall) three portraits of the Hatton ancestors. I believe that John's mother was a Hatton though it may have been his grandmother. The portraits are of Joseph Hatton (1821-1885) and his wife, and I assume his father Thomas Hatton (1784-1833). Joseph Hatton could not have been the father of John's wife but perhaps could have been his uncle and therefore the Joseph Hatton after whom JHO'Carroll was named. This is all a bit of a mystery on which no doubt Jocelyn Richardson could have shed some light.

The family tradition is that we are descended from Lieutenant-Col Thomas Carroll who died in 1690. The fact that he was attained in 1692 and his property confiscated does not contradict this part of the family tradition as this could happen after his death.

A Col Francis Carroll survived the Boyne and served in France in the Irish Brigade and died in the battle of Marsaglia. I believe that our ancestor was his first Lieutenant at the Boyne.

Are we related to Charles Carroll of Carrollton?

It has always been the tradition that there was some connection but how far back no-one was sure. Daniel Carroll was the great grandfather of Charles Carroll of Carrollton who signed the American Declaration of Independence. He has proved to be the common ancestor.

Daniel O'Carroll of Litterluna (d 1688) had four sons:
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Anthony of Lisheenboy
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Charles "the Settler"
1661-1720
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Lt.Col. Thomas
d.1690
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John
d.1733
James
Capt. in Ld Dongan's Regiment
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Charles Carroll of Annapolis
1702-1782
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Thomas
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3 sons
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
1737-1802
Edward
b1715
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John
1740-1776
  

Thus, Charles Carroll of Carrollton and Edward were second cousins.

Prepared by David O'Carroll, Leeds, UK.February 1997  Updated 27.9.98 and 24.10.99

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