Friday, March 10, 2006
Tir Eoghan
If first names are any indication--and they were significant up through my ancestors' emigration to South Carolina in 1768--then there appears to be a strong possibility that our line of O'Neals are descended from Owen, the first O'Neill king, as well as Shane "The O'Neill" aka "Defender of the [Catholic] Faith" born c.1500 to Con Bacagh O'Neill, the first Earl of Tyrone (Land of Owen), and his wife Alice.
This Shane, who died in 1567, married twice-once to an O'Donnell and later to a MacCarthy. His sons were Henry, Con, Art, Hugh (the "Great O'Neill" who led the 1601 rebellion at Kinsale), Shane, and two others unnamed, as well as a daughter Alice.
Leaping ahead in time to my emigrant ancestor Shane O'Neal, b. 1728 in Ireland, and his Irish-born children Jane, Alice, Margaret, and Arthur, it seems likely he and his wife Margaret were honoring this specific lineage.
The earldom of Tyrone (Tir Eoghan) was first conferred by Henry in 1542 on Conn Bacach O'Neill, and was forfeited in 1614 when an act of attainder was passed against his grandson Hugh, 2nd earl--the famous rebel mentioned above--who fled from Ireland along with Hugh O'Donnell, the earl of Tyrconnell (Donegal) and Hugh Maguire, the earl of Fermanagh, in 1607.
Descendants of Con Bacach (in Spain) continued to style themselves earls of Tyrone till the death early in the 18th century of Owen O'Neill, grandson of Owen Roe (Eoghan Ruadh) O'Neill [who returned to fight the British in 1641], himself the son of Art MacBaron O'Neill, and 1st cousin of Art Og O'Neill.
While it is sometimes difficult to piece together this lineage, the names Hugh, Shane (Sean), Conn, Art, and Alice continue in this line right up to where it reappears in 1728 as John (Shane) and forty years later as his son Arthur, daughters Margaret, Jane and Alice, on the Belfast ship list in our family records.
Today, the "Great O'Neill" Hugh's castle in the community of Dungannon (Co. Tyrone, North of Ireland) is now an RUC police station, and the O'Neals as represented by my mother and her sister's black hair and dark eyes still suggest the possible infusion of Spanish blood from the generations exiled on the Galician and Cantabrian coasts adjoining Asturias and Basque country, but my investigation--for now--comes to a dead end on the docks of Belfast two and a half centuries ago.
I recently, however, located an Arthur O'Neal in the 1766 Religious Census Returns for Co. Tyrone, Diocese of Armagh, Carnteel Parish. As well as Freeholders' Records of the early 1800s where I discovered John O'Neal of Co. Armagh. I also came across two O'Neale jurors listed in the 1608 Dungannon Inquisition, one of whom was the son of a Sir Arthur O'Neale. And while browsing through some old Irish maps, I found the ancient tribal name of the Ua Neills in the Armagh/Tyrone region was Airthir, which I presume to be an Irish version of Arthur.
In the end, it seems I've come close to completing the links, but despite the thousands of blood relatives who undoubtedly reside in Ireland today, I'm in many respects separated by more than a few thousand miles from finding them.
This Shane, who died in 1567, married twice-once to an O'Donnell and later to a MacCarthy. His sons were Henry, Con, Art, Hugh (the "Great O'Neill" who led the 1601 rebellion at Kinsale), Shane, and two others unnamed, as well as a daughter Alice.
Leaping ahead in time to my emigrant ancestor Shane O'Neal, b. 1728 in Ireland, and his Irish-born children Jane, Alice, Margaret, and Arthur, it seems likely he and his wife Margaret were honoring this specific lineage.
The earldom of Tyrone (Tir Eoghan) was first conferred by Henry in 1542 on Conn Bacach O'Neill, and was forfeited in 1614 when an act of attainder was passed against his grandson Hugh, 2nd earl--the famous rebel mentioned above--who fled from Ireland along with Hugh O'Donnell, the earl of Tyrconnell (Donegal) and Hugh Maguire, the earl of Fermanagh, in 1607.
Descendants of Con Bacach (in Spain) continued to style themselves earls of Tyrone till the death early in the 18th century of Owen O'Neill, grandson of Owen Roe (Eoghan Ruadh) O'Neill [who returned to fight the British in 1641], himself the son of Art MacBaron O'Neill, and 1st cousin of Art Og O'Neill.
While it is sometimes difficult to piece together this lineage, the names Hugh, Shane (Sean), Conn, Art, and Alice continue in this line right up to where it reappears in 1728 as John (Shane) and forty years later as his son Arthur, daughters Margaret, Jane and Alice, on the Belfast ship list in our family records.
Today, the "Great O'Neill" Hugh's castle in the community of Dungannon (Co. Tyrone, North of Ireland) is now an RUC police station, and the O'Neals as represented by my mother and her sister's black hair and dark eyes still suggest the possible infusion of Spanish blood from the generations exiled on the Galician and Cantabrian coasts adjoining Asturias and Basque country, but my investigation--for now--comes to a dead end on the docks of Belfast two and a half centuries ago.
I recently, however, located an Arthur O'Neal in the 1766 Religious Census Returns for Co. Tyrone, Diocese of Armagh, Carnteel Parish. As well as Freeholders' Records of the early 1800s where I discovered John O'Neal of Co. Armagh. I also came across two O'Neale jurors listed in the 1608 Dungannon Inquisition, one of whom was the son of a Sir Arthur O'Neale. And while browsing through some old Irish maps, I found the ancient tribal name of the Ua Neills in the Armagh/Tyrone region was Airthir, which I presume to be an Irish version of Arthur.
In the end, it seems I've come close to completing the links, but despite the thousands of blood relatives who undoubtedly reside in Ireland today, I'm in many respects separated by more than a few thousand miles from finding them.
