Found! Maps and histories, together with some minute details
from the Freshford parish records, locate Kile as a townland a couple miles north-northwest
of Freshford.
Two baptism records provide the clues that solve the problem
of where to find Kile in Freshford parish. One is Dennis Buggy’s older sister’s baptism:
p
|
date
|
child
|
father
|
mother
|
male sponsor
|
female sponsor
|
residence
|
1
|
7 Feb 1825
|
Eliza
|
Richd Buggy
|
Mary Branagan
|
[none]
|
Margt Buggy
|
2-6 Kile St G[___]
|
Notice that her residence is not simply Kile, as for all the
other Buggy children’s baptisms. The
meaning of 2-6 is unknown, but “Kile St G[___]” is intriguing, even
though a smudge obliterates the rest of the word. It takes on meaning when another baptism a few pages later
specifies a residence of “Kile Tulleroan.”
Two Kiles in the Parish?
That’s what it looks like. Tullaroan
Parish was separated from Freshford parish in 1843, well after these baptisms. It’s to the west of Freshford parish,
on the western border of County Kilkenny.
It appears, from the baptism records,
to have been somewhat distinct even some twenty years before the separation.
Searching for Kile (or Kyle) and St. G___ and Freshford A
Google search for
“Kyle” and “St. G ” and “Freshford” brings up an
eighteenth-century travelogue. The
book describes the natural and man-made features of Ireland, including castles,
“Noblemen & Gentlemen’s Seats,” and ruins. It follows the roads, pointing out interesting sites and the
mile markers where they would be found.
One ride runs from the town of Kilkenny west to Urlingford via
Freshford. Of a two-mile area
northwest of Freshford, the author writes (emphasis added):
A mile beyond
Freshford, on the L. is Kilrush, the seat of Mr.
St. George; and farther on is
Kyle, the seat of Mr. Colclough; and a
little farther are the ruins of four castles, all within the distance of a mile.
Urlingford is about 9 miles west of Freshford along present
route R693.
The Kyle that was somehow related to
St. George lay between one and two miles west of Freshford, in the vicinity of
Kilrush. Happily, this is in
Freshford Catholic parish and very likely the Kile/Kyle of the Buggys.
On this hand-drawn map based on the travelogue, Kile lies at
about the two-mile mark west of Freshford, a mile beyond Kilrush. Note Johnstown, home of Catherine
(Phelan) Buggy, and Tullaroan Townland to the south of Kilrush, the name known
from the Kile Tullaroan baptism.
.jpg) |
Location of Kile, about two miles west of Freshford (left, unlabeled, dot)
adapted by Judy Kellar Fox
|
The Freshford Catholic Parish registers indicate a number of
people who resided in “Three Castles.”
Could this relate to the travelogue’s
“ruins of four castles”? An 1862
publication suggests it may be, and gives a name: Balleen Castle:
ABOUT two miles north west from the
little town of Freshford, county Kilkenny, stand the imposing ruins of Balleen
Castle. Situated on ground of considerable elevation, though of rather gradual
ascent, they overlook a country of beautifully diversified appearance, in fine
cultivation, and interspersed with numerous interesting remains of antiquity.
Once a principal strong-hold of the noble house of Ormond, this castle was of
considerable importance, as is sufficiently attested by the extent of the
ruins, and the elegance of those parts of the building that have escaped
destruction. Of the original structure but two towers at present remain.
Balleen Castle, in ruins already before Dennis Buggy was
born, lay within a mile of Kile.
It formed part of the landscape he and his family saw every day. And this is what it looks like today.
Kilrush The eighteenth-century travelogue also mentions Kilrush,
which shows up on current maps
. An early twentieth-century history of
the Diocese of Ossory (which includes Freshford Parish) describes Kilrush as
part of the
civil parish of
Clomantagh and of the
Catholic parish
of Freshford. Kilrush castle was
associated with the Shortall family and then the St. George family.
This is perhaps, then, the origin of
the distinction of Kile St. George: the part of Kile in the lands of the St.
George family.
The same diocesan history describes the townlands the
Shortalls lost at the time of Cromwell, and they include, besides Kilrush, one
called “Kyle[ballynamoe].”
Notice that this is “Kyle,” but with
more to the name, and the brackets suggest that the full name was not always
used. Kyleballynamoe lies
in the vicnity of Kilrush, just as the
eighteenth-century travel guide described Kyle, about two miles west of
Freshford.
Kyleballynamoe Although Kile/Kyle doesn’t show up on maps or database
searches of townlands, the full name, Kyleballynamoe, does. Here it is, about two miles west of
Freshford, in the lower left part of this map:
.jpg) |
Kyleballynamoe in relation to Freshford and Kilrush
adapted by Judy Kellar Fox
|
Like Kilrush, Kyleballynamoe belongs to Freshford Catholic
Parish, but it is in the civil parish of Tubbridbritain. It would not be found in lists of the
townlands in Freshford civil parish.
The name means Church of the Ford-Mouth of the Cows, perhaps derived
from a cow trail, as the church itself sat about twenty yards from the Nuenna
River (north of Rte. 693).
The 1901 census of Ireland shows the townland comprising
just over 595 acres. The number of
residents of Kyleballynamoe had decreased from eighty-four in 1881 to
thirty-eight in 1901, the dwellings from eighteen to twelve.
Perhaps there were more families
residing in the area when Dennis Buggy and his family lived there. A wonderful
map from 1794 at the
National Library of Ireland describes the fields and acreages in a portion of Kile. They include turnip fields, clover
fields, tenant gardens, orchards, lawns, and a field called “Limekiln,” giving
an idea of the variety of crops and sizes of fields in the decades before the
Buggy children’s baptisms.
So there we have it: Dennis Buggy’s birth townland, narrowed
down to an area of 595 acres in the vicinity of lovely Balleen Castle
ruins. I’ve stuck the map tack in
Kyleballynamoe, Tubbridbritain, County Kilkenny, Ireland, and I’m counting on
my friend to bring me a photo of her ancestral Irish townland!
Next Time: A Wrap-Up
The Post Chaise Companion: or Travellers
Directory through Ireland, Containing a New & Accurate Description of the
Direct and principal Cross Roads, with particulars of the Noblemen &
Gentlemen’s Seats, Cities, Towns, Parks, natural Curiosities, Antiquities,
Castles, Ruins, Manufactures, Loughs, Glens, Harbours, &c. &c., Forming
An Historical & Descriptive Account of the Kingdom, To which is added, A
Travelling Dictionary, or Alphabetical Tables, Shewing the distances of all the
Principal Cities, Boroughs, Market & Seaport Towns in Ireland from each
other, 4
th ed.
(Dublin:
J. Fleming [1786]), col. 476; digital images,
Google Books (
http://books.google.com
: accessed 4 May 2013).
William
Carrigan,
The History and Antiquities of
the Diocese of Ossory, 2 vols. , Vol. 2 (Dublin: Sealy, Bryers &
Walker, 1905), 257; digital images,
Google
Books (
http://books.google.com :
accessed 3 May 2013).
Accounts and Papers: Seventy-Seven Volumes, Population (Ireland):
Province of Leinster, Session 16 January 1902—18 December 1902, Vol. CXXII, Vol. 68, Census
of Ireland for the Year 1901. Part I, Area, Houses, and Population, Vol. 1,
Province of Leinster, No. 4, County of Kilkenny (Dublin: His Majesty’s
Stationery Office, 1901), p. 52 for Urlingford Union; digital images, Google Books (http://books.google.com : accessed 3 May 2013).
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