We were recently contacted by an Irish Sunday Newspaper to research the family History of Enda Kenny, the leader of Fine Gael, Ireland’s second largest political party. During the leader’s speech at his party conference before the recent general election Enda Kenny had very movingly invoked the proud memory of his maternal grandfather as the source of his inspiration in public life. The story is one of a family that through education was able to improve its position in life, a story we find repeated in many of the searches we carry out on behalf of our clients and is a deep source of pride for them. The newspaper thought that readers might be interested to learn more about this man so we took up the challenge.
Our initial information was limited in that although we knew Enda Kenny’s grandfather’s date and place of birth (27th Oct. 1879 or 1880), we didn’t know his parents’ names. Therefore we had to identify all infant boys registered in the name of “James McGinley” between the last quarter of 1879 and 1880 to ensure that we picked up the correct individual, and not someone with the same name born in the same district. This was particularly important given how common the surname ‘McGinl[e]y’ was in the area. (We actually called up 14 birth certificates s before we were confident we had the correct James McGinley) Similarly, we didn’t have the name of James McGinley’s wife, or the approximate date of marriage and so we had to search across a time-frame starting in 1905 and searching +/- 5 years either side, based on his approximate age.
Even so, we were entirely successful in tracing all the documents set out in our original search strategy and we got the McGinleys back to 1857.
Enda Kenny's gt-gt-grandfather John McGinley and his brother and sister would have been born in the 1830s in the Glenties area of Donegal, which at that stage was a Gaeltacht, with little infrastructural development, and no real industry. Unfortunately, there are no surviving parish registers and very few sources for this area with which to find out more about the family at this time. Tracing the family forward in time from the mid 19th Century to the mid 20th Century you see a continuous upward trajectory, exemplified by the change in occupation by the head of household - from cottiers to light-house-keepers.
The 1901 and 1911 Census of John McGinley (Enda's gt-grandfather) show where the family is coming from - the brother Patrick is recorded as a mono-glot - he only speaks Irish and he's not literate. The census is particularly valuable, in that it also shows that all the younger generation [James born 1879, and his sisters] have all received an education - they're all literate. This factor - education - was obviously central to the McGinley family's ability to improve their position.
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