Poor Law Union townlands and some things.............

[Jane Lyons]

Every county has townlands covered by some Poor Law Union that we usually associate with another county - and some  people would never think of looking to the Poor Law Union records for that other county cos they don't understand the way all the divisions worked.

 

I'm using the term Poor Law Union because this is one which most of you are familiar with, and I'm always seeing people asking if there are any records for this or that Poor Law Union (PLU).  In honesty, they probably mean the workhouse when they are thinking of records, i.e. workhouse records.

 

Well, thing is that  from 1864 there are lots of Poor Law Union Workhouse records for ye, it's just a case of finding them and then knowing where to go look for them is another thing too.  It's in the civil records - civil registration records cos you see every birth, marriage and death that did occur in any workhouse was lalmost definitely registered in the civil books - cos that was the law and the workhouse managers obeyed the law (for teh most part)

 

The thing about Laois is that one of the Unions was broken up about 1887 and it was only created in 1850, so, between 1850 and 1887 you go looking for civil records for your family in one Poor Law Union and then after 1887 you have to look in another.  The one 1850-1887 is Donaghmore Civil registration district and then the townlands in this one were re-assigned to the Civil Registration Districts of Roscrea and Urlingford.

 

Anyway, I've put some tables of townland names in some of the Civil Registration Districts (aka Poor Law Unions) on the web, and I've also included the name of the District Electoral Division that they belong to.  It's not that I want to confuse people more by giving them this other division name, but it's the name you need when you go to resaerch the 1901 and 1911 census.  The census is in order of the Poor Law Union or Civil registration divisions and you have to look for the District Electoral Division and then that is broken up into the civil parishes and then the townlands.  I've also put some explanation of the census on my site as well and some other things.  To see what's there go to http://www.laoisgenealogy.com.  My first run at the index to names in the RC parish registers is finished so all the surnames are up and the URL for that is below.  Now, its down to adding more names

 

Jane

 

Roman Catholic Parish Register Name Index

http://www.laoisgenealogy.com/rcnames/index.htm

 

Laois  townlands Athy civil registration District (Poor Law Union)

http://www.laoisgenealogy.com/athy.htm

 

Laois Townlands Donaghmore Civil Registration District (Poor Law Union)

http://www.laoisgenealogy.com/donaghmore.htm

 

 

Laois townlands Carlow Civil Registration District or Poor Law Union

http://www.laoisgenealogy.com/carlow.htm