RootsChat.Com

Oh thank you everyone!!  I knew that Rootschatters would come to the fore with ideas - as you have done for many a year of my researching!  Busy day today - but will be right into your ideas later on...  How annoying it is when life gets in the way of researching!!  Cheers!

Returning to my Irish research, also doing Irish Genealogy Essentials course with Ulster Historical Foundation.  15 years after my initial research, am excited to know about lots of alternative options for records... PRONI has sooo much available, but so disappointed - seems majority are not "viewable" online. - Trip from Australia is beyond me!  PRONI website gives a link to view list "10,000" records online - but the link seems to tell me only about records added this past year or two... Waste of time trawling through masses, to find most  not viewable (even when I ask for "digital" only).  Can anyone advise or give links to help me with this basic issue of how to use PRONI?? For us who just cannot visit?  Am contemplating using their researcher options, but $$$ - and a lot to be searching for!!  Comments anyone?

Halò a chairdean!  As a young expatriate Glaswegian, (too many years ago to count),  with very strong Irish origins, Gàidhlig and knowledge of Scottish heritage were very low on my agenda.  Marrying an Aberdonian here in Australia, years passed before I learned of his strong Stewart/McMillan Highland Traveller heritage.  The 1911 census told me that his paternal grandparents were born ann an Leòdhas, agus bha iad a' bruidhinn Gàidhlig, agus Beurla!  More years passed, as did my beloved Aberdonian, and since then my  long standing Family tree addiction combined with love of my Scottish heritage, and knowledge of my husbands family history has led to efforts to learn Gàidhlig - cànan glè inntineach agus doirbh!! Recent contacts (follow on from posts of years ago) have resurrected my Family Tree efforts. Like many, I had thought (how dumb) that I had just about "done it all"!  So, - reason for this post?  Well, tha mi cho toilichte gu bheil fios agam ri mo shinnsir (às an Èirinn), ach gu bheil fìos agam ri dualchas Albannach!  I am happy also to know of the resurgence of the Gàidhlig language -  so much stronger than it was when I left Scotland so many years ago! 

Hi again Shanreagh,
Sorry - a typo -  omitted year of birth of Mary -  to clarify other points;
1)  Mary was born on 1/8/66. in Nenagh Co. Tiperrary.
2)  Date of Glasgow census was 1871, child listed as Mary Kenny age 4 (birth mistakenly listed as Glasgow Scotland - should have been Ireland.)
3)  Mary was always under the name Kenny or Kenney - never McNab
4)  Mary's parents Michael Kenney (cert. actually written as "Canny" but all else correct), and Jane McNab were married on 6th February 1866 in Templemore, Thurles Tipperary.
5)  Michael and Jane actually met in Glasgow Scotland in 1865.  Jane, her parents and her siblings had moved from County Tyrone in 1864, and they lived in the Gallowgate Glasgow - close to military barracks.  Jane and 2 of her sisters married soldiers.  Michael Kenny was born circa 1828 in Tulla Co. Clare, he was with 59th Foot Regiment which was stationed in Glasgow for a time, where he met Jane.  The Regiment went from there to Tiperrary, where he and Jane married.- He served a total of 18 years in India, East Indies, Cape of Good Hope, Ceylon..  before discharge on 18th December 1873.  He went on to marry Isabella Carter on 3/3/1874 in Limerick.  He and Isabelle sailed for New Zealand on 14/4/1874....  (and actually left a trail of incidents of petty crime  in NZ which makes very interesting reading).  In all of this there is never a single mention of the child Mary Kenny.  They go on to have one child in NZ,  - no descendants.    Mary's grandparents Francis and Mary McNab seem to leave Scotland fairly soon after their daughter Janes death in 1872 - no further records for them found in Scotland, but after much time found deaths for both of them in Omaha Co. Tyrone area - 1885 and 1890. 
Sorry, I told you it is a long complex story.  So many possibilities...

Hi Shanreagh,  Thank you for the offer, but I don't know whether you would be into what is a long complex story!    Quite some years ago, I did a lot of research on Mary Kenney (Kenny) and her parents Michael Kenney (Kenny, Canny) and Jane McNab (my great, great aunt).  Mary was born/baptised 1st August in Nenagh Co. Tiperrary, and also appears with mother Jane McNab and McNab grandparents in 1871 Glasgow census.    Her mother Jane had applied for Poor Law Relief, Glasgow in 1870,  but was refused as the child was not born in Glasgow. This is the last time I have any actual official documents mentioning the existence of Mary the child.   Jane then died in Glasgow in 1872.  Through all this the father Michael Kenney, an Irish soldier, is in India etc. etc.  He then goes back to Ireland, marries again, and migrates to New Zealand, dying there in Oamaru in 1890.   So to get to the point, I have failed to find ongoing records for Mary Kenney (Kenny) in Scotland, or Ireland, and she definitely did not go to New Zealand with her father.  Jane McNabs own parents Francis and Mary McCue  leave Scotland some time after 1873, (after ten very sad years in Scotland) and both of them, Mary's grandparents, died (1885 and 1890) in Omagh area Co. Tyrone, place of the family origin.  We had thought they could have taken the child with them back to Ireland, as no family available to help in Glasgow.... but there is no mention in their own death records of the child, in fact Mary's grandfather Francis McNab dies in the Omagh Workhouse.  Wow..... I wasn't fooling when I said it was a long complex story - and it could be a total waste of time for anyone to attempt further research!  Poor child Mary could have died, got married, migrated, ended up in a workhouse.... but "Mary Kenny" is quite a common name.   A true "needle in a haystack"!  so.... Thank you for the offer!!!!