My Michael Munnelly may have been from Carrowmore, but I do not really know. He was supposedly born 1838-1840. I don't suppose you know if your Mary Munnelly was the youngest or oldest of her siblings? Because Patrick and Mary Munnelly were the sponsors at Michael's son's baptism in Belmullet, this information sounds very encouraging. I do, however, know how common those names may have been at that time. I appreciate your passing it on.
One avenue I have pursued is y-DNA testing. There are a lot of people doing "genealogy by DNA" now. Males pass on a set of distinct genetic markers to their sons at conception. Over several generations, these markers still look the same in later male descendants, for the most part. The markers do mutate very slightly over time, and some markers mutate faster than others.
I am one of the co-administrators of the Manley/Munley/Munnelly y-DNA Surname Project at Family Tree DNA. We have a set of people that have been tested who are all descended from Munnellys in Mayo. They have some marker values that are different, and quite a few that are the same. So far, all of the descendants that have been tested have one marker value that is very rare. That implies that all the Munnellys from Mayo descended from the same person about 350-500 years ago.
My brother has had his DNA tested. He is a straight line male Munnelly descendant from those Munnellys in the Belmullet area. I would love to find someone who is a straight-line male Munnelly currently in the Belmullet area who would agree to be tested. The testing costs about $150.00 USD
if the person joins the surname project. I might be able to cover part of the cost with money that has been donated to the project.
At any rate, if you come up with any additional information about Mary Munnelly's siblings, I would b very interested.
Best regards,
Marianne Manley Granoff
Albuquerque, NM
