1872 will of James Kane ***Updated 6 Sep 2014***

The first major piece of documentation we have is a will for James Kane of Craigbilly (aka Crebilly). We know that Annie O'Keane's (married name: Glumaz) father's name was James and that he was from Craigbilly (and deceased in 1876) from her marriage announcement in the Liverpool Mercury newspaper.


This will can be found here by inserting James Kane in name surname fields and Craigbilly in the Full Abstract field in PRONI Will Calendars.

The first part of the will can be found on the bottom of p 261. From this portion, we learn Jame's kids' names. The boys are Patrick, William, Bernard and John. The girls are Rose, Martha, and Jane (although the 'a' in Jane looks like an 'e' to me). 

The second portion is at the top of page 262 and mentions his wife, Mary. James puts down his 'X' for his signature.

James gives 20 pounds to his son Patrick and to all his daughters listed in the will. This makes me think that Patrick is already doing well, or he is a young son? Not sure, but it is interesting that he gets the least amount of all the boys.

William gets 50 pounds. Bernard and John inherit the farm property and must share it and care for their mother, Mary. It is hard to guess what the birth order for the boys are. My gut reaction is that Patrick is the oldest, has chosen another line of profession, must be doing fairly well, so he gets the minimum amount. William must also be doing something different in way of a profession so he also gets money. Bernard and John are following in the father's footsteps so they get the farm land and all the responsibilities that come with it.

The second page deals with James' debts and how they are to be paid and the care of his wife, Mary. She is to live in her home and in a manner that she was accustomed too...Good Man that James!

So there are quite a bit of family names here that we can match from family documents and UHF church births in Crebilly : James, Mary, Martha, Bernard, amd William.

Missing, however, are Annie's own name and her brother, James. So how to account for that? Well, we know that Annie was the 3rd daughter from the marriage announcement, so we are guessing that Annie must be Jane. Annie wasn't married yet, although she was still probably in Birkenhead area (See 1871 UK Census here), so not necessarily at home.

From the 1901 Irish census, Bernard and James are at the same home in Crebilly, so it makes sense that James is John. Either James John or John James, although Crebilly church records indicate that a James Kane was born in 1841.

So these are the mysteries that lurk at us.

***Update***

Irish Civil Registrations can be viewed online at GRONI. Check this page to see how it works. I was able to locate James' death record. I used the 'snipping tool' from Windows 7 to capture the image for our records.

The date of death matches the will. We can see his son William reported his father's death. We also have an age listed for James Sr. which is 74. This gives us an approximate birth year of 1798.  We figured out that his wife, Mary, was about 14 years younger.

Another interesting side note is that the will has James' surname as Kane and his death records says O'Kane.