Courtney McGrailFrom Laois to Kerry
by Michael Christopher Keane (Beechgrove, Ovens, Cork
€20 + P&P; contact: mjagkeane@gmail.com).
J. Anthony Gaughan
This little book falls into two parts. The first deals with the Laois origins and continuing presence in Kerry of the Moores, Kellys, Dowlings, Lawlors, Dorans, Dees, and McEvoys. The second part records the remarkable lives of their transplanter and landlord Patrick Crosbie and his successor Sir Pierce Crosbie,
The above surnames are among the most popular family names in North Kerry at present. The ancestors of those people once resided in what is now known as Co Laois. This is an account of why and how they were transplanted to Kerry by Patrick Crosbie in 1607-9.
The surnames belonged to members of the Seven Septs (clans) of the O’Moore territory. In the early seventeenth century they opposed attempts by the English to pacify the midlands. Eventually they were vanquished and their leader, Owny Rory O’Moore, was killed in battle.
The authorities in London decided to expel the Seven Septs from their ancestral lands and replace them with loyalist settlers. Land was available in Kerry following the ethnic cleansing of Munster during the Elizabethan-Desmond war. Patrick Crosbie, who already had extensive landholdings, was given a grant of some 25,000 acres in North Kerry and undertook to settle the O’Moore Septs as tenant farmers on his new acquisition.
Michael Keane, himself a descendant of one of the Septs, traces the continuing strong presence of the Laois Sept descendants in Kerry through the centuries down to the present day.
He also records that some members of the Seven Septs were able to avoid the transplantation by taking refuge in forests and other inaccessible places. In addition some of the original transplantees, despite a sentence of death being imposed on those who returned, found their way back to their ancestral lands. Hence the prevalence of their surnames also in Co Laois today.
In part II the author provides detailed profiles of Patrick Crosbie (d. 1610) and his son Sir Pierce Crosbie (1590 -1646). Patrick Crosbie also known as Patrick MacCrossan belonged to a family who were rhymers to the O’Moore chiefs. This, Keane points out, is the generally accepted view of post-1922 historians. In so doing he makes some insightful comments on the claims of historical revisionism.
Patrick Crosbie was better than most other people at weaving his way through the corrupt and Machiavellian politics of his time. From the 1580s onwards he was a trusted English ally for which he received grants of extensive landholdings in Queens County (now Laois) and Kerry.
Commander
Sir Pierce Crosbie inherited Tarbert along with extensive land and properties in North Kerry and Laois following the death of his father in 1610. He was close to the royal court, where he acted first as cupbearer and then gentleman to the king’s chambers. A member of the Irish Parliament and of the Privy Council, he was also a distinguished military commander and was involved in successful campaigns on the continent. After crossing swords with Thomas Wentworth, the Lord Deputy, he found himself in jail. However, following Wentworth’s execution for treason, he soon regained his standing at the royal court.
Despite the dominance of the Protestant religion and the advantages of subscribing to it, Pierce appears to have remained a Catholic throughout his life and had a prominent role in the Catholic Confederacy in his later years. When he died in 1646, the Crosbie legacy in Kerry was assured. By virtue of their extensive landholdings the family was to dominate the local politics and society of the county for the next three hundred years.
This study of the Crosbies and their tenants from Co Laois is a valuable contribution to the local history of North Kerry, and will be of particular interest to those bearing the surnames of the Seven Septs of the O’Moore county.