Kilkenny Women Flax-spinners in 1827

Small Sources 26.  Evidence of women in Irish genealogical sources is unfortunately sparse, and those that do occur are often listed only as e.g. ‘Widow Murphy’. We list here 83 women receiving payments in 1827 for spinning and weaving of flax. The documents are in the  Bessborough papers in the National Library of Ireland Ms 29,805 (1).   The estate was owned by the Ponsonby family who had very extensive estates in Kilkenny.  Their residence was Bessborough House at Piltown in the civil parish of Fiddown.  The house and estate are now an agricultural college    The family lived in England until 1825 when the 4th Earl of Bessborough and his wife came to live there, with their 11 children.  They were ‘improving’ landlords and encouraged local industry and crafts. A full account of the tenant practices of Irish estates is in our article on Rentals.

It is likely that the women on the list below were encouraged by the estate to become involved in spinning.  Although residences for the women are not specified, it is logical that they lived in the immediate vicinity of the estate.  There was no practical reason why the farm management would seek flax spinners further than was necessary.  As further validation of this, almost all of the surnames on this list appear locally in the Griffith Valuation returns (1850) and in the Tithe Applotment Survey.  For example, 15 of the 83 family names appear in townlands neighbouring Bessborough house e.g.  Belline & Rogerstown; 6 in Tobernabrone; 6 in Banagher and 6 in Fiddown.

Flax spinning involved making yarn by spinning, or twisting, fibres of flax into a thread.  It was uniquely women’s work at the time and involved using a spinning wheel operated by a foot treadle.  The yarn was then transferred to the weaver to be woven into linen cloth.   Linen-making was popular with small-holders as it provided work throughout the year, and also involved several members of the household.  Men were involved in growing and processing the flax, and in weaving.  Women were involved in the spinning and (later in the century) also in weaving.   At the period of this list (1827) all of this work was still done by hand.  The later development of steam-powered spinning machines resulted in rapid decline in hand-spinning.  Machine-spinning became centered in large Ulster mills and the cottage-industry gradually disappeared.  Weaving, on the other hand, was maintained partly because of the availability of machine-spun thread.

The Bessborough papers contain several lists of payments for March to July of 1827. They are arranged by date and most of the 83 women receive several payments over the period.    A few of the names are indecipherable, and those of which we are uncertain are indicated.   Our thanks to Mary Flood of Rothe House Genealogy for guidance on the occurrence of the names.  Many of them are very common in South Kilkenny including Butler, Carroll, Dalton, Maher, Morris, Murphy, Power, Ryan and (particularly) Walsh.  Others are rare in the area.  Ancestor Network will offer 1 free hour of research by a professional researcher to conduct further research on these individuals or others in these estate papers and/or to obtain copies of the original. Click here and quote KilkennySS26  in the subject line.

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Dolly Allen
Dolly Alton
Joany Bourke
Kitty Bourke
Nelly Bourke
Peg Broderick
Sally Bullen /Buller
Lally Butler
Molly Butler
Kitty Byrne
Mary Byrne

 

Mary Carroll
Mary Cashion
Kitty Christian
Peggy Cleary
Mary Cotton
Nelly Cravagan
Nelly Cudahy
Nelly Dalton

Kitty Dee
Kate ? Delany
Bridget Donnell
Mary Donnell
Biddy Doyle
Widow Dwan
Mary Dwyer
Nancy Etherson
Nancy Feely ?  Freeney
Biddy Finn
Widow Finny ?  Finnup ?
Cally (Catty?) Fitzgerald
Liz? Fl…tity
Betty Fulton ?
Cally Furniss
Peggy Griffin
Lucy Hartity
Ally Howly
Judy Towly/Howly
Mary Joy
Peggy Kehoe
Mary Kelly
Mary Kiely ?
Kitty Lane
Nelly Lavin ?
Kitty Lewis
Betty Lewis
Molly Lewis
Mary McClennon
Nelly Madden
Peggy Maher
Widow Monahan
Nancy  Morris
Peggy Mul?
Nancy Murphy
Biddy Oates
Mary Oates
Ellen Owen
Kitty? Power
Lally Power
Nelly Quin
Kitty Quinlan
Mary Quinlan
Kitty Riordan
Ally Ryan
Anstie ? Ryan
Mary Ryan
Molly Ryan
Peggy Ryan
Ally Scully
Nelly Scully ?
Anstie Shanahan
Nelly Shanahan
Mary Slatery
Mary Sled…
Molly Spencer
Biddy Sullivan
Mary Thilly?
Lucy Thornton
Nancy Tri…
Cathy Trump
Biddy Walsh
Honour Walsh
Mary Walsh

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Other articles in our series on Irish Family Sources:

• Petty Sessions– the records of local courts
• Grand Jury Presentments – records of local councils on payments for public works and staff
• Rentals – management of tenants by estates and the records created
• Middle names – the use (or non-use) of second or middle names in Irish records
• How comprehensive are  Irish Civil Records?
• Catholic Church Records 
• Travellers’ accounts of Ireland in the 18th and 19th centuries
• Census returns in Gaelic or Irish language
• 50+ blogs with names extracted  from manuscript source.   A handy map index to these is available here.
  

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