The relative shortage of Irish sources makes every record linking a name to a place useful. One of the obscure sources which can be used are the Grand Jury Presentments. These documents were the reports of the Grand Juries, which were the forerunners of the modern County Councils. Each county had a Grand Jury empowered to make decisions on local administrative, legal and other matters. They were appointed by the County Sheriff, usually from the ranks of major land owners. Although originally responsible only for the Justice system, their remit was gradually expanded to commissioning of local public works, i.e. building of roads and bridges, and maintenance of public buildings (infirmaries, courthouses, jails etc). It funded these works by means of a county tax (a cess or ‘rates’) levied on land-owners.
Catholics could not legally serve on grand juries until 1793, and even after this date the jury lists were still predominantly Protestant. They met in spring and summer, just after the regular Assizes (local court) sessions. In these sessions they would hear ‘presentments’, i.e. proposals for grants for the construction or maintenance of roads and bridges etc; and they would also consider and approve payments to public officials or tradesmen for services rendered. The family history relevance of these documents is that:
(a) the proposals usually include the names of proposed contractors and (in some counties) the names of the persons providing services (see example from Dublin in Figure 1) ; and
(b) on occasion, they specify the work to be done by reference to the property of individuals. For example ‘to build a bridge over the river Lingane at Maurice Shea’s house’ or ‘to repair .. the mail coach road. between Timothy Duggan’s ditch and Thomas Butler’s gate, all in the townland of Ballydrihid’ (Both from Limerick Grand Jury Presentments of 1831). These references usually include not only approved projects, but also those proposed, but not approved, for funding.
There was widespread corruption in the Grand Juries. As the members were local landowners, many sought to enhance the value of their estates by building walls, roads or bridges which made their properties more accessible or functional, but which were of little public benefit. Accounts of garden and demesne walls being built using public money are in the report of an 1827 Select Committee which investigated the system. A side-effect was that few roads or bridges were built in the more remote or wild parts of certain counties (e.g. Mayo or Kerry) in which there were few resident local gentry. These absentee landlords were less concerned about the accessibility or appearances of their estates.
Another form of abuse of the system was that the landowners would themselves submit proposals to conduct work, often fronted by one of their staff. They would then contract their tenants to do the work and allow the payment against their rents. The Grand Jury's role in all but judicial issues was ended in 1898, and the role was transferred to democratically elected county councils, or rural district councils. In 1922 they were disbanded entirely.
Figure 1: Extract from Grand Jury Presentment of Dublin City 1806/07.
The records vary in format. Some are in the form of a proposed list of payments to be made for work already done (as in the Dublin example above) or proposals for future work with a specification of the proposed contractors (as in Figs 2 and 3). In other cases, the records are a report on the decisions made at the meetings. Useful information may be contained within both.
The above example of salary and fee-payments by Dublin Grand Jury is usefully detailed with staff members and their roles. However, not all Grand Jury records give the names of individual public servants. The list of proposed contracts for work usually do state the names of the contractors, as well as a short specification of the work. Examples for approval by the Limerick Grand Jury of 1831 include:
KINGSTON, Earl; MONTGOMERY, Thomas; O’CALLAGHAN, Daniel; DONOHOE, John: to build a bridge of one arch over the river Barabee, on the road from Hospital to Clogheen, between the townlands of Skeheenarinky & Barabee
LISMORE, Lord; TAYLOR, Edwin; GRUBB, Samuel; MURPHY, Martin: to build a bridge between Michael KENNELLY’S house and his land at Kilballyboy – road from Clogheen to Dungarvan
The proposed contractors for these two projects are local ‘gentlemen’ (who may also have been Grand Jurors) and also the tradesmen with the specialist skills required for the work. In this case it is bridge-building, but all forms of construction and maintenance are found. Other examples from Kerry, Wicklow and Kilkenny Grand Juries are in the examples below. Records which specify the names of individuals providing minor services within public buildings, as in the Dublin example above, are not as common.
Figure 2: Extract from Kerry Grand Jury Presentment of 1819. NLI Ms 13,631 (4)
Figure 3: Extract from Wicklow Grand Jury Presentments of Spring 1818 – from Wicklow Archives
Fig 4. Extract from the Kilkenny Grand Jury report of 1832
Many of these records are available in county archives or County libraries, while some are in the National Library of Ireland. The extent of holdings varies by county, but full sets of records from the 1780s to 1898 are available in some counties. Examples of their location, and the extent of the records available are:
• Carlow County Library (1786-1895)
• Cork Archives (1834–1898)
• Donegal County Archives (1753-1899)
• Dublin County (1818-1895)
• Galway (NLI 1794-99)
• Kerry Library (1874-89 & 1892-97)
• Limerick County Library, Local Studies Dept. (1807-1900)
• Louth County Council (1713-1732, 1786-1810,1815 and 1823-99)
• Mayo (NAI 1792-94)
• Waterford Archives (years not specified)
• Wexford County Archive (1847-1900)
• Wicklow County Archive (1818-1899)
The records are increasingly being made available on-line. The website www.igp-web.com has indexed records for some counties (e.g. Tipperary) and many others are available through The Virtual Treasury Project (see below). Others can be downloaded from www.archivecdbooks.com. If you are interested in a particular county, it may be worth looking to see if these records are available from some source. A useful central resource for this purpose is the Irish Archive Resource. The Virtual Treasury Project also has a useful presentation on the system.
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