Censuses were taken in Ireland regularly every ten years from 1821.
The 1851 General Alphabetical Index to Townlands, based on material from the 1851 census, was the first published systematic overview of place names in Ireland.
The 1871 General Alphabetical Index to Townlands was also published but is rare and locating an original copy is virtually impossible.
The 1901 Census was taken on 31 March 1901 and the General Index to the Topographical Divisions of Ireland, commonly known as “The Townland Index” was produced while the census was being taken and published as a book in 1904.
It has not been as readily available as its predecessor, the 1851 edition. Now, for the first time 1901 is available here as a digital, fully searchable database. This enables searches by any of the following fields: County | Townland | Sheet Number Ordnance Survey Map and Area | Barony | Parish | District Electoral Division | Poor Law Unions | District Electoral Divisions | Dispensary (or Registrars) Districts | County Electoral Divisions.

Full explanation of these divisions are explained on the CD - click here to purchase

In the 1830s, several schemes were running in tandem to encourage migration from Great Britain and Ireland to the developing Australian colonies.  Perry McIntyre and Liz Rushen are working on a series of books regarding emigration in this period.  Their first joint book Quarantined! concerns the emigration of 444 passengers on the ill-fated Lady Macnaghten, which departed Cork and arrived in Sydney in 1837 with typhus raging on board, resulting in the deaths of 56 people. Their second book, The Merchant's Women outlines the life-experiences of 200 women who migrated from London to Sydney per Bussorah Merchant in 1833. Their third book, Fair Game, explores the work of the Emigration Commission of 1831, and the emigration of 400 women on the Red Rover from Cork to Sydney and the Princess Royal from London to Hobart.  For more details on these books and how to purchase them go to www.anchorbooksaustralia.com.au

The Voyage of the ship Friendship from Cork to Botany Bay 1799-1800, edited by Col Graham, Perry McIntyre and Anne-Maree Whitaker, published by PR Ireland, Sydney, 2000, 46 pages.

This booklet reprints the journal of Mary Ann Reid, wife of Captain Hugh Reid of the Friendship which brought Irish political prisoners to New South Wales following the 1798 Rebellion in Ireland.

Mrs Reid’s ‘Cursory Remarks’ were serialised in the monthly Asiatic Journal between September 1819 and January 1820. While later Journal articles continued to describe the voyage back to England via the Spice Islands (Moluccas) and Bengal, this present publication concludes with the Friendship’s departure from Sydney. As well as the ‘Cursory Remarks’ this booklet includes a list of the prisoners who travelled out on the Friendship, based on Reg Wright’s ground-breaking scholarship, and a select bibliography.

Readers will also note with interest Mrs Reid’s observation that 30 of the 115 prisoners could not speak any English.

Available for $A11.00 including GST and postage within Australia - click here to purchase

Thomas Dunn: Convict and Chief Constable and his Descendants, by Perry McIntyre and Adele Cathro, published by PR Ireland, Sydney, 2000, 230 pages.

This book outlines the story of an Irishman convicted in London in 1796 for theft and transported on the Hillsborough in 1799. In the colony of New South Wales he married a free woman, Rose Bean and became Chief Constable of police in Sydney. They had eight children in the colony. Each family line is charted showing birth, marriage and death dates known at the time of publication. Many descendants contributed to this publication but we are certain there are many more out there. Other than Dunn and Bean the names of first generation include Pawley, Butler, Wright, Alexander, Evans, Cobcroft, Harper, Howe, Beer and Stennett.

While essentially a genealogy of the family this book also is the story of an early convict and his associated families. Each of the eight children of Thomas Dunn and Rose Bean have a short summary of their lives in the colony.

$A30.00 including GST and postage within Australia - click here to purchase

In 1984 Richard Reid and Keith Johnson, then President of the Society of Australian Genealogists lead the first tour to Ireland to help Australians reconnect with their Irish ancestors the Society. Since 1991 Dr Reid and Perry McIntyre have been involved in at least nine tours to Ireland and Richard has also led tours to Gallipoli and the Western Front.

These tours offer some assistance in tracing Irish families through local records but the main focus is on the diversity and drama of the Irish landscape, the remarkable history of the Irish people and the chance to experience the unique charm of the ‘Emerald Isle’ with its ‘forty shades of green’. Places that were household words in song and verse to Australia’s original Irish settlers – the Ring of Kerry, Connemarra, the Hill of Tara – come to life on these tours as well as countless other locations at the centre of the Irish-Australian story – the Aran Islands, the bogs of Offaly, the highlands of Donegal and the streets of Dublin and Belfast. On these tours you will experience something of the ‘real Ireland’, the Ireland of the Celtic past sung and whispered by poets, ballad singers, patriots and home sick emigrants.

We have not set a date for the next tour but invite your expression of interest, click here