Police Sergeant George McIlhagger

Irish McIlhaggers 1898

Standing: William, Henry, David

Sitting: John, George, Mary Kathleen, Mary Jane, Samuel

If the McIlhagger version of the clan name has died out in Australia, has it survived in the Irish branch? Indeed it has! David and Mary's second son, George, did not emigrate. George was born in 1849, three years after his brother John, also in Ballymena, Northern Ireland. He married Mary Jane Boyd from County Monaghan, on 28th October 1876 in Mountpottinger Presbyterian Church. At the time both bride and groom lived in Sandy Row, Belfast. Mary Jane was a Factory Worker. George became a Police Sergeant with the Royal Irish Constabulary and went to work in what we now know as the Irish Republic, in Laurencetown, County Galway.

Their first child, in accord with the Irish naming pattern, was called David after George's father. He was born 6th January, 1879, in Shankill, Belfast, as was number two son, William Boyd, born 8th December 1880. The subsequent four children, John (born 1883), Samuel Robert (23rd September 1884), Henry Joseph (1885/6) and Mary Kathleen (1889) were all born in Laurencetown. Their father George was the sergeant of police there from 1881 to 1894. Thereafter George and Mary returned to Belfast where among many clan members George signed the Ulster Covenant in 1912 and had his name entered in a number of annual Belfast Directories as a retired policeman. George died intestate on 15th October 1914 at 29 New North Queen Street, Belfast. He was buried in Belfast City Cemetery. Probate administration was given to his widow, Mary Jane, who had to pay £130 Estate Duty. Interestingly the High Court of Justice which issued the Letters of Administration mis-spelled their surname McIlhagga. Mary Jane lived until 2nd February 1929, aged 80. She also was buried in Belfast City Cemetery. I will comment on George's descendants in a subsequent blog. We are grateful for the old photograph of the family which has come to us from Australia.

Full Abstract of the Will:

Administration of the Estate of George McIlhagga late of New North Queen Street Belfast Police Sergeant (Retired) who died 15 September 1914 granted at Belfast to Mary J. McIlhagga the Widow).

The Reverend E.F.G. McIlhagger

Some three years ago a member of Pepperdine University, Malibu, California, asked a question on the Internet: 'What role has pacifism played in... Australia? Have any men taken "Conscientious Objection" stands?...'. A reply came from a retired minister of the Churches of Christ. This is a small denomination with historical roots in both Baptism and Presbyterianism. His reply included the following: '...during and after World War II there was in our Australian churches considerable discussion and debate on conscientious objection, Christian pacifism, and war as contrary to the mind and teaching of Jesus Christ. Many ministers, particularly in Victoria and South Australia were... "prominent pacifists". They included E.F.G. McIlhagger... . (Their) names appeared with anti-war statements... collated from time to time in the publication The Peacemaker which was founded by... the Church of England Brotherhood of St. Laurence (sic) 1939...'.

'E.F.G.' also appears in a publication, Ballarat Churches of Christ, 1859-1993, A History, by Graeme Chapman, published in Victoria State, Australia. In chapter 15, entitled Peel St. and York St., 1949-1975 we read that from 1950-1952 Peel Street church was without a minister and that in October 1952 the church organised a Mission led by E.F.G. (Ern) McIlhagga, BA, the minister of Esseden, with Roy McLeod as the song leader.

As I have said in an earlier blog, a correspondent and descendant in the McIlhagger family sent me a copy of a short publication, Family Reunion: Palmer-Pidgeon-McIlhagger... A Pictorial Record, in which Ernest Frederick appears. He was the son of George who at the age of 11 emigrated from Ireland with his parents John and Jane Mary (nee Hull) McIlhagger. The family of (then) four children departed from Plymouth, England, on November 7th 1883 on the SS. Goalpara and arrived at Rockhampton, Queensland, on January 5th 1884. They settled at nearby Bundaberg. George became an Engine Driver at a local Sugar Mill, married Elizabeth Deoberitz and brought up six children of which Ernest was the youngest. He attended the local South Bundaberg State High School. He obtained his BA Degree from Queensland University and a Theology Degree from Glen Iris Bible College, Victoria. He married Margaret Coventry in 1942 in Melbourne and they had three daughters. Ernest died in Fairfield, New South Wales aged only 51 and is buried in Rookwood Cemetery, Sydney.

It will be noted from this and from my previous blogs on the section of the McIlhagger family from Ireland that emigrated to the antipodes that there are no remaining descendants with the clan surname. This is also true of the one son of John and Mary Jane of whom I have not written anything. He was John, born 22nd April 1881 in Belfast, and emigrated aged just two. He like his older brother George, became an Engine Driver at a Sugar Mill (at Mackay). He married Catherine Magnus who was a widow with a young daughter. Her first husband had been killed in a tragic accident. John and Catherine had two further daughters. Catherine died in 1946 and John on 7th May 1955 in Mackay.

Life Calendar

In recent years in the month of October we have published a list of 'life events' in our annual Clan Newsletter and for comparison and information also the events of a hundred years ago. Here is this year's list:

Birth

29 March: William Luke McCrae born to Niall Duncan and Stephanie of Little Hallingbury, Hertfordshire, England, a grandson for Donald and the late Kate McIlhagga.

Deaths

January: John (Jack) McIlhagga of Sheffield, Yorkshire, England (see blog for 17th January);

27th January: June Millar (nee McIlhagga). June was the third of seven children born to Samuel McIlhagga of Coleraine. She was born in 1939. She married Roy Millar and had a daughter and a son. Her grandparents were James Spence and Elizabeth (nee McGrillis) McIlhagga who married in Ballymena. Her great-grandparents were William McIlhagga and Mary Spence both of Tullygarley who were born about 1860. Their fathers were respectively William McIlhagga and James Spence;

25th April: Martha McIlhagger of Belfast, Northern Ireland (see blog for 16th May);

12th June: Margaret (Peggy) McIlhagga, of Belfast, Northern Ireland, wife of the late George Harris.

100 Years Ago

1909: Kathleen born to William & Eleanor McIlhagger, N.Ireland;

1909: George Edward born to David & Elizabeth McIlhagger, Belfast, N.Ireland;

4 Jan: Jane McIlhagga (nee Wade) died, age 71, Greenock, Scotland;

16 Jun: John born to James Spence & Elizabeth McIlhagga, Coleraine, N.Ireland;

22 Jul: William Crawford McIlhagga (infant) died, Liverpool, England;

31 Aug: Joseph McIlhagga married Annie Glenesk, Greenock, Scotland;

5 Oct: Anne McIlhagga married James Bingham, Shankill, N.Ireland;

3 Nov: Harriet Jane McIlhagga married William Robert Girvin, Shankill, N.Ireland;

10 Dec: Clark McIlhagga (infant) died Old Kilpatrick, Scotland;

21 Dec: Mary Kathleen McIlhagger married James Boyd, Shankill, N.Ireland.

200 Years Ago

6 Sep: Ann McIlhagart baptised, Co.Antrim, N.Ireland.

Congratulations

Amy, age 13, (daughter of Mr. & Mrs. R.A. McIlhagga) of Ballymena Academy who won the County Antrim section of a National Poetry Competition, whose theme was 'Talkin' 'Bout My Generation';

Jimmy McIlhagga was chosen last season by Ards Football Club, Northern Ireland, Board of Directors as their top player. He is their first team midfielder.

Two Greenock Graves

I've had an email from someone with whom I have corresponded previously when she was doing some family history research for a McIlhagga friend. She had kindly copied down the wording of two gravestones she had spotted on the south-west coast of Scotland in Greenock Cemetery, which is incidentally one of the largest graveyards in Europe. One was for my first cousin twice removed, James McIlhagga, his wife and three of his eleven daughters. The other was for a fourth, his eldest daughter, Marion. The first stone (in Section 2F) reads "James McIlhagga died 7th Feb 1913 age 59, wife Joan McCulloch died 17th Jan 1905, daus Agnes died 14th Jan 1919 age 26 at Calgary, Isobel died 26th Sept 1944 at Kimberley BC, Margaret died Feb 1961, 4 children died in infancy". The second stone reads simply "Marion McCulloch McIlhagga died 3rd Nov 1961 age 84" (in Sction 2B).

There are a number of things to note about the wording of these stones which make us cautious about recording people's 'vital statistics' with confidence. The date of James' death is indeed correct. The Greenock Telegraph for the following day confirms this, as does the Register of Deaths which tells us in addition that he died at 4h 45m Pm at 31 Lyle Street, Greenock, of 'Phthisis Pulmonalis'. His eldest son William, of 88 Portland Place, Hamilton, reported his father's death to the Registrar and I presume it was he who gave his age as 57 years. This however is two years different to the age on the memorial stone which says 59 years. So was he born in 1856 or 1854, or indeed 1855? We have no record of his birth so we must calculate from other sources. The 1881 Census implies 1856, 1891 implies 1855 and 1901 implies 1856. The strong possibility is that the stone is wrong, though it may not be!

James' wife is called Joan McCulloch. It is a good Scottish practice to use a wife's maiden name in such a situation, which for us either confirms what we know from another source, or perhaps tells us what we hadn't known, even if, as in this case, the first name has been 'simplified'. She was Joanna, rather than Joan! Actually she was Joanna on her marriage certificate and Johanna on her death certificate (and in the Greenock Telegraph). As for the three daughters, I did not know the date or place of Agnes' death, though I had a note of an Agnes McIlhagga aged 21 leaving for Montreal in 1913. Isobel is I'm sure the simplified version of 'Isabella McFady'. I had not known that she too had emigrated to Canada, nor did I know the date of her death. It is interesting that one sister went to Calgary, Alberta, and the other to Kimberley, British Columbia.

It is possible that one or both had gone to join their brother Joseph who joined up in the First World War in Calgary with the Canadian Expeditionary Force. Joseph in fact gave his sister Marion as his next of kin, as by then both his parents were dead, though in fact for five years he had had a wife who like Marion was back in Scotland. Margaret (who also seems to have been called Matilda) and who had McCulloch as a second name, appears to have remained unmarried and to have died in Greenock, again on a date that I am glad to know. Marion McCulloch was the eldest child of James and Johanna and she also lived and died unmarried in Greenock. The first stone mentions but does not name '4 children died in infancy'. They were Robert McCulloch (1883), Annie Bell (1900-01), Janet (1902) and Mary Morrison (1904). I am indeed grateful to my correspondent for the extra information she has sent me.

Iona and Mull

Prioress Anna Maclean

I have just been away for a week staying on the Isle of Iona in the Inner Hebrides and was able to spend one day visiting the new Heritage Centre on the Ross of Mull at Bunessan, called Tigh na Rois. It is in the rebuilt Millbrae Cottage. I had taken with me a chart showing the names of three MacKechnie second cousins. The staff member in charge was able to confirm that they were all deceased and that their Memorial Inscriptions were published in a new production by the centre, Kilpatrick Burial Ground. However, she knew that there were descendants and she kindly phoned a 'senior' MacKechnie lady in the village who was able to see me and tell me the name of four offspring, who of course are my 3rd cousins. I can now write to them to introduce myself - I wonder if they will want to know?

I was able to do something else. The connection was through my grandmother, Margaret McLean who married William McIlhagga in Liverpool in 1892. She was the daughter of the eldest son of a large family that was born on the Isle of Coll, the Macleans of Auchnasaul, who in the late 1800s moved to the Isle of Mull where they were tennant farmers. Mull is of course the home of the chief of the clan Maclean, at Duart Castle. And there have also been Macleans living on Iona until quite recently. Now there is a famous Memorial Stone in the Abbey Museum on Iona, of Anna Maclean. She was Prioress of the Nunnery on the Island 1508-19. The stone is a product of the Oronsay School of Carving, c. 1550. Anna died in 1542. I asked the volunteer at the Iona Heritage Centre if ever people enquire how Anna fits in to the Maclean Clan. To my surprise she was uncertain whether there had ever been such an enquiry. I had learned a lot from a visit to Coll a couple of years ago and as a result have been able to trace my M(a)clean line back to include Anna. She turns out to be my first cousin, fifteen times removed (15 generations back!). I didn't tell the Heritage Centre the personal bit, but I did leave them a chart of Anna's family, descending from her grandfather Charles Maclean of Kingairloch, and down five generations. They are going to submit it to their consultant historian and hopefully I will have my research either confirmed or corrected.

Two families of 11 and a Dental Violinist

A couple of recent blogs have painted a picture of the hard life that immigrants to Australia had in the mid to late 19th Century. However, tragedy seemed almost endemic to such a hard life-style. John McIlhagger's wife, Mary Jane, died in 1886 at the age of forty-one with consumption. She left seven children, the eldest of whom was Mary aged 18. The oldest three were ready to work and fly the nest, but John was left with four young children to bring up. He found that Mary had a wise head on her shoulders. John took her advice and decided to write to a former sweet-heart, now widowed, back in Ireland, and proposed marriage. Isabella Humphreys came to Australia with her eight children and married John the very day she disembarked in 1889. A household of thirteen, including eleven children, then lived on the corner of Edwina and Kolan Streets in Bundaberg.

Eighteen years old Mary, born 9th October 1870 in Ballymena, had left home the previous year (1888) to marry and to begin her own family. She married Jacob Heininger, son of Andreas Heininger and Rosina Bekler who had emigrated as 'free passengers' on the ship Reichstag from Switzerland in 1871. Mary and Jacob resided at Stewart Street, North Bundaberg where their twelve children were born (one stillborn). In 1911 they moved to Mount Larcon with the six youngest. John became a train driver. Jacob Cecil enlisted in the First World War. Mary became a cook. Frederick also enlisted in World War I and then worked on the railway; he was a noted footballer. George William died suddenly as a teenager when he too had enlisted. Arthur Andrew became an Insurance and Real Estate Agent. Elizabeth Rose married a Dairy Farmer and Fruit Grower. Earl Victor worked the family farm. Rose married a Grazier who later became a Hotelier; she trained as a nurse, then went into the fashion business. Robert David became a farmer and Thomas a miner. Their mother, Mary (nee McIlhagger) died 16th January 1946 at Townsville, Queensland.

John and Mary McIlhagger's second child was George who became a Sugar Mill Engine Driver. Born 29th April 1872 in Belfast, he lived until his sixtieth year and died 26th May 1931. He and his wife Anni Elizabeth Deoberitz had seven children. Three boys gave hope of the family name being carried on. The eldest three however were girls. Ruby Catherine became a very talented tailoress, married and had six children. Linda Mary also married and had three children. Dulcie May also married. She and her husband took over her parents' house at 6 Elizabeth Street, Bundaberg, when they died. After the three girls, the first boy, William, died as an infant. Then came George Albert Phillip, born 12th September 1906 at Targo Street, Bundaberg. Like the other children he was educated at Bundaberg and district schools. He became apprenticed to a dentist called Bill Finnemore. He marred Norma Mary Mulcahy in Maryborough where he transferred to the dental practice of Herb Bashford. Later on he purchased this practice after he had become a fully qualified dentist. George remained in business until the late 1950s when he sold out and joined the State Health Department, travelling the Wide Bay Burnett District caring for school children until his retirement in 1972.

George was a very good musician and studied the violin. He won the open violin solo at the Maryborough Festival on 27th October 1927, when seventeen years old. Thereafter he won numerous eisteddfods. They had just one daughter. The last daughter of George and Anni was Heloise Myrtle who married and had two sons. The youngest child of George and Anni was another boy, 'EFG' who will be the subject of another blog.

Website and Newsletter

The score of a century is perhaps something to be celebrated! This is the 100th blog I have written since I started the McIlhagga Clan Blog in January last. It happens to come in the month of October which in the past seven years has been the month when Neil in Ottawa and I have produced an annual Clan Newsletter. You can read all the past ones on our Clan Website at freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~clanmcilhagga. Neil and I feel that now we have this blog there is less need for an annual newsletter. I would be happy to put any clan news on the blog and also publish any items people would like to write for us, given that they are of clan interest. Also, to be frank, not only has the Newsletter taken a lot of time to produce - it has taken us most of a month each year - it is also expensive to produce. We have never asked for a financial contribution towards it and the cost of paper, ink and postage has kept rising.

I know that many of you have appreciated receiving the Newsletter either by email or through the post. I recently received a message saying how much someone was looking forward to the next one, and I confess to feeling a bit guilty that we had taken our decision. But I hope the items in the blog are a good substitute. And the blog doesn't arrive just once a year! I've published 100 items in 9 months! And you have the chance to respond to a blog item immediately. I realise that most of the blog items have been historical, but some have been 'contemporary', and more can be. I know there are still people without a personal computer, but a majority do now have email and have access to a computer, so I hope they will understand. Neil and I will write to everyone later this month. At the same time I hope to include in this blog some items that would normally have appeared in the Newsletter.