The Death of Maria West

With the death of Maria West in 1846, the direct Irish ancestry of our family comes to a close. She was the last member of the line to have been born and lived there, and with the final sale of her lands, all family relationships with the island ended for good. 

For sure, those lands had been acquired by dubious means, through colonization, confiscation and thereafter purchase from revenue accrued from a major smuggling enterprise. 

Copied from: http://www.mcmurray.info/genealogy/Ireland/default.htm

It is hard not however when travelling through the beautiful and luxuriant countryside of County Down and gazing over the wide expanse of Strangford Lough not to feel just a slight pang of regret for lost heritage – however ill-gotten that heritage may have been. 

And we should spare a thought for poor Maria, who as she moved through life in London seemed to have no-one around her who could have remotely understood the world she grew up in, much as she might have tried to regale them with tales of the Hadzors in Gibraltar, or the Wests and their castles, and the Potters and their lands, and the Nevins and their Presbyterian theology, and so much more above and beyond. 

Maria would have been buried in Stoke Newington, possibly in the St. Mary Church graveyard, under Church of England rites. The Church of Ireland would, for Maria, have long since been a mere figment of a forgotten past.

Open Borders

Quoile Castle informational board, mentioning Captain Richard West as its likely builder. 

Travelling north from Dublin, it does not take too long to reach the extraordinary neolithic monument of Newgrange, testament to the skills and knowledge of the ancient Irish. From Newgrange, it is only short drive to the site of the Battle of the Boyne, the memory of which seems to be indelibly printed in the memory of all the Irish. Heading further north, crossing the border into the north is currently a seamless process, visible immediately only through the fact that roadsigns become English only, and that kilometres have been replaced by miles. 

But then you start to notice the flags, fluttering above the housetops, the Union Jack included, and you are reminded that still to this day the Orangemen cross annually to the south to celebrate their victory at the Boyne, on that seminal day when Hadzors and Wests briefly faced each other across the lines.

History runs deep in this part of the world. The Northern Irish, at a guess, are probably the fiercest of British patriots, determined to maintain their historical rights, and roots, and not be absorbed into any kind of Gaelic speaking, Catholic and Celtic counter-culture. 

What both sides of the island shared however until recently at least was membership of the European Union and an open border arrangement that  brought the communities of the island together. For the Irish, common membership of an impersonal and supranational, secular body with no historical stake or prejudice on the island seems to have provided a secure umbrella under which to develop the country as a whole. 

The prospect of a new hard border between North and South following a Brexit vote in which the Northern Irish asserted conclusively that they would like to stay in the European Union now occupies a central place in the discussion agenda

Being Ireland, the outcomes are unpredictable – but perhaps it is not beyond the realms of possibility that the day is not so very far off when the island will be fully reunited once more, and make its own way in the world. This is an outcome that has been made more likely – not less likely - by the Brexit referendum, which as far it proved anything, demonstrated only how English weight of numbers and power have always been the determinant of British policy and official identity. 

Should this day come, it would mark a triumph from beyond the grave for Thomas Russell and the short-lived United Irishman movement whose ideas briefly lit up the Downpatrick discussion circles within which the Wests, Hadzors, Potters, Nevins, Carsons and other Irish cousins of Hetty Jane Owen briefly weighed up their political options, and like so many others moved on and quietly vanished from the scene, leaving behind their lands, their mills, and their tower houses as faint whispers only of their extraordinary lives and times.

The Disappearance of the Potters

John Potter of 'The Hill' died finally on the 15th April, 1802, aged eighty-five, passing on his estates to his daughters, including Rose Nevin and Elizabeth Carson, later to pass at least some of her lands to her first cousin, Maria West.

Blackwood also notes that in his will, John also left legacies to John Johnston Potter, and David Johnston Potter. Blackwood clearly could not uncover exactly how John Johnston or David Johnston were related to John, and opened a new page for this branch. 

Copied from a Liverpool Irish website. The unique Liverpool identity,
and accent derive from Ireland, rather than England.
The slogan in the photo was coined at the time of the
1916 Easter Rebellion.

It is interesting to observe that like Godfrey West, these two Potters also left County Down for good, and made their way to Liverpool, there to make fresh starts in life. For whatever reason, all was not well for them in Downpatrick. 

Blackwood records six children for John Johnston Potter. Two of these children were apparently tinsmiths in Liverpool and Tranmere respectively. Of David Johnston Potter's four children, two became mariners.

It is said that probably three-quarters of Liverpool's population has Irish descent, with two major periods of influx taking place during the period of the great famine of the 1840s, and, earlier, at the time of the 1798 United Irish rebellion. And certainly it was around this time that both these two Potters along with Godfrey West arrived in the city.

There are a number of other Potters listed on the County Down website of Ros Davies, some no doubt relatives of John Potter, but again there are no clear-cut connections.

As we have learned though, the John Potter who married Maria Hadzor was a highly successful entrepreneur, and the man who was responsible for Harriett Wombwell inheriting her portfolio of County Down lands. The majority of his holdings and wealth passed to his daughters after his death. Whatever legacies he passed on to John Johnston and David Johnston Potter seem to have gone little way to securing for them the life of luxury that John and Maria must have enjoyed in Downpatrick.

The Founding of the Grand Lodge of Downpatrick

Downpatrick Lodge 367 from one of the early
Minute Books. Copied from the DownpatrickFreemason Website.

It is perhaps hard to appreciate from a distance the ideological and religious ferment of those bygone days. For those of a theological disposition, the precise relationship of Jesus Christ to God was a matter of passionate debate and disagreement, as exemplified in the trial of the Reverend Thomas Nevin,  So too was the question of who - if anyone - should be the symbolic and mediating link between earth and heaven. It could be the Pope, if one chose to be Catholic, the Monarch if you chose the Anglican route, or nobody much at all if you followed the dissenting tradition for whom the function of their leaders was more a matter of governance than direct intercession. 

Then there was the question of how this intersected with the rise of nation states and national identity, which also seemed to demand conformance to a common set of beliefs and values. For the English rulers of the time, this meant adherence to Anglicanism, and second class citizenship at best for others. 

Add to this the explosive concepts unleashed by the French and American revolutions that laid the base for universal rights and secular organisation, enormous economic and social disparities, and powerful vested interests in the status quo, and there you have a recipe for interesting times. 

Tongues will hence have fluttered wildly in the Downpatrick debating societies, not only in the Whig club, but also in the Downpatrick Grand Lodge of the Freemasons, Lodge Number 367 to be precise, after the issue of its official warrant in 1767. 

Edward Parkinson, who was to write about the West family at the turn of the twentieth century was a member of the Lodge. So too many years earlier was Thomas Russell, the Linen Hall librarian and United Irishman, who was to meet his end on the gallows outside Downpatrick prison in 1803. And so also, a generation earlier, was Godfrey West, the grandfather of Harriett Wombwell.

Ballydugan Mill

Whilst the politics of Ireland descended into further turmoil, the Nevins, Potters and their business partners did not allow themselves to be distracted too much, and in 1792, they embarked on the building of the Ballydugan Flour Mill.

The history of the mill is summarised on the web-page of its current owners who restored the ruined mill in the 1980s and converted it into a hotel and restaurant. Six storeys high and powered by water, wind and steam, the mill all too briefly brought employment and prosperity to the region. 

Ballydugan Mill before its restoration. Tweeted by Cyril Dobbin

By 1857 however, the mill had been abandoned. And by this time too, Hetty Jane Owen’s Irish ancestors had mostly disappeared from the County Down scene.

The Hanging of Thomas Russell

The Execution of Thomas Russell. From:
http://www.historyireland.com/18th-19th-century-history/thomas-russell-united-irishman/

To say that the United Irishmen rebellion of 1798 was a failure is something of an understatement. One of its leading lights however, and an extraordinary figure and idealist in his own right was Thomas Russell, oddly enough a predecessor of Reginald Blackwood as Linen Hall Librarian in Belfast. Russell's dream of a United Ireland, free of English interference and sectarian division, and founded on principles that owed their origin to The French Revolution and Thomas Paine was not one however that was shared by the English establishment and Protestant Ascendancy.

In 1803 he was tried for his part in the rebellion, found guilty, and sentenced to death. He was moved to Downpatrick prison, and on the 21st October, brought outside the gates and publicly hanged and beheaded. 

Surveying his jury in 1803, Russell is said to have remarked that at least six of them had in the past lent their support to the very cause that he was about to die for. 

Sitting in that very jury listening - not necessarily altogether comfortably - was one Thomas Potter. Another jury member was Arthur Crawford, very possibly a relative of the James Crawford who was a partner in the Ballydugan Mill project. 

Who knows whether any of these Potters, Nevins, Carsons or Crawfords were on Downpatrick Hill that day to see Russell's gruesome end? They certainly had the opportunity should they have wished to witness the spectacle however.

Whatever their inner feelings though, they must have all recognised that the days of Whig Club debates were over. In 1801 the English had passed the Act of Union and abolished the Dublin Parliament, thus creating The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The Anglican Church was to be the official church of Ireland, and Catholics were not be allowed to hold public office. The Prime-Minister, William Pitt apparently intended to follow up the Act of Union with some form of Catholic emancipation, but had to resign when George III refused utterly to countenance any such concessions.

Russell spent his last days studying the Book of Revelations, and indeed asked for a stay of execution so that he could complete his commentary. With a macabre touch of gallows humour, the judge turned the request down. The time required to reach a complete understanding of the Book of Revelations, he remarked, would mean that Russell would most certainly end up living longer than most of those present in the courtroom. 

So when Elizabeth Carson wrote her final will in 1833 and made her bequest to the poor of Downpatrick to be distributed without regard to religious distinction, she may just have been thinking back to the days of the United Irishmen and their vision of a united Ireland undivided by sectarianism. 

Downpatrick Whigs And Volunteers

The Whig Clubs as explained by a contemporary source in the no-holds-barred historical style of the day, seemed to be intended to allow a forum for discussion of more liberal ideas, and act as a kind of pressure valve that would discourage more radical action. 

From a History Of Ireland from its First Settlement to the Present Time (1845)

Deeply influenced by the ideals of the French Revolution, members of these clubs, whether in Downpatrick, or nationally, could envisage a future in which rights and privileges were not accorded on a sectarian basis, and in which a united Ireland would be able to exercise at least some moderate form of self-government. 

The Irish Volunteers meanwhile were originally founded in 1778, as a voluntary defence and police force, since much of the British Army were needed in America.  The Volunteers however took advantage of the circumstances to exert pressure on London for more independence for the Dublin parliament. 

Out of these groups and out of their various internecine disagreements evolved both the United Irishmen organisation, and also the Yeomanry. The United Irishmen eventually opted for armed rebellion. The Volunteers transformed themselves into the Yeomanry, discarded liberal principles, and as a Protestant militia played a significant part on the crushing of the 1798 rebellion. 

This then was the new territory through which the Potters, Nevins and Haughtons now had to manoeuvre themselves and their Hadzor wives and their children through. Without doubt they began on the side of liberal reform and an end to religious discrimination - at least for the Presbyterians. Where they all finished is not quite so clear.

A New Presbyterian Church for Kilmore

Kilmore Presbyterian Church from the Church website  
built on lands donated by Elizabeth Carson and Rose Nevin.

For the Hadzors of Downpatrick, members of a distinguished Anglo-Norman family that managed on a serial basis over the centuries to fall foul of the English establishment, the eighteenth century represented an attempt to regroup and prosper by conforming to English imperatives. 

Ironically, as their name faded away, the prosperity they sought came not through the English, but via a Scots-Irish entrepreneur with a taste for transatlantic smuggling, namely, John Potter, the son-in-law of Seneca Hadzor.

The Potters it would appear believed in rendering unto God what was God's but not necessarily rendering unto Caesar what was Caesar's. This would have been understandable. Religious taxation and tithes tended to be collected from all, but used only to fund the established church, in other words the Church of Ireland. Furthermore, Presbyterians as well as Catholics still as the eighteenth century drew to a close were deprived of rights, including the right to vote. To suggest therefore to a wealth-creator like John Potter that he might willingly submit his business accounts for the scrutiny of the official customs and excise officers of the day might just have provoked a fairly sharp response. 

The excerpt below is from a chronicle published in the 1830s by the non-subscribing Presbyterian community. It gives something of a flavour of the highly-charged theological disputes of the day, but beyond this tells of the building of a new Presbyterian church in the Parish of Kilmore.

Where did the land for this new church come from? 

From none other, it would appear than Elizabeth Carson, and Rose Nevin, the daughters of the smuggler, John Potter.

Harriett Wombwell's Downpatrick Lawyers

Thomas Nevin, the husband of Rose Potter, and son-in-law of John Potter had a younger brother, William Nevin. This William married one Abbey Wiley. 

Their daughter, Elizabeth Nevin (died 1830) married Hugh Wallace (died 1855), and had a son William Nevin Wallace (1818-1895). This William was to go on to become a Justice of the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant of Downpatrick.

Plaque to William Nevin Wallace in Downpatrick Cathedral. 

As well as being Harriett Wombwell’s lawyer, 

William Nevin Wallace was a Justice of the Peace 

and Deputy Lieutenant of Downpatrick.

It was the legal firm of Hugh and William Nevin Wallace that oversaw the lands of Harriett Wombwell all the way through to their 1881 sale. Harriett had not acquired her top team of representatives by accident. They were family connections. 

Thomas Nevin and Rose Potter

Rose Potter married Thomas Nevin in 1799, and it is in this marriage that the merging of the Anglo-Norman Hadzors with the Scottish Presbyterian settlers comes into a rather more distinct focus.

Thomas Nevin was a grandson of The Reverend Thomas Nevin

Original members of the Northern Whig Club in 1790, including Rose
Potter's husband, Thomas Nevin.

(1686-1744), who was born in Kilwinning, Ayrshire. On 20 Nov. 1711, this Thomas became minister of Downpatrick at Down presbytery. In 1724, he was brought before the general synod and charged with Arianism. The case rumbled on into the Downpatrick Assizes, and the charges, which were effectively for heresy, were eventually dismissed. 

When the dust settled, and putting aside the theological details and disputes, the elder Thomas proceeded on his way as the head of the non-subscribing division of the Downpatrick Presbyterian Church, to be succeeded by his son, and then grandson, both named William Nevin. 

The Thomas Nevin who married Rose Potter was the elder brother of the latter William, and hence a member of a very well-known and influential Downpatrick Presbyterian family.

Thomas was also a member of  Irish Northern Whigs, as well as being one of the partners in the Ballydugan flour mill enterprise. On 21st November 1792, he is also known to have chaired a meeting of the Down Volunteers. 

Thomas Nevin died in 1818, aged around 70. Rose lived on to 1835, and died in Downpatrick, aged 79.

Joseph Haughton and Catherine Potter

The second daughter of John Potter was Catherine Potter (1752-1813). She married Joseph Haughton in 1799. 

Of Joseph Haughton, the County Down site of Ros Davies records that he was a sailing master who arrived in Downpatrick in 1778 from the West Indies. According to Blackwood he died on 'The Hill' in 1827 and was buried in Downpatrick Church.

As a sailing master with Caribbean connections, there is naturally a possibility that he too was part of the smuggling consortium with sugar being an obvious possible product. 

Ballydugan Mill today. Copied from:
http://www.top100attractions.com/attractions/item/the-mill-at-ballydugan

John, like his father-in-law, was a member of the Downpatrick Whig Club in 1790, and a member in the partnership along with John Auchinleck, Thomas Nevin, John Potter and James Crawford that built and then operated the Ballydugan Flour Mill.

In 1795, Joseph was listed as one of the executors of the will of John Dun of Downpatrick; the other executors were Thomas Nevin and Alexander Gracey. This was probably an ancestor of the Thomas Gracey named in Harriett Wombwell's will as owing her one thousand pounds.

Catherine Potter died in 1813, aged sixty-one.

The Lands of Elizabeth Carson

When John Potter died in 1802, aged 85, he must have left quite an empire of real estate. Sorting out these lands, and deciding who owned or who would own what seems to have taken quite some time if the 1881 Auction Lot details are interpreted correctly. 

And here in the auction documentation, a full cast of characters emerges. Elizabeth Carson, her sister Rose Nevin, her first cousin Maria West (Wombwell) to whom Elizabeth Carson was to leave the lands described in the 1881 auction, and Maria's daughter, Harriett Wombwell (Robinson), who was to inherit the lands in her turn in around 1846.

John and Joseph Richardson were also involved. This would have been the John Richardson who is recorded with his brother Joseph as operating the Down and Saul Office and Corn Merchants in Irish Street, as well as acting for agents for emigrants to Canada (1832) and operating the Saul Distillery (1846 and 1850). A John Richardson was also Director of the County Down and Liverpool Steamboat Company in 1836. (See: Ros Davies County Down website).

Catherine West meanwhile, was Maria West's sister, and hence another first cousin of Elizabeth Carson. The auction descriptions seem to suggest that she too was alive and involved in 1834.

Problems and disputes over these lands were to continue all the way to the Robinson v Neale case referred to, which was to be conducted in the High Court of London in 1863. For now however, what can be definitely concluded is that the Irish lands that were sold off in 1881 were inherited by Maria West from her first cousin, Elizabeth Carson, the daughter of John Potter and Maria Hadzor.

Seneca Hadzor Disapproves

Central high pulpit originally built for Thomas Nevin in
the first non-subscribing Presbyterian church in Downpatrick
(Down Museum photograph). See: VelvetHummingBee for
more. One of John Potter's daughters was to marry into the
family of Thomas Nevin.

Blackwood notes that Dr. Seneca Hadzor, despite leaving Maria a legacy of 500 pounds, disapproved of her marriage to John Potter. 

It may be that Dr. Seneca was well aware of John’s unorthodox business practices and felt obliged to make some kind of formal statement of censure on this count, without entirely standing in the way of what must have been a highly lucrative marital catch. 

It may also be that as a descendant of the old Anglo-Norman Catholic establishment, albeit realigned to the Church of Ireland, that he felt uncomfortable about marrying off a daughter into what was probably a Scots Presbyterian family. 

Regardless, the marriage went ahead, and whilst so many of John’s contemporaries made a new life for themselves in America, a land in which their religious beliefs would not present an obstacle to progression, John used the earnings from his smuggling operation to venture into the real estate business. John and Maria's children were to reap handsome benefits, as indeed were the succeeding generations.

John Potter

John Potter in the 1881 auction lot details.

Maria Hadzor, the second daughter of Seneca Hadzor died around 1763 in Downpatrick. She married John Potter and they were to have three daughters. 

Blackwood records that John Potter (1717-1802) spent time in America and that he smuggled brandy and tobacco from France, America and the West Indies earning in the process, £30,000. He also states that he was a linen weaver and bought and sold yarns.

With this not inconsiderable sum of money, John bought up lands in the Lecale, Kilmore and Portaferry districts of County Down. John also seems to have had a Downpatrick grocery business (1747) on Scotch Street, opposite Market House, and to have leased out part of the Upper Ballymote Townland from the Southwell Estate in 1752.

There is a further reference to John Potter in the Vestry Books for the County of Down, as reproduced below:

It is not, however, until the year 1777 that there is any reference to the cleansing and lighting of the streets of Downpatrick. In the years 1759,1765, and 1773 acts were passed by the Irish parliament providing for the lighting and cleansing of cities and market towns, the administration of such acts being, as a rule, vested in the vestries. On 15 Sep., 1777, a meeting of the vestry was held in the parish church of Down, "in order to cleanse the streets and light the town of Downe, pursuant to an act of parliament in that case made and provided." This meeting was adjourned for a week. At the adjourned meeting it was resolved "That William Trotter, Richard Caddell, James Crawford, escjrs., and Mr. John Potter shall be directors, and survey the town in order to range the inhabitants into four classes: that the first class, in order to the cleansing and enlightening the town of Downe, should pay the sum of six shills. and sixpence; the 2nd, four shills. and fourpence : the 3rd, two shills, and twopence; and the fourth according to an applotment made thereof." This meeting was adjourned to 29 Sep., 1777, when it was resolved "that twenty-five lamps shall be hung in the most convenient parts of the town of Downe; that the streets of said tcnvn, where paved, shall be swept twice a week, and where not paved shall be gathered with a shovel…

See: www.jstor.org/stable/20566341

In 1791, John went into partnership to build Ballydugan Flour mill with his son-in-law, Thomas Nevin, along with James Crawford (see excerpt above) and John Auchinleck. John is also listed as a member of the Downpatrick Whig club in 1790.

With these small details, we at least glean some insight into the life of John Potter and his immediate circle, a life in which the politics of the day, religious observance, civic engagement, and a free-flowing entrepreneurial spirit merged into a unique but not always entirely legal set of configurations.  

This is the John Potter who makes an appearance in the 1881 Belfast auction lot details, and it is beyond doubt that the Irish lands of Maria West and Harriett Wombwell were a direct product of John's highly lucrative smuggling enterprise. 

John was buried in a vault at the Downpatrick Meeting House Yard, confirmation that this was a Presbyterian family.

Strangford Lough Lookout Posts

The Cuan Inn lies just beside Strangford Lough and makes for a comfortable and richly hospitable lodging for travellers. So much so that the Game of Thrones cast use it as their accommodation when filming scenes at nearby Castle Ward, otherwise now known as Winterfell. The owners of the Inn would seem to do their very best to acknowledge the commercial possibilities this brings whilst avoiding turning themselves into a theme park. So, for the most part, the inn continues its traditional role as local pub, and provider of rather delicious local seafood.

Strangford Customs and Watch House. The lands across the lough will have been very close to the Wombwell lands in Ballyedock.

Through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Strangford Quay, just around the corner from the Cuan inn developed into the eighth busiest port in Ireland. Into this port came sugar, rum, French brandy, tobacco, and more. At least that is what was supposed to happen. For this was a boom that was accompanied by a thriving smuggling trade, leading eventually to the building of the Newry Custom and Watch House next to the quay. Whether this succeeded in regulating the illicit trade is another matter, and there would appear to be plenty of reports that the customs officials often found it more judicious to work with the smugglers rather than against them. Given in any case that the lough covers over 150 square kilometres, and is the largest inlet in Great Britain, it was a trade that would not have been easy to curtail.

One named individual who apparently did extremely well out of the smuggling trade was one John Potter. And John Potter is yet another member of the large cast of individuals identified in the Harriett Wombwell 1881 auction lots, doing real estate business with Hugh Nevin of the well-known Scottish Presbyterian family.

The Plantation in County Down

There is a revealing account published in 1888 by one John Harrison to the Scots Plantation of County Down, which again name-checks some of those very same families that appear in the Belfast Auction Lots, such as the Montgomery family. Harrison dates the arrival of these families back to 1606, notably from Ayrshire, and describes how the Scots settlers absorbed the lands described in the Auction Deeds. Even these beneficiaries of English policy were not however entirely open to the idea of adopting the English state religion, and brought their own clergy with them, men like Thomas Nevin. In their interactions with English settlers, it seems that those English with a Puritan background found the Presbyterian movement far more to their taste than the established church. Hence there seems to have been a certain amount of denominational mobility. Not really what the English intended, but that is another story.

Much of the land in question was originally in the possession of an Irish Chieftain, Con O'Neal. Down on his luck, O'Neal was prepared to deal with the likes of the Montgomery and also Hamilton families. This ended with his lands being divided between himself, the Montgomerys and the Hamiltons, with Scots settlers being provided to O'Neal along with rental on the remaining third of his estate, an agreement, note that was witnessed by one Richard Hadzor. 

Lands changing hands. Note the appearance again of the Nevin family, but
also a certain John Potter (From the 1881 Auction Lots)

None of this seemed ultimately to do any more than slightly prolong O'Neal's tenuous hold on his legacy. Each time he runs into trouble, the Montgomery and Hamilton families are on hand to help him - at a cost. The shrinkage of the O'Neal lands is detailed in a rather serious JSTOR article, and in a rather more sensational version by Ron Chepesiuk in: The Scotch-Irish: From the North of Ireland to the Making of America.

In this latter version Con O'Neal was having a drunken party, and fuddled by alcohol sent his men to Belfast to relieve the authorities of more stocks of his wine which they had impounded at the port. One thing led to another, and his servants fell into a fight with English soldiers, in which one of the soldiers was killed. Now O'Neal had a price on his head. His Scottish friend, Hugh Montgomery stepped into the breach to help him - in return for O'Neal lands! Hugh sent his relative Thomas to Carrickfergus castle, where he gained entrance to O'Neal's room by making love to the daughter of the keeper. He had brought O'Neal food in the shape of some cheese in which was concealed a rope. O'Neal scrambled down the rope, made his way to a waiting ship and escaped to Scotland. It is not reported what type or volume of cheese was needed to conceal the rope.

Whether through such escapades, or whether through more formal agreements, or outright confiscation, the end result is pretty much what we know. The old Irish chieftains disappear from the scene and land ownership passes into the hands, by and large, of the English and Scottish settlers. 

Lands in Ballygallum

In reading through these auction lots, and developing a hazy appreciation of the how the land parcels were formed and how they changed hands, it demands only a little more rooting round the available data to start to build a picture of the dramatis personae, their background, and the wider historical context:

The following, for example, is an extract from "An historical account of the Diocese of Down and Connor, ancient and modern" by the Rev. James O'Laverty (1878). I have copied this from the Ashe Family History Website.

In 1710, the estate called " The Ten Towns of Lecale," was purchased by the trustees under the will of Hugh Rainey of Magherafelt, for £6,545, subject to a reserved rent of £5 ; the rent of these townlands at that time was £333, although they contain 2,529 acres of the richest land in Lecale. " The Ten Towns" are Bally warren, Tobermoney, Mill Quarter of Do., Upper Ballyclander, Lower Ballyclander, Grange Walls, Grange Ban, Corn-Mill of Do., Ballyhossett, Milltown of Do., Ballygallum and Lower Ballymote. The rents, after paying certain debts, were to be paid by the trustees, one half to Mr. Rainey's grand-son, John Ash, or John Ash Rainey, and the other half to Magherafelt School. In 1737 William Ash Rainey, to whom the property of his brother John had passed, obtained an Act of Parliament empowering him to sell or grant leases for ever of the estate subject to a rent of £175 to be paid to the Protestant Primate for the benefit of Magherafelt School. 

Nearly all the tenants availed themselves of the powers of the Act and became purchasers of the fee of their lands. From the reserved rents £175 per annum was paid to the school, and the remainder, amounting to £600 per anmim, was paid to Mr. Ash Rainey, but he continued to sell from time to time these rents to different parties, amongst others, to Judge Ward, who also purchased the interest of several tenants in Ballyhossett and the Grange, which are now vested in his descendants, Lord Bangor, and Mr. Ward of Bangor Castle. When at at last Mr. Rainey became reduced in circumstances, his former tenants voluntarily purchased for him an annuity of £50. The permanency of tenure enjoyed by the farmers in these townlands has produced that independence, self reliance, and prosperity for which the occupiers of those lands are characterized, thereby giving a convincing proof that what is wanted to produce prosperity among the farmers of Ireland is permanency of tenure. Of course Catholics who at that time could not hold such leases were deprived of the advantages of the Ash Rainey leases, and of the opportunities of purchase which the sale of the Downpatrick estate in 1710 afforded.

The places in Lecale referred to cover almost exactly the range of places referred to in the Belfast Auction lots. William Ash Rainey seems to have part of an extended Presbyterian family, in other words probably of Scottish origin. In the case of the Reverend Thomas Nevin referred to, there is no doubt at all. This leading light and controversialist in the Presbyterian movement described himself as 'Scoto-Hibernicus'.

So, to a very large extent, the lands that ended up in the possession of Harriett Wombwell dated back to the period of the Plantation when numerous land grants were made by the English authorities to Scottish Presbyterian settlers, as part of an ongoing, long-term policy to pacify Ireland. This of course does not explain how some of these lands ended up in the pocket of Harriett Wombwell over in London in the nineteenth century.

Lands in Ballyedock and Ballywarren

Just one page from the auction lots, showing the County Down lands of Harriett Wombwell being sold off by in 1881. Strictly speaking, these were fee-farm rentals, meaning that there was a kind of hierarchy of ownership that started with the monarch, proceeded through the aristocracy and down to the tenants, who were by and large the disenfranchised Irish Catholics, at the bottom of the food chain. The Nevin family were closely connected to the earlier generations of Harriett Wombwell's family, and were a well known Scottish Presbyterian family.