Margaret Belton : Short Biography

Margaret was born on 19 Sep 1877 to Andrew Belton, a tin plate worker and Anne Caulfield in Rathdrum. Her godparents were Myles and Frances Caulfield. She had one older sister, Sarah, and seven younger siblings. Her sister Sarah died in 1889 when Margaret was just thirteen. Her father Andrew died in 1893 when she was only sixteen. Margaret had to help her mother care for her younger siblings and tend to the house. 

Margaret was not living at home with her mother in 1901 and cannot be found anywhere in that census or on the one in 1911. 

On April 24th 1905, Margaret married William Horgan of Ballinasloe, County Galway, where she was living at the time. The marriage was witnessed by JJ McKewna and Frances Belton. Margaret's address is given as Ballinasloe. It is unknown how she came to be here. The most likely option was she came to work in Galway as a servant. Her sister Fanny witnesses her marraige so she must have been there too. She seems to have married well above her station. William had had a vastly different and more comfortable childhood, his father being a land agent. He had been able to finish his education unlike Margaret and become a professor.

Children of Margaret and William

John Joseph  B. 12 Feb 1906

Andrew William B. 8 July 1907

Michael Francis  B. 7 Jan 1910

Margaret and William lived at first in Church Hill, Ballinasloe, but by 1907 had returned to her homeplace in Rathdrum where they settled near her elderly mother. Their second child Andrew was born here. William worked as a secondary teacher there. 

Margaret was present at the death of her mother in Rathdrum in 1919. There is no death record for her or her husband in either Rathdrum or Ballinasloe.