William James Lanktree of Oldcastle, Meath

Valerie:

Were the Langtrees Church of Ireland or RC? Likely C of I. Roots Ireland has Oldcastle C of I records back to 1814 but no William. Maybe the family was living somewhere else?

There is a Matthew Langtree listed in the Griffiths Valuation on Cloghan St. in Oldcastle. The Griffiths was taken around 1852. Possibly Matthew was a brother to William.

The 1901 census has only one Langtree family in all of Co. Meath. Possibly the head of household James was a brother to William.

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Meath/Oldcastle/Oldcastle/1619875/

1911 census  http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1911/Meath/Oldcastle/Oldcastle__a_/728540/

I located the civil marriage record for the James in the 1901 census. He married Elizabeth Holden in 1861. You will note that the father of James was Matthew.

https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/images/marriage_returns/marriages_1861/09618/5487899.pdf

Roger McDonnell

Ancestry shows the following marriage for Mary M. Langtree or Ford:

Name Mary M. Langtree Or Ford

Gender         Female

Marriage Date         06 Apr 1863

Marriage Place        0329, Lurgan,Cavan,Ireland

Spouse         Joseph Byers

FHL Film Number    101450

Source: Ancestry.com. Ireland, Select Marriages, 1619-1898 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.Original data: Ireland, Marriages, 1619-1898. Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.: FamilySearch, 2013.

Ancestry gives the following cemetery record for Mary Mitchinson Byers.

Name Mary Mitchinsen Byers

Death Age    52

Birth Date     abt 1833

Death Date   11 Sep 1885

Cemetery      Auckland-Symonds St/Grafton

Burial Place   Auckland

Source: New Zealand Society of Genealogists Incorporated; Auckland, New Zealand; New Zealand Cemetery Records  Source Information Ancestry.com. New Zealand, Cemetery Records, 1800-2007 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.

Apparently Mary emigrated to New Zealand sometime after her remarriage

Thank you, Roger and Patricia, for your research and responses - much appreciated.

My ancestors were Lanktrees, though Langtree could also have been a spelling of the name. My guess is they were Church of Ireland - William James's wife Mary was the daughter of a Methodist minister.

The information from the census records is interesting - the dates would fit for James to be brother of William James. And clearly James was a family name. I will have to do more digging. Very interesting that there was only one Langtree family in County Meath in 1901 - perhaps the others had emigrated as well? Or died in the famine?

William James's widow, Mary Mitchinson Ford, returned to Ireland after his death and remarried in 1863. Later that year Mary, her new husband Joseph Byers and her eldest daughter immigrated to New Zealand. The two younger daughters followed in 1874. I cannot imagine how awful those voyages were in those years, and to go from Ireland to the US, back to Ireland and then to New Zealand must have taken a lot of stamina.

William James Lanktree is proving a very elusive character, but I'll keep on digging. Please let me know if you stumble across anything else. Thanks again.

Kind regards

Valerie