Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992)

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Paddy Casey
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Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992)

Post by Paddy Casey » Tue Jun 21, 2011 3:27 pm

This topic follows on from the thread entitled "Very Rev. Lord Fitzgerald and Vesey listed in Griffiths".

The records of the Land Commission, which was disbanded by an Act of 1992, passed to the Department of Agriculture.

Some very helpful people at the Department of Agriculture told me that :

The records of the old Land Commission are held at

The Records Branch
Unit 11
Clonminan Industrial Estate
Portlaoise, Co. Laois
Tel. 057 863 4988

The people at Unit 11 can give information if one has the record number or estate number. If one doesn't have this information one should contact

Department of Agriculture
Lands Branch
Farnham Street
Cavan, Co.Cavan
Tel. 049 436 8200

and they will try to find out the record number or estate number and contact Unit 11 (above).

If one is simply trying to find out who owned some property in recent times gone by the info for Co.Clare is held (of course) in Waterford at the

Property Registration Office
Cork Road
Waterford
Tel. 051 303 000


Paddy

smcarberry
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Re: Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992

Post by smcarberry » Tue Jun 21, 2011 4:24 pm

Paddy,

That's excellent information to share with us all. Although I have seen references to the Land Commission, seeking out the records from those activities within its jurisdiction, and those records being organized by estate, are not aspects that I have thought about, and I don't think that topic is covered in existing gen. guidebooks (not completely certain on that, only that I have not picked up on that as being covered).

In any case, in addition to having the addresses so clearly set out, could you also add the exact years involved so that it is likewise clear which office to consult for which time frame ? In the excitement of having a new resource, it is possible to focus on the wrong office unless it is all laid out in one place.

Thanks,
Sharon C.

Sduddy
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Re: Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992

Post by Sduddy » Tue Jun 21, 2011 7:26 pm

Thanks for clearing that up! And for passing on so much information.

Sheila

Paddy Casey
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Re: Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992

Post by Paddy Casey » Tue Jun 21, 2011 9:18 pm

smcarberry wrote:.......could you also add the exact years involved so that it is likewise clear which office to consult for which time frame ? In the excitement of having a new resource, it is possible to focus on the wrong office unless it is all laid out in one place. Thanks,Sharon C.
Hi Sharon,

In "A Guide to the National Archives of Ireland" at http://homepage.eircom.net/~seanjmurphy/nai/puboffs.htm (undated, as far as I can see; author appears to be Sean J Murphy) it says "Irish Land Commission. Deposited records of the now defunct Irish Land Commission date from the seventeenth century onwards, but are not yet catalogued or generally available for public inspection. The records, contained in some 50,000 boxes, consist mainly of deeds, abstracts of title and similar material, and were amassed as a result of the operation of the Irish Land Purchase Acts 1881-1923. The best existing finding aid was compiled by the National Library of Ireland, entitled Records in the Irish Land Commission: Survey and Guide, and takes the form of typescript volumes and card indexes (accessible only in the National Library). The bulk of Irish Land Commission records relating to the Six Counties has been deposited in the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, where they are catalogued and accessible.

Because there is no date to this document I don't know whether "....not yet catalogued or generally available for public inspection..." is current information. I just hope that the 50,000 boxes haven't been culled or "pruned".

That document by Sean J Murphy contains lots of other interesting (for me, anyway) information with lots of signposts as to where land information is (or was ?) archived.

Paddy

smcarberry
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Re: Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992

Post by smcarberry » Tue Jun 21, 2011 10:18 pm

Ah, I see -- lots of paper and not enough organization of it as yet. Time to get a graduate student in history out there to do a general overview. At least now we know the records survived and where they are, thanks to your curiosity and willingness to do an email/pick up the telephone.

The alternative is to consult either or both of two series of books at the Registry of Deeds, Henrietta St., Dublin, in person and after paying a fairly substantial access fee. One book, in beautiful clear script, provides abstracts of land transactions (including marriage settlements and leases) back to 1710, and the other, in sometimes undecipherable handwriting, provides details of transactions organized by townland.

Sharon C.

Sduddy
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Re: Records of the old Irish Land Commission (disbanded 1992)

Post by Sduddy » Fri Jan 07, 2022 9:31 am

It looks as if there’s a while to go before Land Commission records become available. Claire Santry’s announcement at the New Year sounds hopeful, but the accompanying Irish Times article and video dampens expectations of anything coming soon - scroll down to Jan 1st : https://www.irishgenealogynews.com.

But it’s good to see that the records are being carefully conserved now. When Terence Dooley was writing his book, The Land for the People, in 2004, he discovered that Land commission records had been “pruned.” In his introduction, he speaks of the difficulty of gaining access to Land Commission records. The records at that time had not yet been microfilmed, although researchers were already asking for records, such as estate records, to be extricated from the material that the commission considered too sensitive.
He says, “the records branch of the Land Commission contains an estimated eleven million records including title documents, maps and related papers ….. such as title deeds – dating at least to the fifteenth century”
He goes on, “According to P.J. Sammon [who wrote “In the Land Commission: A Memoir, 1933 – 1978”] the suggestion of microfilming the documents was mooted from time to time ‘with a view to conserving storage space’ but this never happened; instead, Sammon tells us, ‘the pruning of estate files was authorised in the late 1960s’…. what was pruned? How much was pruned? Has there been further pruning? Will there be pruning in the future?” (p 23)

Well, I think we can rest easy about the pruning now.

Sheila

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