CONDR*Ns of County Cork

County Cork is the largest county in Ireland, at 2,895 square miles. Cork city is the largest city in the province of Munster, and the second largest city in the south of Ireland. It is therefore not surprising at first sight that a number of CONDRONs I’ve had contact with on email and Facebook relate their roots back to Co. Cork. 

Yet in fact, the nineteenth century and early twentieth century records show that there were not many CONDR*Ns in Co. Cork, and most of those came from the small Roman Catholic parish of Shandrum in the north of the county, close to the border with Co. Limerick. (There were even fewer CONDR*Ns in Co. Limerick.)

From the start of civil registration of births in Ireland in 1864 through to 1911, there were only 30 CONDR*N births registered in Co. Cork. Nineteen of those (nearly two-thirds of the total) were in the registration district of Kanturk, which contains the parish of Shandrum. And seven births in the neighbouring registration district of Kilmallock are all for the family of James CONDRON who was baptised in Shandrum parish in 1853, son of Patrick CONDRON and Margaret REIDY. The names Denis and Michael seem to be common amongst the male Shandrum CONDRONs, but John, William, George, Richard, Patrick, James, Timothy, Simon, Arthur, Jeremiah and David also occur.

There were 24 CONDR*Ns in Co. Cork in the 1901 census by my count, out of 839 CONDR*Ns in the whole of Ireland, and 25 in Co. Cork in the 1911 census. The only CONDR*Ns in Co. Cork in the 1911 census who were not born in that county were:  

• Joseph CONDREN in Ballymurphy, who was born in Stradbally, Queen’s County (Co. Laois) in about 1896 to James CONDRON and Bridget HEWITT;
• Denis CONDRON and his family in Knocktemple, who was born in London in about 1855 (though I have not found any record of this birth); and 
• Michael CONDRON in the city of Cork, who was born in Queen’s County in about 1835, married Elizabeth PRICE in Pembrokeshire, Wales, and had eight children (born variously in Wales and Scotland) before he returned with Elizabeth to Ireland.

After 1911 the number of births and marriages in Kanturk registration district declined. More and more births and marriages took place in Cork registration district, which includes the city of Cork, starting with the marriages there of Thomas CONDRON in 1915, Albert CONDRON in 1920, and James CONDRON in 1924.