CONDR*Ns in the Proceedings of the Old Bailey

The historical records of proceedings of the Old Bailey, London's central criminal court, which have recently gone on-line at http://www.oldbaileyonline.org, reveal a few CONDRENs and CONDRONs who paid dearly for breaking the law.

1726 December 7 James COWDON alias CONDRON Theft - grand larceny
James Cowdon, alias Condron , was indicted for stealing a Fustian Frock, Value 10 Shillings, a Wig 7 Shillings, a pair of Shoes 3 Shillings, a Leather Apron and 2 Linnen Handkerchiefs , Oct. 29 .
John Baxter depos'd. That he found the Goods upon the Prisoner in Clement's Lane in Clare-Market, the Sunday was Sev'night after.
The Prisoner said he was sorry for it, and intended to bring the Goods again. The Jury found him guilty to the Value of 10d.
Punishment: Transported.

1748 July 6 Thomas CONDRON Theft - receiving
Catharine Bourne was indicted for breaking and entering the dwelling-house of William Simpson , about the hour of two in the night, and stealing two silver spoons, a ham of bacon, a table-cloth, two pewter dishes, and one hundred and eight glass bottles, the property of William Simpson , in his dwelling-house. Thomas Condron was indicted for receiving a ham of bacon, and two pewter plates, part of the said goods, knowing them to be stolen , June 12 .
Punishment: Thomas CONDRON was sentenced to be transported for 14 years.

1831 October 21 John CONDREN Theft - stealing from master.
JOHN CONDREN was indicted for stealing, on the 29th of September , two 100l. Bank notes, and an order for payment of 30l. , the property of John Phillips Beavan , his master.
MR. JOHN PHILLIPS BEAVAN . I am a solicitor , and live in Sackville-street - the prisoner was in my service as porter for about eight months. On Thursday, the 29th of September, I gave him two 100l. Bank notes and a cheque for 30l.; I desired him to leave the two 100l. notes at my bankers, Sir C. Scott and Co., and to bring me the money for the cheque - he did not return; I found him in custody at Liverpool on the following Monday; when I went into the room I said."I am sorry to see you in this situation: you are the last man in the world I should suppose would be guilty of such conduct" - he said he was very sorry for it, that it was the first time he had ever committed a wrong act, and he said a 100l. note which was found on him was mine also one hundred and three sovereigns, which he said he got in exchange for the other 100l. note and the cheque- I have recovered 203l.
Cross-examined by MR. PHILLIPS. Q. You believe it is his first offence? A. Yes - he bore an excellent character from several masters with whom he lived many years- he could have robbed me of 700l. the day before.
JOHN McCOMB . I am an officer of Liverpool. I apprehended the prisoner - Mr. Beavan's evidence is correct.
GUILTY . Aged 27.
Strongly recommended to Mercy by the Prosecutor and Jury.
Punishment: Transported for 7 years.

1887 April 25 George Stratford CONDREN Theft - mail theft
GEORGE STRATFORD CONDREN (22) PLEADED GUILTY to three indictments for stealing while employed in the Post-office three letters containing orders for the payment of money, the property of Her Majesty's Postmaster-General, also to four indictments for forging and uttering receipts to the said orders.
Punishment: 5 years' penal servitude.

A big welcome to the IFHF on-line genealogy databases

I am delighted that the Irish Family History Foundation has made a major step towards making searchable parish records for the whole of Ireland available through the Irish Genealogical Online Record Search System. This will surely revolutionise genealogical research for Ireland.

So far, records are online (ifhf.brsgenealogy.com) for 19 of the counties of Ireland: Antrim, Armagh, Cavan, Cork (north), Down, Dublin, Fermanagh, Galway, Kildare, Kilkenny, Leitrim, Limerick, Longford, Louth, Mayo, Roscommon, Tipperary, Tyrone and Westmeath. Those for Donegal, Sligo and Wicklow are "coming soon", whilst for 10 counties plus Cork (south) and Dublin City there are no indications of when yet they will become available online: Carlow, Clare, Derry, Kerry, Laoise, Meath, Monaghan, Offaly, Waterford and Wexford.

This development by the IFHF is a far-sighted one. I am sure that by making it much easier and more efficient for individuals to search their indexes online for free and then obtain selected full records also online for a reasonable fee, they will greatly promote Irish genealogical research and increase the income of the member organisations of the IFHF.

For the most part the records cover the nineteenth century. In the county records so far available I have found 673 CONDR*N baptisms and 278 marriages, plus a few dozens of births, deaths and burials records. Of these, the counties with the most occurences of these names are Dublin, Kildare and Westmeath.

As the CONDR*Ns originate in the heartlands of Offaly (King's County) and Laoise (Queen's County), it is a slight regret that these two counties are not amonst those already online. It is very much to be hoped that Irish Midlands Ancestry, who hold the records for Offaly and Laoise, will engage with this initiative and put their records online in the near future.

Surname challenge

I have today added a downloadable list of all CONDRANs, CONDRENs and CONDRONs from Griffiths Valualtion of Ireland to the Condran One-Name Study website. Griffiths Valuation was the outcome of a survey by Sir Richard Griffiths, Ireland's Commissioner of Valuation. The survey was used to determine the amount of tax each person should pay. This involved determining the value of all privately held lands and buildings in rural as well as urban areas to figure the rate at which each unit of property could be rented year after year. The resulting survey was arranged by barony and civil parish with an index to the townlands appearing in each volume. Griffith's Valuation can be used as an excellent census substitute for the years after the Great Famine as censuses prior to 1901 were destroyed. These data from the index to Griffiths Valuation were extracted using the excellent site http://www.failteromhat.com. Unfortunately this site does not give all information that is available in Griffiths Valuation (in particular "description of tenement"). If anyone can tell me where on the web I can find these additional details, or if anyone can send those to me for the CONDR*Ns listed in Griffiths Valuation, I would be most grateful.

I had an email recently from Bill Conran of Reno, Nevada. Among several interesting pieces of information Bill shared with me was that a Philip CONRAN was mayor of Dublin in 1593. Bill asks whether my line been traced to a Conerain or O'Conerain founding father, and whether I have Church of Ireland or Quaker ancestors or were they Catholic? On the latter point, I don't know for my own ancestors but it is noteworthy that in the 1911 census of Dublin where religion is recorded all the CONDR*Ns are Roman Catholic. Of course, non-Catholics may have emigrated. It would be interesting to hear what religious faiths other people's CONDR*N ancestors were.

As for Bill's first question, for my own family line the answer is not as yet. But it's a very good question, so here's the Surname Challenge: has anyone out there with CONDRAN/CONDRON or CONRAN/CONRON forebears traced their line to a CONERAIN or O'CONERAIN ?

Changes in surnames

Surnames can and do change over the generations, meaning that some lateral thinking may be required to succeed in tracing our ancesters to earlier generations. This is well illustrated by Karen Conderan's family. I am grateful to Karen for sharing the following information. Karen's great-great-grandfather was John CONRAN of County Carlow, Ireland. John CONRAN's son Patrick emigrated to Canada. There his name appears under a variety of spellings in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century directory listings. Finally it appears as CONDERAN which it has been consistently since. Having run into a brick wall tracing her family back before Patrick, Karen was fortunate to find baptismal records for Patrick CONDERAN and his brother James showing CONRAN as the original spelling of their surname. So as Karen says, we should really consider all the possible variations in spelling - an extra letter after the D, and especially dropping the letter D - if we run into a dead end. It worked for her!

Origins of the CONDR*N surname

I'm grateful to Robert CONDRON for the following information on the origins of the CONDRAN, CONDRON etc. surname (posted to the CONDRON Rootsweb mailing list 31 Jan 2008):

The Irish surname Condron is patronymic in origin, being one of those names derived from the first name of the father. Thus the name means "son of Condron". The name finds its roots in the Irish surname O Conarain, the prefix "O" denoting one who is the descendent of or the grandson of Conarain, the personal name of the original bearer. The Irish name was then anglicized as Conron or Condron, the "O" being dropped, probably as it was a reminder to the bearer that he was one of a conquered nation. Condron is a relatively modern variant, as all known references to the name before 1700 take the forms Coneran, o'Conran and O'Coneran.

Families bearing this name originated in County Offaly, where the name was common and it was also popular in the adjoining counties of Leix and Kildare, as can be seen in the Ormond Deeds, the Tudor Fiants and Petty's "census". In Munster the surname is recorded, in the form Coneran, in the survey of County Fermanagh, made in 1603. There people bearing this name are mentioned as coarbs, that is the abbot or "heir" of the saintly founder, of the "parish church of the Mill" in the barony of Tirkennedy. However the surname has not survived there, as is has in Lenister. The place name Ballyconran in County Wexford suggests that there were once influential families bearing this name living there also.

UK CONDRANs

One of the pleasures of genealogy is that one occasionally makes contact with hitherto unknown relatives. Hence it was a great pleasure recently to be contacted by Nick CONDRAN. It turns out that Nick CONDRAN's great-grandfather Ernest CONDRAN (b. 1893, Nottingham) and my grandfather Frank CONDRAN (b. 1890, Nottingham) were brothers. Nick tells me that of the small number of CONDRANs in England and Wales in 2002, 13 are descendants of or related by marriage to descendants of Ernest CONDRAN.

CONDRAN website goes live

The new site for CONDRAN One-Name Study information (including
of course CONDREN, CONDRIN, CONDRON) is now live at
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~condran .
I hope to develop the pages to include links relevant to these names, downloadable material such as census listings and family histories, surname distribution maps, and other material on individuals and families with these names that people want to see or contribute.

Michael Thompson
condran[AT]one-name.org (replace [AT] with @)