Family dates don't add up

[pansypetal]

I have a uneasy feeling about a section of my family tree despite being assured by my mother in law that the gravestone that gives me some details is the correct headstone.
I am looking at James Kearney – the family headstone is at http://www.discovereverafter.com/plot/10867
it advises that James DOD is 20/03/1878 aged 54.  His children’s DOB’s are Elizabeth  Jul 1863 and Francis 26th June 1871 (DOD according to the headstone was 16/07/1942 aged 71), using the parents names I couldn’t find any other registered births or baptism records.
James was married to Mary Moran, no wedding date. According to the headstone she died 20/01/1900
In the revised Valuations records at Proni I have found the land transfer from James Kearney to Francis Kearney  and it looks like the observation date for this was 1901.
My hesitation is the age at which James and Mary would have had the children. And Francis would have been only 6 when his father died, but the land was transferred much later which I would have assumed was a more like time frame for the death of his father James.
However my mother in law, this is her family line is sure that this is the grave of her family as she used to visit it.
All the details and dates look very unlikely so am abit stumped as to how to confirm or rule out these details.

[SmallTownGirl]

This query has also been posted on another forum


STG

[pansypetal]

Yes STG I  posted it another seperate forum

[glensman]

One possibility is that when James Kearney died in 1878, the property passed to another James Kearney who may then have died around 1901.  If you search https://geni.nidirect.gov.uk/ for such a death you will find a James Kearney who died on 22 April 1901 and whose death was registered in Magherafelt. 

[pansypetal]

Thanks Glensman, haven't found another family member called James Kearney (yet). Its good to get other pop els opinions as I still quiet new to this especially researching Irish family history and the ages all seemed very different to the rest of the family I've done that married young and had lost of children

[glensman]

Is Francis the blacksmith in Rocktown in 1901 census here: http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/reels/nai000640467/ ?
If so, were they somewhere else in the period before 1887?  Have you traced then right through from the early 1860s?

[pansypetal]

Hi Glensman,

yes thats them.

I have Francis born 26th of June 1871, the family address on his baptism record is Drumard. On his sisters Elizabeth baptism record 12th of July 1863 there is no address only states Lavey Parish I don't have any other locations for them prior to the 1901 census. Is the date you mention 1887 significant?

[glensman]

Hi Pansypetal

I found Francis in Rocktown in the 1901 census and then attempted to trace him back through the Revised Valuation Books on the PRONI website.
 In VAL/12/B/34/23E I found 58 b (forge) transferred from James to Francis in 1901; and 58a (house & garden)transferred from Mary to Francis in 1905. 

In 23D I found 58a (house, forge & garden) transferred from James to Mary in 1987 (very faint writing); and 58b in the name of James in either 1886 or 1887.

In 23C I do not see reference to a forge or to anyone at 58.  So I assume that they were elsewhere at that time. It would be interesting to see where they were before this in the books.  Probably close by.

 In the meantime you can see scope for confusion in the above entries and I wonder if the fact that James's name appears in 1901 flows from the earlier rather confused entries of the house and forge.

[pansypetal]

WOW thank you Glensman,

still very new to this and this was the first time I've actually used the Revised Valuation, didn't actually know what it was until somebody on facebook suggested it.  Didn't think of trying to trace any other amendments in it.

I'll have to have a good look thru it