Mellan/Millan

[Craghead]

Searching for my Irish ancestors.  I know that the Mellan name is most common to theTyrone Co, so that is why Im starting here.

Some how my Irish family ended up in Maybole Ayrshire Scotland as Cotton Handloom Weavers.  They were there in 1841 census and then migrated to Australia in 1863.

Does anyone know from what area or county they may have come from.  I have been told that they would have been Linen weavers in Ireland.  Is there a particular area that they would have come from?, before taking the step to Maybole.

They are listed as being born in Ireland but no further information so I don't know where to start.  I also have Murphy, Tate and O'Neil family as well.  All are in the same industry.

How do I manage to find birth details in Ireland?

[aghadowey]

Mellon, etc. is quite a common surname and your family left Ireland well before the start of civil registration of births in Ireland so you need to find all possible information from Scottish records before searching for any surviving records in Ireland- to find church records you'll need to know both the family's religion and where they lived (parish if not actual townland) but many church records pre-1850s do not survive.

Have a look at Introduction to Irish Records and My Ancestor came from Ireland - where do I start? .

[Craghead]

Thanks for that

Looks like most of the family that were born in Ireland would have been born in Ireland around the early 1800's and late 1700's.  Then they have moved to Maybole where their children have been born and they all worked in the Cotton Handloom industry in the town, they were there for the 1841 and some for the 1851 sensus.

I will try looking into the scotish records and see if I cant get more of an idea.

Thanks

Cheryl

[Elwyn Soutter]

Does anyone know from what area or county they may have come from.  I have been told that they would have been Linen weavers in Ireland.  Is there a particular area that they would have come from?, before taking the step to Maybole.

In the early part of the 1800s, most households did a bit of weaving, right across the country. It was not restricted to any one county let alone a specific part of Tyrone. People had handlooms in their houses and made relatively small amounts of material which they then sold at local markets to commercial buyers. It was a way of raising a bit of extra cash, especially in poorer households where there wasn’t always work all the year round. By the 1850s, in Ulster, mechanisation led to the creation of linen factories which could make it much more quickly, much more cheaply and to a more consistent quality and this pretty well killed off home weaving.

[mithral]

Hello Craghead, My name is Di and I live on the Mid North Coast of NSW. I was interested to read that you have ancestors who lived in Maybole and who originated in Ireland as although we are not related, I share the same story. My ancestors travelled from Scotland to Australia also.
As we have the same difficulty, I was wondering if you would like to keep in touch and work together re ideas on how to go about finding that one clue that might unlock the story of our ancestors. As you say - that there were so many Irish settlers living in Scotland in the census, there may be clues in the number of people there, maybe there are other members of the family there or something. No doubt you have thought about this already - anyway if you would like to get in touch and even have a grumble about how the information from Ireland is just not there, I'd be happy to join you.
Cheers Di