Nicholas and Margaret Bowens, Kentstown

[caoimhin]

Looking for parents of Nicholas Bowens, Shepherd, of Kentstown age 46 in 1911 census and family/maiden name of his wife Margaret, aged 41 in same census.
Any leads would be appreciated.

[shanew147]

The best place to start is with a search for a birth of one of the children to establish Margaret's maiden name. Once you have this a marriage search is much easier. I had a quick look for possible birth index matches for some of the children, but haven't found any good matches yet..

see : Introduction to Irish Records

here's the family on the 1911 census for reference : Bowen family - 1911

Have you located the family on the 1901 census to confirm their ages ?


Shane

[myluck!]

1901 census for all Bowens in Meath
http://census.nationalarchives.ie/search/results.jsp?census_year=1901&surname=bowens&firstname=&county=Meath&townland=&ded=&age=&sex=&search=Search&relationToHead=&religion=&education=&occupation=&marriageStatus=&birthplace=&language=&deafdumb=&marriageYears=&childrenBorn=&childrenLiving=

Marriage Nicholas BOWNES to Margaret WALSH Drogheda Apr-Jun 1893 Volume 2 Page 423
from familysearch.com If correct couple marriage cert will give Father's names

If second family in area is related the 1901 census could help here

No obvious birth records for children or NIcholas but only just briefly looked

Best of luck

[shanew147]

There's actually a second possible Margaret on the same register page :

 Name: Margaret Johnson
 Registration district: Drogheda
 Event type: Marriage
 Quarter and year: Apr-Jun 1893
 Volume: 2 / Page : 423



Shane

[caoimhin]

Thanks Shane and Myluck!, I will keep investigating with the leads you have supplied. I know there are still Bowens in Meath who are descended so will also contact them.

I believe I found Nicholas on the family search but haven't found the marriage details you quoted yet.

Thanks again for your help

[myluck!]

just to note that the Nicholas Bowens I found the surname was spelt BOWNES

[caoimhin]

I always used to think my mother was wrong when she spelt the name Bownes, whereas the family of today spell it Bowens, I know spelling used to be random, maybe it was in this case?

[myluck!]

Could well be my mother (in 70s) spells her maiden name different to her brother! and their cousin died recently and I noticed his obituary showed a different spelling again.
In old records so much was based on phonetics and local knowledge there are variants of nearly every name