Hunting Irish ancestors

[Colleen Ronan Asaro]

I'm a bit confused...first time on this site...
I am hunting for my irish ancestors on both sides of my family all came stateside before 1850
Ronan
Clancy
Fordyce
Henderson
Caldwell

[gaffy]

Welcome to RootsChat.  Before 1850 means pre civil registration in Ireland (bar protestant marriages from 1845), so you may find it challenging.  Not to worry, have a look at this topic on tracing Irish ancestors:

http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=498742.0

Once you are comfortable, choose one of the families you have mentioned and simply post additional relevant information about them here.  Just one plea going forward, if you start a topic about a particular family line, keep posting to that same topic rather than create different topics about them, multiple topics cause confusion and nugatory effort when people are responding to what you've posted.

Good Luck. 
     

[hallmark]

http://www.irish-genealogy-toolkit.com/irish-roots.html  is worth a read!

[philipsearching]

Good links.

Assuming that you have found ancestors on the US censuses, collect up the names and ages of any born in Ireland, then try ship records (Ellis Island is a good starting point) to see if passenger lists give any helpful information.

Irish records are tricky as many were lost and not all the surviving records are online, so collate what you can, then post queries on this site and you will find many helpful people with a wealth of expertise.

Good hunting!
Philip