KELLY, Mary ¹

   Another name for Mary was McGUNNIGAL, Mary.¹

   User ID: N2.

  Research Notes:

KELLY

Kelly is one of the most common Irish surnames. It is rendered in Gaelic as O'Ceallaigh, the eponymous ancestor's personal name being 'Ceallach', and is found in the anglicised version of O'Kelly or O'Keily. According to Edward MacLysaght in Irish Families this surname came into being independently in at least seven widely separated places. He is of the opinion that the Ulster Kellys are descended from the O'Kelly of Cinel Eachach sept, found in counties Antrim and Derry.




MARY

What we are able to say about Mary Kelly is minute in contrast to what we do not know about her. We have no personal documents about her that would detail her birth, marriage, childbearing or death.

We know from only one document, the death certificate of her son, James, who came to Scotland in the mid-1860s with his family, that her family name was Kelly, her Christian name Mary, that she was married to Michael McGunnigal, farm labourer, and that she had at least one son, James. County Donegal in Ireland was very likely her homeland.

Mary McGunnigal, or Kelly, was married to Michael McGunnigal at some time before 1820, around which time her son James, was born. She was likely to have been more than twenty years old when she married and began to have a family, especially since she was in all probability working as a single woman in an agricultural setting. Her birth year may have been around 1795. We do not know if James was her first, or only, child. If he was not her first born, then her year of birth may have been earlier in the 1790s, and her date of marriage much earlier than 1820.

We do not know when she died, only that when her son, James, died in 1888, she was already dead. She may never have left Ireland, and may have died before James and his wife left for Scotland. ^{1 2}

Mary married Michael McGUNNIGAL. (Michael McGUNNIGAL was born about 1788.)