People, Place and Power: The Grand Jury System in Ireland

I've just carried out three separate research jobs for a client which relied heavily on Irish land records, but the third in particular involved the use also of Grand Jury presentment and query books for County Louth, with many of the relevant query books available online from the Louth County Archives website at www.louthcoco.ie/en/services/archives/online-digital-archives/louth-grand-jury-query-books/. 

The books, produced from the late 18th century onwards, are a wonderful resource for the main arm of local administration in Ireland prior to 1899 (before they were replaced with County Councils, Rural Councils and District Councils), with published presentment books and query books from the late 18th century listing jurors, constables and sub-constables, as well as public works to be carried out in the county, and the costs involved. 

The Beyond 2022 project (https://beyond2022.ie) has now placed online a new book published by Trinity College Dublin entitled People, Place and Power: The Grand Jury System in Ireland, by Brian Gurrin, david Brown, Peter Crooks and Ciaran Wallace, which can be found at https://beyond2022.ie/the-grand-jury-system-in-ireland. The book is free to download.

The Grand Jury was in use in Ireland from Anglo-Norman times, although for many centuries it largely only had a judical function at assizes and quarter sessions. A lot of Grand Jury records have been destroyed, not least with many of them gathered into the Public Record Office, which was largely destroyed in the Irish Civil War in 1922. A lot of material has survived, however, in published form and at other repositories, and with some resources reproduced online (including for Donegal on FindmyPast).

Enjoy the book - and don't forget that my new book Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records will be coming out from Pen and Sword later this summer, and is already available for pre-order at Amazon on www.amazon.co.uk/Tracing-Irish-Ancestors-Through-Records/dp/1526780216 (NB: there may be a change to the cover!)! 

Chris

Just out, Sharing Your Family History Online is on sale at https://bit.ly/SharingFamHist. Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Scottish2 is also out, as are Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed) at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Irish1 and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Scotland1. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, and on Twitter @genesblog.