Populating the past, getting to know the neighbours....who lived on James Street?

At the core of this project are the people: the owners, businessmen and women, the traders, the lodgers, the children...all of whom have made up the community of James Street since the late 18th century.

In order to find these people and trace their origins, inward and outward movements to and from the street, and to track their fortunes, we must firstly look to the historical documents. Much of these have been digitised and available online. Patience, and much time, will yield the researcher the reward of a snippit of historical information. All of these snippets merge to forma the bog picture of life on this street, indeed in this city, during the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries.

Below is a collation of references within historical documents...with noted continuation highlighted in coloured format. The documents used include:

1787 - Lucas' Cork Directory link
1809-10 - West's Cork Directory link
1824 - Pigot & Co's Munster Directory link
1844-45 - Aldwell's County and City of Cork P.O. General Directory link
1853 - Griffith's Valuation link
1863 - Laing's Cork Merchantile Directory link
1871 - Fulton's City of Cork (& Queenstown) Directory link
1875-76 - Guy's County and City Directory link
1901 - Census of Ireland  link
1911 - Census of Ireland link
1913 - Guy's County and City Almanac and Directory link

This collection represents the raw civil data for the street, and provides a research framework to build on. Further information is to be gathered from religious and other sources, in order to enrich the picture, and a 'zooming in' of several interesting findings will be detailed in forthcoming blog posts. In the meantime, here is the current progression chart.

 


Link to progression sheet as a .pdf file