Where do I research ancestors from County Cork?
Cork is a split county, and knowing the split saves weeks. The north-east, the Diocese of Cloyne, belongs to Mallow Heritage Centre, whose Catholic and Church of Ireland registers are on RootsIreland. The city, south and mid Cork, the Diocese of Cork and Ross, is not on RootsIreland at all: its Catholic registers are free on IrishGenealogy.ie. West Cork has its own service at Skibbereen Heritage Centre, with a database built for the far south-west. Over all of it sits the Cork City and County Archives in the city for paper records, though it holds no birth, marriage or death certificates. Work out which Cork your family came from, city, Cloyne or west, before you search anywhere.
Useful pages: The Irish surnames map · Trace your Irish roots · The 1926 Census guide · Coming home · Irish around the world · Plan your journey
Sources
- Irish Family History Foundation: RootsIreland and the county genealogy centres, rootsireland.ie
- IrishGenealogy.ie and the General Register Office: civil records of births, marriages and deaths
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