ACHESON of Graddum, Rockfield and Tippecanoe a Working Draft
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ACHESON of Graddum, Rockfield and Tippecanoe A working draft November 24, 2012 This is a draft based on the information available at time of writing. Additional information may become available and the interpretation of any information may subsequently change parts of this narrative. Origins Achesons, of various and sundry spellings, have been documented around central Scotland since Mediaeval times. Some genealogies trace back to a Johannes Atchesonne noted about 1450 in Druntennend in Angus. Various merchants around Edinburgh in particular carried this name, including those who built Acheson House which still exists as a fine example of a strong merchant home and offices in the old core of the city. Mixing politics, commerce and opportunity, Captain Patrick Acheson moved to Ireland after obtaining grants of land in Armagh and Cavan. He died in Armagh in 1617. His son Archibald solidified the family’s hold over the property at Markethill, County Armagh, as part of the Plantation of Ulster. Over the next three hundred years, the family’s reach and well-connected marriages moved it through titles and lands, firstly in the local radius, then connections to English aristocracy, until, like many of their ‘peers’ , an early twentieth century marriage into an American fortune. The Earls of Gosford have now only the most tenuous links to Ireland, the current Earl living in Australia; the heir apparent an economist with the Transportation Security Administration in Washington D.C. This family has been well documented back to their Edinburgh roots and no branch seems to provide a home for the Achesons of Cavan to roost upon. So I make some very solid assumptions: our Acheson roots are Scottish; we arrived in Ulster with the Plantation, either as cousins or fellow travelers to the Achesons of Markethill. Certainly, there is documentary evidence of Achesons in the same part of Cavan as today, as early as 1761. The 1761 Poll Book for the County of Cavan held in the PRONI in Belfast shows a listing of freeholders eligible to vote. Thomas and Francis Acheson are both listed at Shannow townland, and are both also challenged in the list for lack of freehold. Voters then would have needed to be members of the Established Church and with freehold property above a certain amount. Achesons were, and are, quite numerous across Armagh and into Fermanagh and Leitrim. Some suggestions of a link between the Cavan and Leitrim families have been made but not yet proven. For now, the likeliest connection would be with those eighteenth century Achesons in central Cavan. Graddum The earliest record showing the current family group is a fragment of the 1821 Census of Ireland. Cavan is fortunate in having much of the Census survive for the civil parishes of the middle of the county. Most of the Nineteenth century censuses were destroyed either by government action to pulp for paper during the First World War or by fire in the Civil War destruction of the Public Records Office in the Four Courts in Dublin. The census record can be confirmed in light of later records. It shows the occupants of a single story house in the townland of Graddum. Robert Acheson, aged 73, is living with son-in-law William Stafford and daughter Elizabeth with their children, Emily, 3, and Sophia, aged one. Also listed are Robert’s other children Thomas and Mary Anne, both 16. Further records shed light on the relationships. Sophia Staffords’s baptism on October 1 1820 at Kildrumferton had been witnessed by Thomas and Mary Anne Acheson. Mary Anne Acheson married Henry Brown at Kildrumferton on January 10 1828. Sometime before 1825 Thomas Acheson married Elizabeth Johnson. Their first child Robert was baptized on October 30 1825. His birthplace was recorded as Graddum – a fact also recorded in the later family Bible belonging to Thomas Stafford Acheson. One of the sponsors at the baptism of Robert was his aunt Elizabeth Stafford. Thomas and Elizabeth’s next two children, John and William, were also born in Graddum, in 1827 and 1831 respectively. Figure 1 Tithe Applotment Book 1828 - Graddum. Thomas Acheson holds 19acres; his neighbours are - presumably- brother- in-law William Stafford and -likely - father- or brother-in-law John Johnson Rockfield Before the birth of the next son Thomas in 1833 the family had relocated a short distance to Rockfield. (The Tithe Applotment Book entry for Rockfield from 1828 shows a James Acheson with 16 acres held from the Bishop of Kilmore, George de la Poer Beresford. How James relates to Thomas is not yet clear.) Figure 2 Graddum (top) and Rockfield (bottom) in the 1837-1842 Ordnance Survey. Both townlands lie in Crosserlough civil parish. Francis Acheson was born in 1835 and daughter Eliza in 1837, both at Rockfield. The ‘Anglo-Celt’ newspaper of June 29 1849 reports the following: “CONSISTORIAL COURT, CAVAN The Rev. Dr. CARSON, Surrogate, held a court on Monday last in the Court-house, Cavan. The business was of little importance. Thomas Condron cited Thomas Acheson of Rockfield, farmer, to attend and shew cause why he had “slandered, defamed and injured the good name, fame, and reputation of Thomas Condron, on divers occasions, and particularly on the 26th of March last, by stating to Joseph Gordon and others, that he the said Thomas Condron had forged and counterfeited a false order or undertaking in the name of Mr. James Hearne, for the sum of 30s., by which order the said Thomas Acheson had been defrauded of said sum.” Mr. Swanzy appeared for promovant, and Mr. Moutray Erskine for impugnant. In this case it appears a certain order had been forged in the name of Mr. Hearne and presented to Mr. Acheson for payment; the latter honoured it, and shortly afterwards covered the fraud. The promovant alleges that Mr. Acheson then reported the handwriting in the order to resemble his (Mr. Condron’s) by which he was deprived of his situation, that of parish schoolmaster. In consequence of which the present citation was issued. The learned proctors had a long discussion on the preliminary points, and the law bearing on them; at the conclusion of which, the Court decided it had no power to take cognizance of the matter- that the promovant might, if he thought proper, institute an action for damage at common law.” (Consistory courts were church courts that, until the 1850s, had jurisdiction in probate matters and, among other cases, defamation.) (Records show Thomas Condron, Church of Ireland, schoolmaster of Carrickacroy schoolhouse in 1824. 60 pupils attending – 30 girls, 30 boys. Condron, having lost his house and employment in one, took his family to Liverpool. In the 1851 Census he is a bookkeeper in a factory there. Three of his daughters had already moved to Australia in 1844. In 1852, he and his other family joined them in Melbourne, where he ran a bar called the 'Cavan Hotel' His daughter Isabella, in Melbourne in 1862, married Joshua Roberts Mooney. Joshua's mother was Dorothea Gethings - my mother's great great grand aunt!) Figure 3 Page from family Bible of Thomas Stafford Acheson (courtesy of Cavan Acheson) The ‘Anglo-Celt’ reports, in the March 8 1855 edition, that Thomas Acheson of Crosserlough donated 7s. 6d. to the Patriotic Fund – the Crimean War being ongoing the fund was to support widows and orphans of British service members. Elizabeth Acheson née Johnson died on April 26 1855 at the age of 56 years. In less than a year, Thomas Acheson remarried to Margaret Naye at Laragh on April 3 1856. Her father is recorded as Robert Naye. Thomas’ father is also recorded as Robert. Griffith’s Valuation for Cavan published in 1857 shows Thomas with three holdings –30 acres at Rockfield and 28 acres at Crosserlough townland; both leased from J.D. Beresford and 72 acres at Kilmore held from Lord Farnham. Margaret and Thomas had five children together: George - born 1857 Alexander – born 1858 Mary Anne – born 1860 Margaret Jane – born 1862 And lastly my great-grandfather Henry – born 1865 Thomas Acheson died on June 15 1877. His will – transcribed below shows the extent of his holdings – a ‘strong farmer’ – and his decisions for his youngest children: “I Thomas Acheson of Rockfield in the County of Cavan being sound in body and mind do make this my last Will & Testament revoking all other Wills that I may have made. - I will that my executors ? in all ? that may belong to me at the time of my death. I leave to my son George Acheson the sum of Two Hundred & fifty pounds Stg on his attaining the age of Twenty one years. I leave to my son Henry Acheson the sum of Two Hundred and fifty pounds Stg on his attaining the age of Twenty one years. I leave to my daughter Mary Anne Acheson the sum of Two Hundred pounds Stg on her attaining the age of Eighteen years - I leave to my daughter Margaret Jane Acheson the sum of Two Hundred pounds Stg on her attaining the age of (Twenty) Eighteen years. - I leave the above bequests to my children subject to the conditions that they have seen, that they come to age dutiful and obedient to their Mother and pleased my Executors. - I leave to my dearly beloved wife Margaret Acheson the continued occupation of my present dwelling house in Rockfield during her remaining life also one half of the Stock of Cattle I may possess at the time of my death also the chattle property I may possess at my death and the use during her life of my farm at Rockfield.