Abstracts from the Vestry Book
The following is compiled from notes made by Fr. Denis O'Donoghue in 1917. They are from the Vestry Book of the Church of Ireland in Inchigeela. This book was a compilation of notes on Parish Meetings and Church Expenditure.
The Vestry Book of the Parish of Inchigeelagh
starts with a minute of a meeting held in May
1807 with reference to approving the sum of £22
to be raised in the Parish for the coming year,
£10 of which was to be the Clerk's Salary.
Signed Nicholas C. Bowen,
Curate.
Wm. Boyle, Michael Williams,
Joseph Browne.
A minute of a Vestry
Meeting held on the 13th. day of
November, 1807, for the purpose of raising a
subscription in the Parish in order to provide
substitutes for the XXXXX agreeable to the Act
of Parliament, it was agreed that the sum of 3
shillings and 6 pence a gneeve be applotted
on each gneeve in the Parish and that John Tobin
be appointed Collector for which he received the
sum of 3 guineas.
(Editors note:
1 gneeve - one twelfth of a ploughland)
Signed Nicholas C. Bowen,
Curate. James Barry and Wm. Boyle.
A minute of a Vestry Meeting held on June 16th.
1806.
Wm. Boyle of Drumcarra and Alexander
Larymore of Inshunanave, Church Wardens and
Barry Crean of Kilbarry, Sidesman for ensuing
year.
Signed Nicholas C. Bowen,
Curate. Wm. Boyle, James Barry,
Michael Williams and Thomas Williams.
At
a Vestry Meeting held 3/4/1809 being
Easter Monday it was agreed that Michael
Williams of Currihy and Joseph Brown of
Inchigeelagh be nominated Church Wardens.
Vestry Meeting held on 23rd
April, Easter Monday 1810. It was agreed
that Wm. Brown of Inchigeelagh and Chris Woods
of Teeranassig be appointed Church Wardens.
Signed Deane H. Nash, Curate.
Vestry Meeting held on 18th
April, 1811, being Easter Monday was signed by
Deane H. Nash, Curate. James
Donleson.
Vestry Meeting held on 27th
May 1811, for the purpose of the Church Wardens
to give in their accounts for the year 1810, but
which they have not done, nor attending this
Vestry. It is resolved that the
applotments of 1 shilling and 8 pence per gneeve
(£22) having lain on Commission Table, be
confirmed.
Vestry Meeting held Easter
Monday 30th of March 1812, Richard
Busteed of Drumcarra and Charles Connel of
Inchineal be appointed Church Wardens, also
George Grainger with Michael Williams and Joseph
Brown do applot the sum of £22.
At a
Vestry Meeting held on the 7th of
July 1812 it was agreed that 4 pence per gneeve
should be added to the former applotments for to
pay for the interest of £250 which is to
advanced by the Board of First Fruits for the
Rebuilding of the said Parish Church, and it is
also ordered that a plan and estimate of the
intended work be laid before the bishop of this
Diocese for his approbation.
Signed
Richard Henry Rogers, Curate.
Copy of a letter found pinned on to a leaf of
the Vestry Book, giving an account of a meeting
held on the 23rd May 1809.
Glebe, April 9th.
Dear Miss Brown,
Corly Callaghan told
me that you wished me to prevent strangers
sitting in the pew in which you and your sisters
generally sit. I have neither the power
nor the inclination to prevent any persons of
sitting in any part of the Church they please,
not appropriated to the requirements of Divine
Worship, but, as you have probably perceived,
Mrs Spring, to prevent unpleasantness has made
Miss Brown, who has been staying at the Castle,
sit with herself. I have also got the
Church Wardens to make an entry in the
Vestry Book, which I hope will answer your
purpose as it recognises the fact of your
occupying the sitting you wish should be left
for you with the option of better accommodation
any time you should desire to make the exchange.
I enclose you a copy of the entry, and on back
of it a copy of the only other allocation of
pews in the Book, for a term of 67 years, the
period over which it extends.
Very truly
yours,
Edward Spring.
As an instance of the value of money
in Inchigeelagh in 1825, the following extract
from an entry in the Vestry Book will show:
Nineteen perches of the Church wall at 7
shillings a perch = 6 pounds and
thirteen shillings.
To the Mason - 1
shilling and 10 pence per day = 1
pound, 14 shillings and 10 pence.
To
floor the Church = 11 pounds.
For letters from Vicar Gen. = 4
shillings and 4 pence.
For Labour - 5 men
at 7 pence each = 2 shillings and
11 pence.
For horse hire - 10 horses at 2
shillings and 6 pence each = 1 pound
and 5 shillings.
24 labourers for
planting and carrying = 14
shillings.
For building the walls under
joist and getting stones = 4
shillings.
For 30 joists at 5 and a half
pence each = 13 shillings and 9 and
a half pence.
For timber for a gate and
painting and nails = 8 shillings and
8 pence.
To Mangan for 8 lbs. of Iron at
4 pence per pound = 2 shillings and
8 pence.
To the Smith = 3
shillings and 6 pence.
Pay Tobin for
making do. = 2 shillings and 2
pence.
1825 money expended =
24 pounds, 6 shillings and 4 pence.
Money
in hand = 23 pounds, 9 shillings and
9 and a half pence.
Due by the parish to
Mr. B. = 16 shillings and 6 and a
half pence.
A Note on the
Vestry Book.
The Notes written by the
Church of Ireland clergyman at the beginning of
the 19th.c. throw an interesting
light on how the local representatives of that
church intended to spread the costs of the
upkeep of that Institution across the
parishioners. In this first instance they were
considering the required sum of £22 for the
following year, of which £10 was for the salary
of the Clerk, and the uses of the remaining
£12 is unstated. This £22 would represent
about £22,000 in today's money.
In
May 1807 the principle is agreed that the total
sum to be raised is £22 for the year.
In
November 1807 it is agreed that the individuals
contribution shall be based on 3/6d. per gneeve,
where the gneeve is an old land measure equal to
1/12th. of a ploughland, itself an
archaic and imprecise unit of land measure.
John Tobin, who has the dubious pleasure of
"collecting" this imposition, will be rewarded
by receiving 3 guineas, ie.£3-3-0 or £3,150 in
today's money.
By May 1811 the
contribution is amended to 1/8d. per gneeve, but
this is still calculated to bring in £22 for the
year.
In March 1812 it is confirmed that
£22 is required for the year.
In July
1812 the sum of £250 is required apparently for
interest on the capital sum provided by the
Board of First Fruits for the rebuilding of the
Church. To raise this £250 requires an
additional contribution of 4d. per gneeve.
These notes raise a number of
queries.
1.Who was the "Clerk"?
The term "Clerk" could be taken to mean a "Clerk
in Holy Orders", ie. the Curate himself, in this
instance Nicholas Bowen, and later, Deane Nash,
and then Henry Rogers. But Brady tells us that
in 1837 the Curate was employed at a stipend of
£18 per annum, not £10.
An alternative
interpretation is that "Clerk" refers to a
"Parish Clerk", ie. the official in a large
Parish who kept the Parish Records, and other
similar clerical duties. He would be a layman, a
prominent and active parishioner, and likely to
have other means. eg. a local landlord.
It is difficult to believe that there was
enough work for a Parish Clerk in Inchigeelagh.
But we do have a reference to a William Browne
who died in 1862 and is called "the Parish
Clerk."
2.What are the "gneeves"
referred to?
A gneeve was 1/12th.
of a "ploughland" in the archaic land measure
system. The concept of a ploughland was
"that amount of land which could be ploughed by
one team". By this definition, it was an
imprecise measure. It could represent 100
acres of good flat arable land, say in Milleen.
Or 1000 acres of rough "unprofitable" land up in
the mountains.
In common parlance, a
gneeve often referred to a small farm unit, say
10 to 30 acres, which could support one family.
The term had also become a unit of taxation,
which was probably the case in this instance.
In the Survey of 1655, the Parish of
Inchigeelagh, excluding the eleven townlands in
Carbery, was described as being 23 ploughlands
and one gneeve. This division into
ploughlands and gneeves was probably still in
use in the beginning of the 19th.c.
Thus when it is expected to raise £22 from an
imposition of 1/8d. per gneeve, the calculation
becomes:
20 pence x [(23 x 12) +1] =
£23 which is not far out. There
were 240 pence per £ then. 240
It would, of course, have been well
known, which were the individual gneeves, and
who owned them.
This does not explain
why, in May 1807 they thought they needed to
impose 3/6d. per gneeve to raise this same £22.
Perhaps this was a simple miscalculation, which
was put right in May 1811. Or there may be no
connection between the sums calculated in May
and November 1807., which would have been for
different purposes.
3.How could 4d.
per gneeve pay for the interest of £250?
Again reference to Brady shows that the
final cost of rebuilding the Church in 1814 was
£230-15-4 3/4d. ! In other words, the £250 was
the total cost, and it should read "to pay for
the interest on £250". 4 pence per
gneeve would yield £4.62, a rate of interest of
3.7% pa. average, which seems reasonable,
although today's Banks would not agree, now that
they have decided that Usury is no longer a sin!
4. Why was the Curate involved,
and not the Rector?
Again Brady is a
great help. From 1791 to 1838 the Rector was
Rev.George Sealy, and for most of this time he
was an "absentee". He lived in England on the
princely benefice of £380 pa., and Inchigeelagh
Parish was left in the care of a Curate who was
paid £18 pa. plus a house and the rents of the
Glebe. There were, as it can be seen, a
series of Curates changing at regular intervals.
We do not have a full list of them.
5.The
letter to Miss Brown.
This again is of
great interest, but is much later.
Rev.Edward Spring was Rector of Inchigeelagh
Parish from 1867 to 1871, so the letter was
slipped into the book at a much later date.
Miss Brown was probably a daughter of Joseph
Browne (1786-1847) who had two daughters, Diana
b.1813 and Elizabeth b.1817. All this family
were Protestants. They were direct
descendants of Dr. Jemmett Browne, Bishop of
Cork (1702-1782) and who built Riverstone Park
as his Bishop's Palace.