Thomas, Head of the Family

It was during the sacking of the Abbey that Thomas’s’ three sons: Thomas the Elder, who married Mary O’Brian of Naas, niece of Hugh O’Byrne, Patrick, and James, escaped - found refuge with Hugh O’Byrne of Dublin, one of the Confederate Catholics. In the early 1600s, the O’Byrne family, owned vast estates round Clare, Naas in Kildare, and Wicklow. Thomas died in Spain, nine years later. Patrick entered Spanish service in the military, and Hugh married Margaret O’Brian, daughter of Dermot O’Brian of Naas. Their son John O’Brian married Mary, daughter of Owen M’Kewen of Clontarf and Swords. Their second child was a daughter born in 1749, who married in 1780, Hugh O’Moore of Longford, Castlepollard, in the County of Westmeath. The whole family were Catholics - held Gaelic allegiances to language and habit.

In 1653-65 Leinster was one of four equal land provinces of Ireland made-up by areas such as Kilkenny, assigned by the English parliament as security for soldiers and adventurers, Carlow and Kildare, kept as a government reservation, and Queens County kept aside as an area included in the plantations of the Catholic James I. The throne of England was, after James II, occupied by Mary and William of Orange – hence Irish Protestants becoming ‘Orangemen’. This reign effectively destroyed the Catholic landowning classes. The outcome of the Cromwellian plantation period found some Irish catholic citizens selling-up, others quite demented by worry, some running away, and others executed. The transportations completed finally in July 1655. There were many arrests for failing to transplant; in fact so many that the goals were full… hangings made space available, until an excuse was made to let some go. Those picked on and freed were landowners not the landless. A few years later some of the new owners sold up, to others who increased their grants by purchase to become the new ‘gentlemen landowners’. It was generally a clearance of the old landowners and even in the Restoration; things were never the same again - the old ways in Kilkeary disregarded. Some old freeholders went to Irish counties whilst others went aboard, mainly to Spain and Holland - away from English influence… changing their names and making a fresh start. By this time, the clan was almost non-existent.

In the Civil Survey of 1654-1656, the Parish of Kilkeary, spelt Kylkeary, showed even at that late stage spellings were still not regularised, it also suggests that the parish was considerably larger containing several townships and parcels of land. The parish began at the ford of Bellasuillsane, at the river of Geagh, bounded with the parish of Kylnaneafe followed the river southward to Poellacholla, which adjoins Tampledony, Ballymacky, Grenanstowne and Lisbony. The parish described in the survey as having good arable meadows and pastures, several springs and a number of plough-lands. The Hearth Money Rolls indicate that several members of the family living in Co. Tipperary started to use the English form of Ceary to retain their estates. They were better off under the Restoration settlement, for they received back three-fifths of their land. That was before the 1691 Jacobite War… by the end they had even less. Those of the family who retained their Gaelic native Irish name lived outside Clonmel’s walls.

Many of the old gentry, including the O’Ciardha and the O’Kennedys, evicted - from their estates. In exchange they had been given ‘fractions’ - huts to live in, where they had to stay without possessions. One of the clans, the O’Kennedys of Ormond, had their ‘fraction’ confiscated in the Williamite wars – because forty-eight of the clan families wished to maintain their Gaelic inheritance… this did not go down well with the Anglo-Irish who expected them to conform. Other families, related to the old gentry, hid under another name for fear of losing what little they had managed to retain.

The O’Ciardha and O’Kennedys were not the only clans to live by deception. It is clear that few of the old families realigned back to their former allegiances. They had not been happy under the previous relationships and wanted to make a change. Some of the elderly stayed at home and worked for their new masters, tilling their own land… others, wishing to leave allotted land in Connaught. In Ormond, the more adventurous gentry took refuge in the inaccessible valleys of Glenculloo between the Slieve Felim hills, from where their descendants still carried their dead… to the churchyard at Kilkeary.

In 1659, Kilkeary, in the barony of Upper Ormond, held 769 households with a population of about four thousand persons. Kilkeary was a direct grantee land made over to a new sitting owner James d’Alton. Some years later, during the Restoration period, some of the transferred settlement land retrieved by the old landowners. These landowners included the O’Meara, O’Connor’s and, Charles and Antony O’Carroll. Catholics held twenty percent of land in Kilkeary, Toomevara and Nenagh. This percentage reduced during the 1700s. In Petty’s Census of 1659, the O’Ciardha made up the largest percentage living in the Baronies of Scrine, Co Meath, and Ballybritt, south Offaly. The McCareys of Moycashel Barony, Westmeath were also in abundance. Ireland was a mainly Catholic population ruled and given their laws by an Anglo-Irish hierarchy. The country’s link to Rome gave it its cultural base, which made it allied to the Continent through the Irish Colleges in France, the Italian military academies, and those businesses engaged in overseas trade. To the English the Irish appeared a threat even though Ireland was a poorer cousin.   

The Irish population in 1690 was now nearly two million and growing. Limerick was a prosperous seaport and used as bastion against British influence… it was the last to hold out. The Jacobite used the town and its river to retreat to… Limerick’s city walls held… but only just! William confiscated all the land belonging to those Catholics who later escaped to France. The result of the defeat was The Treaty of Limerick in 1691 – it was the third great defeat. Thomas and Bridget Carey of Legbourne in 1692 saw the defeat of the Catholic cause. A number of families allowed to live there, retaining their property - considered docile enough - accepting English law; however, all Catholics were subject to Penal Laws.

At that time, there were a number of landholding and public office Acts that restricted the rights of Catholics - prevented them assuming state office and property. If an individual wished to ‘get on’- ‘improve his lot’, he had to go where there was money to be made, skills passed on and property to be bought. That goal accomplished by appearing to adopt the Protestant religion, using a name translated into English, or adopting a more recognisable English name. This was the start of the clan’s Gaelic connection given up and the more English ‘C’ or ‘K’ used - to form and spell Carey or Keary, by adopting these changes, a move could be made to either live in a settlement area or to find a new life abroad.

In the diocese of Killaloe, which included Kilkeary, there were only a few beneficed clergymen and even less actually resided in the area. There were about three Catholic priests to one clergyman. Churches were not maintained properly - allowing rotting roofs and broken walls to let in the damp and rain. This state - the paucity of the clergymen, also affected other church property, including glebe houses and land. Idleness was also recorded when it came to tithe collecting and ministering to their parishioners.

There was an exodus from the countryside - for there were few opportunities for the ambitious and capable. The landowners patronised the tenant farmers who at one-time had been self-supporting - now relied upon handouts and loans because of the potato blight. The problems were so acute that stealing crops a daily event, to survive and prevent children starving. Not long before, generations of families had lived together in harmony… they populated land not belonging to them - knowing they would not be evicted. Now the English Parliament was taking their land away... Economic fluctuations prompted by taxation, upset the normal domestic industry, particularly the cost of seed, potatoes and livestock. These extra costs created unrest. Rebellion was in the air, and tensions increased in rural areas, releasing sectarian antipathies. There was a general collapse of Protestant morale. When looking towards the Catholic majority, they could see they were outnumbered. There were several threats both real and imaginary of invasion, rebellion, and insurrection, coming from France and Spain.

Tenant farmers, working from small farms in the diocese of Killaloe, mainly produced vegetables and corn, larger farms grazed cattle. Previously leases could have been set for forty years. Farmers had made their own repairs and improvements, draining the land and rotating their crops. The landowners made sure their land fully occupied - so that the land did not lie to waste, and become overgrown. Now when a farm became vacant, the new lease ran according to periods of prosperity or want – in times of plenty they were short term. The result being that tenants were not taking a long-term view of their future: by planning ahead, keeping back some of their produce - to use as next years seed, have a planned rotation of crops, or devise ways to improve the drainage - by digging ditches and drains.

In the mid, 1750s, the poor majority in Ireland lived in utmost poverty. Their accommodation was squalid, and their diets made up of potato, turnips and a little wheat, and milk and on rare occasions beef. The population was increasing at an enormous rate… It was only the narrow coastal plain, which provided a market economy - where they managed to sell some of its produce. The poorer folk, living further inland up in the hills, depended on a subsistence economy. High rents were increasingly becoming unpaid - which generated debts - the result of which meant evictions. The property owners forced the poor to pay an ever-increasing amount for rent; the interest rates on owed money continued to rise. The whole system discouraged improvements in property and proper farm management, particularly towards land drainage, fertilization, rotation of crops, animal husbandry using  fallow land – as a cushion for poor harvests. It was a self-generating national disaster, which seemed to be unstoppable – and as it turned out, was!

About this time Daniel O'Cary, adopted the Protestant religion and, wishing to anglicise his name still further - in order to make a distinction between the families, asked for a meeting with the then head of the family, to declare an oath whereby he would reassume the spelling of Keary - removing the prefix O and the use of C. Many of the Irish began to look beyond their local areas for employment. The more adventurous found that America and the Caribbean offered them more. America became an important land for Irish immigrant labour. The life appealed too many - for its religious nonconformity and political independence. The American war of Independence started in 1775 and was an inspiration to many of the Irish poor to get back at the English.