Just for fun more origins of names

Lots of potential on the Casey (Maternal) side for famous ancestors. Curiously enough, Casey's are related to the O'Brien's while our branch of the McBryan's are not. Granny Case, (Grace Casey) always told us that "Casey's are decended from the Kings of Ireland." She was quite proud of that. Found out she was right. Casey's are decendants of the Tribe of Cas (DalgCais) more commonly refered to as the Dalcassians of Thomond who are descended from a progenitor, Cormac Cas who died in 254 A.D. The most famous of the Delcassians was Brian Boru, Last High King of Ireland, who like that much better known but much less documented Welshman, King Arthur, waged a lifelong battle to keep Northern Europeans, Danes in this case from swallowing the whole country.
Check out, and, and.

O'Brien's trace their decent directly from Brian Boru.
Casey's trace their decent from his second son.

Those O'Brien's are really up on this genealogical stuff, they have a lovely slick website. For those hankering for family shield and heraldry, the've got the stuff.

See here:
They have a castle, Dromoland Castle and a Dromoland Estate in Thomond House where the current O'Brien,

"The O’Brien, Prince of Thomond, Chief of the Name, The 18th Baron Inchiquin, 10th Baronet of Leamaneh -aka "The Great Condor" for flying, rather than driving, his Aston Martin. Conor Myles John O’Brien, born in Surrey, England on 17th July 1943, the son of the youngest son of 15th Baron Inchiquin”lives and "run(s) an exclusive guest house in their home Thomond House at Dromoland, as well as having turned Dromoland Estate into a major sporting and leisure centre. Activities include, driven pheasant shooting, stalking, fishing, horse riding, eventing, hunter trials, clay pigeon shooting, archery and other activities".More:

Bet there are more O'Briens and McBryans prowling around Ireland with visitors visa in the summer than there are actually living there anymore.

This Casey line has reached a terminus, Alan and Olive's children, Christopher, Martin and Leanora have not had children of their own.

I thought for a while that Margaret Kenny's (Dad's mother) people might be also Dalcassian, but a search on her name led me to:

Kenny: (Paternal Maiden name)The name Kenny in Ireland is derived from a number of sources including the native Gaelic O'Cionnaoith (without servile work)Sept, who were principally based in Counties Galway and Tyrone. From there the Galway Kenny's probably entered Tipperary crossing the river Shannon at Portumna to settle primarily in the northern part of Tipperary. Other descendants may derive from English or French (Normand) settlers who arrived into County Wexford. John O'Hart in his book Irish Pedigrees records that the name Kenny and Kenney is of Huguenot origin. The Huguenots were protestant refugees from France, Belgium and the Holland who fled from religious persecution under King Louis the XIV in the 1600's. The Duke of Ormond (Barony of Ormond is now Tipperary) and the Earl of Stafford under the rule of King Charles then set out to encourage the Huguenots to emigrate to Ireland during the mid 1600's. (Ulster Plantations).The Kenny name is among the eighty most frequently found in the country."

Makes one wonder about Granny Mac's rabid Catholicism. I do remember her however, telling me that her family came from near the River Shannon in Ireland. We are not sure where Granny's family lived in Eastern Canada or when they came. I did get a sugestion that she was from Napanee Ontario and a quick google confirms that Kenny is still a pretty common name in Napanee. On my father's (Kenneth McBryan's) birth certificate she uses Toronto.

Additional info from the dusty crawl space of my brother's house. A copy of Margaret Kenny's baptismal certificate. Apparently her father's name was Michael Kenny and her mothers name Jane Clair. The location of the baptism is St. Antony of Padua in Newburg Ontario. These photo's have a Mrs J McBryan written on them in my father's handwriting, but I bet these are of Margaret Kenny's mother, they are too old a costume to be her.


Woolsey, (Maternal Maiden name) Granny Case's father, (Casey was her husband's name). All I know about him was that he was English, living in Ireland where Granny Case (Grace Lillian) was born, somewhere in Ulster. Woolsy is a very common name in Norfolk and Suffolk in England, pure Saxon, from before William the Conqueror.
I know my great grandfather served in India, (my grandmother had one of his tunic buttons on a hatpin and some coiled Indian brass snake bracelets with emerald and ruby eyes. My sister still has one). He later moved the whole family to Swansea in England where Granny trained as a teacher. He might have been a British soldier stationed in Northern Ireland around 1880 to keep an eye on "The Troubles" who married an Irish woman while he was there.Grace Lillian later emigrated to Canada where she married Martin Casey son of a Newfoundland dory fishing family.