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Aghavallen

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"AGHAVALLIN, or AGHAVALAH, a parish, in the barony of IRAGHTICONNOR, county of KERRY, and province of MUNSTER, 4½ miles (W. S. W.) from Tarbert; containing with the town of Ballylongford and the island of Carrigue, 5688 inhabitants. This place anciently belonged to the O'Connors of Kerry, whose principal seat, Castle Carrig-a-foile, signifying in the Irish language the rock of the chasm, was situated on the south-west side of the inlet between the mainland and the small island of Carrigue, which is encircled by the river Shannon.
The parish is situated on the river Shannon, and within a mile and a half of the high road from Tralee to Limerick, and comprises 15,152 statute acres, as apploted under the tithe act."
[From A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland by Samuel Lewis (1837)]

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Cemeteries

The two old burial grounds of the parish are located at Aghavallen, around the ruins of the old parish church, and at Lislaughtin at the site of the old abbey.

Aghavallen Churchyard

  • Kerry County Council has scanned the Aghavallen burial registers for 1934 to 2010 as a  PDF which can be downloaded here
  • Find A Grave has photographs of Agahavallen Churchyard with names on memorials and photographs of some graves here.
  • Joe Maher has taken photographs of all memorials in the church yard and uploaded them to his Kerry Burials website.

Lislaughtin Abbey Burial Ground

  • Kerry County Council has scanned the Lislaughtin Burial Ground burial registers for 1960 to 2004 as a PDF which can be downloaded here.
  • Find A Grave has photographs of Lislaughtin Abbey with photographs and names of memorials - here.
  • Joe Maher has taken photographs of all memorials in the burial ground and uploaded them to his Kerry Burials website.
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Census

Note: The Civil Parish of Aghavallen ceased to be used for census purposes in the mid nineteenth century when District Electoral Divisions (DEDs) were introduced.

Aghavallen comprises the entire DEDs of:

  • Astee (Astee East and West, Ballynoneen, Carrigane, Cloonaman, Curraghderrig, Glanawillin, Kilcolman, Killeton, Kylatallin, Larha, Letter, Sliss townlands)
  • Carrig (Aghanagran Lower; Middle and Upper, Carrig Island, Carrigafoyle, Gortard, Martara, Rusheen, Rusheen Park townlands. This DED also includes most of Ballylongford town.
  • Lislaughtin (Ballyline East and West, Ballymacasy, Bunnaruddee, Coolnagraigue, Dromalivaun, Gurteenacloona, Leanamore, Lislaughtin, Shrone townlands. The DED also includes the Will Road and Main Street areas of Ballylongford Town.

and part of

  • Lisselton DED (Tullahennel North and South townlands),

The 1901 and 1911 census schedules are available on the National Archives of Ireland website.

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Church History

In the Church of Ireland, the parish of Aghavallen has been united with other parishes since the seventeenth century. The old church continued in use into the nineteenth century, and was rebuilt in 1840, but is now in ruins.

The 1840 church was designed by James Pain, and his architectural drawings can be seen on the Representative Church Body Library website here.

In 1878 the parish was merged with Listowel. The nearest Church of Ireland church is now in Tarbert (Kilnaughtin Church), administered from Rathkeale in County Limerick.

In the Roman Catholic chuch, Aghavallen was united to Kilnaughten from at least the beginning of the eighteenth century. In 1859, the parishes were again separated, but under the modern names of Ballylongford and Tarbert. The Roman Catholic parish of Ballylongford is identical with the old parish of Aghavallen.

There are two churches in the parish:

St Michael the Archangel's Church, Ballylongford, was built in 1871 to designs by J. J. McCarthy. Information about the church can be found on the National Inventory of Archectecturial Heritage's Buildings of Ireland site. This replaced an earlier chapel dating from 1806.

St Mary's Asdee, was built in 1835 as a chapel of ease.

The page for Ballylongford Parish on the Diocese of Kerry website is here.

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Church Records

The Church of Ireland Parish registers for Aghavallen were deposited at the Public Record Office, Dublin and destroyed by fire in 1922. From 1878 entries for the parish were included in the Listowel registers.

The Roman Catholic parish registers for Ballylongford were microfilmed by the National Library of Ireland and are now available to view online. The records are written in Latin and have missing or mutilated pages.

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Civil Registration

From 1863 Aghavallen was included in the Ballylongford Registrar's District, part of the Listowel Superintendent Registrar's District. See the Registration Districts page.

The Irish Genealogy website, maintained by the Irish Government's Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, has transcriptions and/or scans of the entries in the registers of births, marriages and deaths. As of October 2020 the following were available:

  • Births 1864-1919
  • Marriages 1864-1944
  • Deaths 1864-1969

The indexes can be searched here. (Enter 'Listowel' in the Civil Registration District/Office field)

Registrations for other years can be searched and photocopies obtained at the General Register Office Search Room, Werbergh Street, Dublin 2.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic the search room is currently closed

No search services are currently available but a photocopy may be obtained by email if you have the Superintendent Registrar's District, Year Quarter, Volume number and Page.

Both Ancestry and Find My Past subscription genealogy sites have searchable indexes of the years 1845-1958 which can assist in obtaining these details. Many public libraries subscribe to these sites.

The GRO Search Room web page gives current information.

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Description & Travel

Websites

You can see pictures of Aghavallen which are provided by:

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Gazetteers

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History

Websites

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Land & Property

The Primary Valuation of Ireland, also known as  Griffith's Valuation was carried out between 1848 and 1864. It provides  detailed information on tenants and landlords and is valuable as a census substitute. In the case of County Kerry the valuation was carried out in 1851-52.
The valuation is searchable online at the Ask About Ireland website. Search results for the parish of Aghavallen can be found at this link.

You can see maps centred on OSI grid reference Q9830945659 (Lat/Lon: 52.553162, -9.499964), Aghavallen which are provided by: