Looking for Family Information

Statutory birth registration only began in Ireland in 1864 so you won?t find a birth certificate for your grandfather. You might find his baptism but to do that you need to know his exact denomination, and then search the relevant records (which are probably not on-line). Looking at the 1901 census for Co Down there were 93 people named Conn listed, split fairly evenly between Church of Ireland (ie Anglican) and Presbyterian. Do you know which denomination your grandfather was?

Copies of most surviving church records are held in PRONI (the public record office) in Belfast. The records are mostly on microfilm though some are the paper originals. A personal visit is required to search them. In a few cases the local church still holds the relevant records and consequently you need to go there to see them.

You can see what churches records exist in the Newry area by looking at the PRONI website:

http://www.proni.gov.uk/index/research_and_records_held/catalogues_guid…

Thank you for your help.   From the little information that we have about him I think he was a Methodist.  Unfortunately his son (my grandfather) had little to do with the family after his marriage (which was to a Catholic) so no information was passed down through the family.  i have had to start from stratch.   Do you know if there is anywhere online that I can apply to get information about his military service?

Thanks again.

For information about the 18th regiment try here :

http://www.firstandlast.ie/

Though Methodism was established a s a separate denomination in Ireland around 1819, many Methodists carried on using the Church of Ireland for baptisms and marriages right up to the 1870s. (There were various reasons for this to do with not wanting to separate from the mainstream church, also the lack of Methodist Ministers and, for marriages, licensed buildings). So if you don?t find them in Methodist records, try Church of Ireland.