THE O’GORMAN FAMILY OF COUNTY CLARE, IRELAND

The following information regarding the ancestry of the O’Gorman family was obtained by Reverend John Robert O’Gorman with some assistance from Reverend John Joseph O’Gorman by examination of the records of Ireland and Canada. Members of the O’Gorman family migrated from County Clare to Canada in the years 1829 to 1840. They settled in the Ottawa Valley, but later their descendants moved to many other parts of Canada and the United States.

Pre-Norman Invasion O’Gormans

The Hy Bairrche (pronounced Ui Bairche) was the generic name for the O’Gormans and related families. The Hy Bairrche ruled the tuath or territory now known as the barony of Slievmargy in South East Queens County (Southeast County Liex) adjoining Carlow. This was land passed on from generations beginning before St.Patrick until the coming of The Norman Invasion.

The Book of Lecan lists the following saints as belonging to the Hy Bairrche:
Tighernach of Clones, Fiace and Fiachra in Sliebhte, MacTail of Cill Cuilinn, MacCuil of Mann, Fiacra, Goll, Ermine of Letha (Brittany), Diarmuid Mac Sibhair Mic Dallan, Madioc of Glenn Uisean and other saints. To this must be added the mother of St.Columcille...St.Sinnell of Cleenish who was St.Columban’s teacher before he went to Bangor, and possibly, conjectures Mrs. Concannon in her life of the saint, St.Columban himself.

The political status of the Hy Bairrche is given in the tenth century Book Of Rights which describes their territory and tribute. When surnames became common about the time of Brian Boru (1st King of Ireland), the ruling Lord of the Hy Bairrche took the name of MacGorman. The surname is derived from ‘gorm’ meaning blue.

The Norman Invasion

Under the date of 1124, the Four Masters, in their usual pompous way, record the death of Muireadach MacGorman, Lord of Ui Bairrche, “The ornament and glory and chief old hero of Leinster.” The O’Gormans of Tullycrien have offshoots of the family by the name of Howard who were still living on the land in 1918.

On the eve of the Norman Invasion, we find four O’Gormans who were well known writers or teachers:
Mal-Kevin O’Gorman was the Master of Louth, abbot of Termonfeckin and a cheif doctor of Ireland.
MacImuire O’Gorman published an Irish Martyrology or metric list of names of the Irish Saints.
Finn MacGorman was the Bishop of Kildare, drew up and transcribed The Book of Leinster
Flann O’Gorman was the head of the National School of Armagh.

The Book of Leinster is a miscellaneous collection of Irish romances, poetry and history of greater literary value than any other book compiled in any other living tongue in Europe of that Century.

The Annals of Ulster contain the following obituary notice of Flann O’Gorman under the year 1174: “Flann O’Gorman, chief professor of Armagh and of Ireland, a man, learned observant in devine and human knowledge, having been twenty-one years learning among the French and English, and twenty-one years directing the schools of Ireland, died peacefully in his 75th year.”

Here we see an O’Gorman, who had studied at the infant Universities of Paris and Oxford, and who by his ability, was developing The School of Armagh into a University. Only the Norman invasion prevented Armagh from becoming one of the great universities of the Middle Ages. During O’Gorman presidency, Roderick O’Conner, King of Ireland, established a chair at Armagh in honour of St.Patrick, to instruct the youths of Ireland and Scotland in learning. An Irish Synod (council) required that all Irish teachers should study there before teaching elsewhere.
The School of Armagh was destroyed ten years later by the Normans.
At the Norman invasion, rather than lose their liberty, the O’Gormans moved to County Clare, where they received the territory of Ibrachan from the O’Briens, King of Thomond, whose prosperous marshalls they became. There they supported poets and fed the poor for another four centuries, as we learn in MacBrady’s sixteenth century poem.

The family spread widely in Clare, but lost their lands in the seventeenth century rather than abandon their faith.
In the first quarter of this century there were O’Gormans...Bishops of Dioceses as far apart as Sioux Falls in South Dakota and Sierra Leone in Western Africa, while priests of the name were found from Dublin to Peking.

Land Confiscation

The Records Office in 1903, Dublin, stated that the estate at Tullycrien, over 1100 acres, was held by Malachy O’Gorman and three other O’Gormans. It was confiscated and given under Charles II to Captain William Hamilton. it is quite feasable though that family records indicate it had been confiscated under Cromwell. The Act for the Settlement of Ireland passed in 1661, in a large measure merely confirmed the grants given under the Cromwellian settlement.

Today

Gorman, MacGorman and O’Gorman are all of the same family and are still in County Clare, Limerick, Galway and Monahan today. Of the O’Gormans who joined ‘The Wild Geese’ in the service of France, the best known is Chevalier Thomas O’Gorman (1725-1808), an officer of the Irish Brigade, who later owned extensive vineyards but who lost his fortunes in the French Revolution. Notable figures in Irish politics were Nicholas Purcell O’Gorman (1778- 1857) who worked with O’Connell in the struggle for Catholic Emancipation as Secretary of the Catholic Association. Richard O’Gorman (1820-1895) was prominent in the Young Ireland movement.

Motto

Primi et ultimi in bello
first and last in war