The Sinclairs of Co Tipperary

Isaac Sinclair was recorded in Griffith’s Valuation of 1864 as farming land in the townlands of Fawnagowan and adjacent Corrogebeg in the parish of Cordangan, nearby the town of Tipperary. He married Eliza Cleary, the daughter of Joseph Cleary, also a farmer. Isaac’s brother Thomas was a shopkeeper at 2 Main Street, Tipperary, where he had a confectioners, grocers and spirit shop in 1856.

The following by Mrs Margaret Power, aged 76, the grandmother of the respondent, was transcribed as part of the National Folklore Collection at University College Dublin:

The Sinclairs were a family who lived in Barrack St., Bansha. They had a big garden at the back of their house and a field which was separated from the garden by the river Ara. They refused to pay the rack rents and rates of the time, and fought the landlord under the Plan of Campaign. The sheriff and emergency men came to evict Thomas Sinclair and they built a hut in Sinclair’s field. They stocked the hut with plenty of food, and a big flitch of American bacon which they hung from the ceiling. Some of the patriotic women of the village broke into the hut headed by Ballcohey and burned the bacon. In the dark of night four men banded together and threw paraffin oil on the hut and burned it. They then took a goat and decorated her with green ribbons and paraded her through the streets followed by a crowd who sang every old songs they had, including “The Peeler and the goat”. The emergency men however did not evict Thomas Sinclair, but went away. The police caught two of those who opposed the eviction – Richard Bourke and John Cullinan. The other two escaped: Ben Martin and John Ryan. These were the four young patriots who set Sinclair’s hut on fire.  (www.duchas.ie)

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DESCENDANTS