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The Swantons: From England to Ireland

My Swantons were either descendents of the few Swantons who lived in Ireland during Cromwellian times, or of the Swantons who fought under King William of Orange against King James II in 1690. Swanton is an English name derived from a place in Norfolk [1], and all the Swantons were originally from England .

In 1653, Cromwell formed a new mode of government called the protectorship. The Catholic officers and nobility were forced to abandon their estates in the other provinces and cross the Shannon into Connaught and the County Claire , where Cromwell enjoined them to remain, under pain of death, without express permission to leave them. Here they were subjected to the insolence, oppression, and cruelty of the tyrants who ruled over them.

Cromwell, in the meantime, either wishing to conciliate the Irish by kindness, or give them a favorable opinion of his benevolence, established at Athlone a court of claims, by which it was decreed to grant in those parts of the kingdom, to the proscribed proprietors of lands, (who would be found not to have been implicated in the rebellion,) a portion of land sufficient for their subsistence, and befitting their qualify and pretensions. By this regulation it happened that some of these noblemen enjoyed in Connaught and the county of Claire a fourth, others a third, and some one-half of the revenues they possessed at home. [2]

Two of the recipients of these Connaught Certificates were Michael and Margaret Swanton. Michael is not a common first name for Swantons, and in the 1800’s, it appeared primarily in the Catholic Swanton lines in Dunmanway and Midleton. Michael Swanton was the name of my great-great grandfather.

Most of the Swantons, however, arrived in Ireland in 1690 to fight under King William III against King James II. In the History of Bandon, written by George Bennett in 1862, Mr. Bennett notes that “A great many of those that fought in the last campaign under William, settled in and about Bandon, amongst whom were Captain William Scott, who commanded a troop in one of William’s horse regiments at the Boyne, Hornibrook, Swanton, etc.”

In The Story of West Carbery, I found the following Swanton reference:

"The Swantons are still another family which must have arrived in West Carbery about this time as we are told that Swanton was a Williamite arrival in Bandon about 1690. During the following century, the family acquired large estates, and founded the town of Ballydehob , which at one time was called " Swantons Town ".

Smith does not mention it at all, so apparently it did not exist in 1749 but in Lewis's Dictionary of 1837 we are told that it had 100 houses and 601 inhabitants, and that a "new line of road, formed by the Board of Works, from Skibbereen to Rock Island runs through it".

In 1768 Richard Tonson demised lands, in and near Ballydehob to William Swanton for lives, renewable for ever, which suggests the two families were then on very good terms. A William Swanton made his Will in 1825, and refers therein to property owned or rented by him in over 70 different townlands, mainly round Ballydehob, but extending westerly to Goleen, Dunmanus and Durrus, and easterly round Skibbereen and beyond Leap."

Edward MacLysaught wrote that "though Swanton is an English name derived from a place in Norfolk, it has become closely identified with West Cork since the 17th century. There are no less than seventeen references to Swantons in Ireland in the 15th century, including two Connaught Certificates.[3]

The name occurs frequently in the Cork and Ross wills and in the marriage license bonds for the same diocese from 1690. Practically all the fairly numerous Swanton births of the 19th century were registered in County Cork . In 1853, Griffith found as many as fifty-eight Swanton families in West Cork , and in 1878, there were seven of the name among the large landowners of County Cork , owning between them 11,750 acres.

A few Swantons do appear in our records elsewhere; e.g., a sheriff in County Kildare in 1675. The most notable of the Cork Swanton family were those who distinguished themselves in France . James Swanton (1760-1820) who at the age of 12 was adopted by his uncle, the Abbe Swanton, served in Berwick's regiment of the Irish brigade and afterwards as a colonel in the French army. Hilaire Belloc was his grandson. His son, Armand (c.1785-c.1830), was also an officer in the Irish Legion. He was said to be the handsomest officer in the French Army.”

From The Book of Irish Families, Great and Small by Michael C. O'Laughlin

Swanton, of English origins, Swan

Swanton families are assumed to be of English settler origins. The family is found in County Cork in the 17th century. Cork is traditionally considered the home for the name. The 1890 birth index and Griffith 's survey give the name centered in Cork as well. The 1890 index finds 5 of the name in Cork and 2 of the name in Dublin . "Swanton" is found in Dublin and Antrim then.

Several are found in the works of O'Hart, and some are found as 'wild geese", in the ranks of foreign armies on the continent, as was one James Swanton of the Irish Brigades in France , 1760 - 1828.

Several of the name held estates in Cork in the last century. At least one of the name is found as a sheriff in County Kildare in the latter half 17th century.

Swanton Wills Probated in Cork between 1548 and 1855[4]

John Swanton, Letterbellish, 1717
William Swanton, Aghill, 1750[5]
George Swanton, 1757
George Swanton, Banashanaslogh, 1775
John Swanton, Bandon, 1790
William Swanton, Gortnegrough, 1798
Robert Swanton, Ballidehob, 1833
John Clerk Swanton, Bandon, 1836 (husband of Jane)
James Evans Swanton, Aghadown, 1837
Young Swanton, Augaginveen, 1842
James Swanton, Ballydehob, 1843