Sandy

Don't want to put you off but I reckon this would be very difficult, because of the poor state of the Irish records. There are three things which will hold you back 1) the Irish birth registration (which of course included all of Ireland at the time) didn't start until 1864. The marriage registration started in 1845, but I imagine it was originally a bit hit and miss. None of these dates would pick up the births/marriage of John/Rachel or the births of their children 2) during WW1 the British government pulped the 1841, 1851, 1861, 1871 & 1881 Irish censuses. They said this was for the paper but they didn't pulp the English censuses, which would be much more paper, or the Scottish ones for that matter. No-one knows why they did it. 3) There was a fire in the Dublin Registry Office in the Four Courts (a court building) in Dublin in 1922. This was part of the Irish Civil War when some of the IRA against the treaty with Britain holed themselves up in the Four Courts and were bombarded on the orders of Michael Collins, leader of the IRA during the war with England and now leader of the pro-Treaty faction. Typically of Ireland there was an attempt to persuade the rebels to let the records be taken out before the bombardment began but they refused. The fire destroyed the 1891 census (which would have been no good to you anyway) and about 70% of the Church of Ireland record - because the Church of Ireland was the established church and its BMD records had to be deposited in the Registry as public records. These records could also contain RC BMDs because they had at one time to be registered in the Church of Ireland. You don't say what religion your McAuleys were. Antrim McAuleys tend to be RC - because they came to Ireland with the O'Donnells before Presbyterianism had reached Scotland - but not always.

PRONI is the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland which is in a leafy suburb of Belfast. Here is the website http://www.proni.gov.uk You have to register when you arrive - you just turn up - but see the opening times on the website - but this and everything else is free (except copies of documents). About the only thing they would have which might get your McAuleys is church baptismal and marriage records (think their website has a list of churches at least in some of the religions). If it says they are from Antrim (where? in US censuses?) it could mean anything - even Belfast which was regarded as part of Antrim in those days. Actually though if it is in a family bible I would say people would refer to the town they were from rather than the county so it could be worth looking up all the churches - it helps if you know what religion your folks were - in Antrim town and going through the microfilm for the dates you have - remembering people often got baptised some weeks or months after they were born. My guess would be John McAuley be from Antrim town too. People didn't travel far to find a spouse in those days. PRONI have microfilm which can be very poor quality - indecipherable writing and often poor photography - especially before 1850 - after that there was an official format. I find it useful to bring a hand magnifying glass. You have to trawl through the microfilm to get to where you want. Get one of the staff to show you how to thread the film and how to do fast and slow and forwards and backwards. It is a tedious business but you get better at it after a while. Also I would ask the staff in the main room (who are generally more helpful than the microfilm room staff) how you would find the churches in and around Antrim town.

If you have to go through all the churches in Antrim County, which as I say could include Belfast, you will be very lucky to find anything. It would just take too long. Also the earlier dates you try the worse the records are. 1815 would be very early for Ireland. There seems to be virtually nothing at all before 1800 and not that much just after it. Belfast churches are particularly poor.

The records which PRONI have are also usually available in the Mormons (LDS) local History Centres, which are all over the world. The LDS website http://www.familysearch.org/ could tell you where the centre nearest to you is. Their Irish records are often better than PRONI's. Often they did the microfilms. This would give you more time to trawl through the whole of Antrim if it came to that.

I take it you have tried to search for John, Daniel and the William McAuleys on the LDS website which has a pretty good search facility.

GRONI (not FRONI - that may have been my mistake) is the General Records Office Northern Ireland, which is in Chicester Street in Belfast. Because of the dates you are looking at I don't think they would have any records which are any good to you.

I doubt if there is anything in Dublin which would be any more use than PRONI and I believe the Dublin Records Office is a bit of a scrum.

There might possibly be records in Ballymena (now admistrative centre of Antrim county) library. This link give details of the library but not what is in it.

Sorry if this all sounds a bit negative but wouldn't want you turning up at PRONI full of hope and finding it was all very difficult. It certainly does look worthwhile searching the baptismal/marriage microfils for the churches around Antrim.

I wish you all the very best with your search

David Quinn