Shem Dubourdieu and the Briggs

The literature on the Huguenot Dubourdieu family on the Continent and in Ireland is large and inconsistent, and I offer only a few tentative remarks. In summary, I think that Canon W H Dundas [4] or his editor, in transcribing and publishing notes on the Bests and Dubourdieus, mistook 1837 (the year of the Ordnance Survey Memoirs entries for Magheragall) for 1887, and that this error continued in the 1967 book Baby on her Back by Rev. W J DuBourdieu [5] and in these PRONI catalogue notes:

Mention of the Du Bordieu line is also made in a notebook of the late Canon W.H. Dundas of Magheragall Parish, Co. Antrim. An entry for 7 August, 1887 states: 'Shem Dubordieu of Knockadona, farmer and son of the late Shem Dubordieu, is a grandson of the late minister of that name…’

Unfortunately, due to the fragmentary nature of the archive, it is not possible to construct an accurate and complete family tree...  

Here is an extract from the Dundas typescript in PRONI T1398:

These words in Canon Dundas’s papers are very nearly – not exactly – those in the printed Memoirs for the parish of Magheragall:

Shem Dubourdieu is named here among those interviewed for the Memoirs in summer 1837. Today our guess at his family tree is still unlikely to be “accurate and complete”, but we should note the gossip omitted or not seen by Dundas (Shem is “not locally said to have been lawfully begotten”), and also the phrase “offspring of the Dunluce family”: that is, of the McQuillans of the “Route”, a region north of Lough Neagh and considerably north of Lisburn, around the Bann valley and Ballymoney / Coleraine / Dunluce.  George Briggs married Rebecca McQuillan (McQueelan etc.) in 1832, and she died in 1864 with her age given as 55, and a George Briggs has an interesting Portglenone link discussed below.

The date 5 August 1837 also appears in:

There are several mentions of the Hertford landowners and of quarrying:

Baby on her Back says: 

Here Rev. DuBourdieu knows that something is astray in the Dubourdieu timeline but not that Shem Dubourdieu of Knocknadona, farmer and son to the late Shem Dubourdieu and The present Shem Dubourdieu and his children refer to the 1830s not the 1880s. Dundas’s error of 50 years infects DuBourdieu’s long discussion, and in order to identify “the late Shem” and his large family he has to twist Dundas’s meaning ("I understand the Magheragall rector to say...").

“I was permitted to peruse this notebook”: it is not absolutely impossible that some of Dundas’s original written notes date from summer 1887 – he was aged 14 – but I think the simple misread suggested here is more likely, and a sufficient explanation. Shem Dubourdieu in Magheragall parish in the 1880s Valuation Book revisions is not “the present Shem Dubourdieu”; he is of a later generation.

The limestone quarries mentioned probably include the Belshaw family business. Dundas again:

The Knocknadona hall is still on the corner of Glenavy Road and Ballyclough Road, near the quarries and White Mountain. This identification of “Briggs’ Hill” is less helpful than we would wish, because Ballyclough Road runs uphill through all three townlands Kilcorig, Knocknadona and Ballyclough; the various Briggs in Magheragall parish needed to move only very short distances, say because of marriage or a rearranged lease, to change townland; and indeed “Briggs’ Hill” and these quarries lie only a couple of miles from George and the others in Knockmore, and from McQuillan’s Hill which is now a solar farm beside Maghaberry prison.

Shem Dubourdieu who may be the same 1837 man – other candidates are lacking, if the above phrase “that at present exist in Lisburn or its vicinity” is accepted – appears in a notorious manslaughter case: William (or John) Orr died after a severe kicking in Lisburn in March 1837. James Munce testified (Belfast Commercial Chronicle, 17 July 1837): Was at Lisburn on Easter Tuesday; was in the house of a man called Belshaw; heard a noise there; ran out; saw deceased fighting against two….Lewis Nolan then kicked deceased in the side; three other persons kicked him also ­­– Nocher, Magale, and a man named Dubourdieu; Orr never rose to his feet…

Other witnesses agreed that Orr was the aggressor and at least equally to blame. Still, the matter did not rest:

-         Dublin Evening Post, 13 April 1837. Thomas Drummond (1797-1840), army officer and engineer from Edinburgh, was then at the Castle as Under-Secretary for Ireland and was probably one of the more enlightened British administrators.

The names are variable and with variable spelling as usual, but here are labourers “Shem Dubordiew”, “Patrick Connor (or Knocker)” and “John Nowlan” with ages and police descriptions.

Shem Dubordieu, for the manslaughter of William Orr, at Lisburn, on the 28th March, 1837. Prisoner objected to Mr. Lawson as a Juror, and Mr. Redmond was sworn in his place. The evidence produced went to show that a fight took place among deceased, prisoner, and others, in the yard of John Belshaw, in Lisburn, in the course of which the deceased received such injury, that he died that day. There was no evidence that prisoner had done anything in particular to deceased to cause his death. Guilty; to be imprisoned one month from the first day of the Assizes.

-         Belfast Commercial Chronicle, 14 March 1838.

This is already an odd case, previously noticed by The Digger online (5 May 2011), but now things become interesting.

It may yet be in the recollection of the readers of the Ulster Times, that a young man, named William Orr, was killed in an affray at Lisburn on the 8th [sic] of March, 1837, and that Shane Dubordieu, Patrick Connor, and John Nowlan, were charged with his murder by the verdict of a coroner’s jury, held on the day after he met his death. These three persons absconded, and a proclamation was issued from Dublin Castle, April 3, 1837, offering ‘a reward of 50l to any person or persons who would within six months from that date give such information as might lead to the apprehension and conviction of all or any of the persons aforesaid.’ About two months subsequently an active young man, from the neighbourhood of Lisburn, named George Briggs, received some intimation that those persons were secreted in the house of a relation near Portglenone, and he at once set himself about finding them out. This he accomplished, after travelling all night, and, at the risk of his life, had two of them arrested (Nowlan and Connor), and lodged in Carrickfergus gaol, where they were tried last summer assizes, and found guilty of manslaughter. Briggs, after the assizes, applied to the lord lieutenant for the reward, and after having written several letters without receiving any reply, he at length succeeded in receiving an answer through the crown solicitor for the north-east circuit, stating ‘that his excellency had been graciously pleased to order the paymaster of the county of Antrim constabulary to pay him 20l as a reward for his services!!’ Briggs again applied and remonstrated, stating that he held the proclamation offering the reward of 50l, signed ‘T. Drummond,’ but, being unable to extort any further reply, he at last was obliged to consent to pocket the 20l only, having been also obliged to be a trifle out of pocket to pay his travelling expense to and from Ballymena! Surely, if such be the practice of paying rewards legally offered from the castle, it will soon damp the ardour of any person to look after individuals charged with murder or any other offence….

-         Morning Herald, June 13 1838, reprinted from the Ulster Times to whom it was communicated by “a Lisburn correspondent of the highest respectability, and in whom perfect confidence may be placed”.

Shem married Margaret Briggs (daughter of labourer Andrew) in Derryaghy Church of Ireland in December 1845, with John Abbott and Mary Abbott as witnesses; whatever his parentage, the acknowledged parents were Shem senior (“farmer Shem” with the many children in Baby on her Back) and Jane (née Abbott) Dubourdieu. Andrew Briggs here is likely to be the father of James Briggs of Aghnahoe (Aughnahough etc.), whose October 1845 marriage to Sarah Welsh in the same church is also interesting: the witnesses appear to be Pat Connor and “SM” Dubourdieu. I have no proof that this Pat is the 1837 miscreant, but we might wonder about the name or nickname Nocher / Nocker, given the man or men called Patrick Connor who lived in Knocknadona (or “Knocknadoney”) in Magheragall. One Pat was too young, marrying Mary Parkinson in 1848 with age given as 25. A better candidate married a neighbour Elizabeth Bell, also in 1848, in Magheragall, with age given as 35 and father given as John Murphy.

Ten years later, in more court reports:

Jas. Briggs, Francis McBride, and Shane Dhuberdhu, were indicted for stealing a quantity of coals, the property of Redmond Jefferson, on the 19th of March last, at Lisburn. Guilty; McBride to be imprisoned for three months; the others to be imprisoned each for six weeks.

- Belfast Commercial Chronicle, 14 April 1847.

This Redmond Jefferson may be Hugh McCall’s brother-in-law, who was a merchant of Lisburn and then Belfast, and who with Eliza McCall had a son also called Redmond.

Other press accounts have “Shane Dubardeau”. I suggest this is the same man, with the Biblical name Shem, but there were several locals surnamed Shane and further confusion cannot be totally ruled out. George Briggs stood witness at the 1851 marriage of Nathaniel Shane and Agnes McQuillan. From the Briggs point of view we want to know George’s family links, if any, with “near Portglenone” and with the McQuillans and Margaret and Andrew Briggs.