Court Records 1897

dub70

Looking to find out where I can get access to old court records. My grandfather and his 2 siblings were sent from Dublin to a Cork orphanage by court order in 1897. I have the orphanage's admission note for my great aunt which says ' Court ordered due to mother being destitute/poverty'. Any help much appreciated

pinkypinky

Have you checked the Poor Law Guardian minute books on Findmypast?

The National Archives have court records but you'll need to check their catalogue to make sure those records survived the fire in the Public Records office.

dub70

Thanks pinkypinky. I wasn't sure how good findmypast is so I didn't sign up

pinkypinky

They do a free trial.

tabbey

dub70 wrote: »

Looking to find out where I can get access to old court records. My grandfather and his 2 siblings were sent from Dublin to a Cork orphanage by court order in 1897. I have the orphanage's admission note for my great aunt which says ' Court ordered due to mother being destitute/poverty'. Any help much appreciated

Presumably the order was by a magistrate's court (Petty Sessions).

It is something of a lottery whether the relevant book was retained.

With the introduction of the District Courts by independent Ireland in the 1920s, the official in charge of the District Court system advised Court Clerks that he could see no reason why clerks would want to retain and preserve the records of the petty session courts, foolishly perceived as a relic of colonialism. However he had no objection to a clerk keeping the volumes if he chose to do so.
These are the records which made their way to the National Archives of Ireland, which were microfilmed by the LDS and digitised by Find my Past.

Unfortunately many more, depending on time and place, were not kept by officials, or if they were, lie in somebody's attic unknown to the current occupier.

If your ancestor's case record does not survive, the best resource is a newspaper, local or national depending where it was.

Remember though, that papers did not print everything, just enough to fill the pages, or indeed the journalist could have been late arriving in court, gone to the loo or not have attended at all.