John Kavanagh & Elizabeth Death

• Thomas

• Mary

• Catherine

• Elizabeth

• Denis

• John (Jack)

• William

• Teresa

• James

• Mary

1901 Census

By the turn of the century, John and Elizabeth had been married for nearly fifty years. The 1901 census finds the couple residing in the townland of Askintinny, located in the Arklow Rural district of County Wicklow.

Now around seventy years old, John is recorded as the Head of the Family - an Agricultural Labourer, with Elizabeth by his side. The census return offers a glimpse into a multi-generational Irish home, showing that their lives remained deeply connected to their descendants.

On the night of the census, daughter, Mary Kavanagh lived in the household. Also included were two of John and Elizabeth's grandsons: seventeen-year-old Peter Dunne and five-year-old John Kavanagh.

Completing the house on census night was a twenty-two-year-old visitor named John Penston.

The 'Particulars of Inhabited Houses' tell us about the structure of the family home. It had walls constructed of mud, wood, or other perishable materials. In turn-of-the-century Wicklow, this almost certainly signifies a traditional mud-walled or cob cottage, built from local earth and clay. The home would have featured a classic thatch roof, commonly made of straw or reeds sourced from the surrounding Arklow countryside. The cottage was a small dwelling consisting of two rooms. The front of the house featured just a single window, meaning the interior would have been relatively dark, lit primarily by the hearth fire and natural daylight filtering through the main doorway.  John Kavanagh was the landholder.

There were three outhouses on the land - a stable, piggery and a fowl house.

1911 Census

Four years following the death of John, the 1911 census reveals a significant shift in the family home at Askintinny.  Elizabeth is listed as the Head of the Household. Living with Elizabeth was her daughter, Mary Connors and her three sons Michael, John and Thomas. Elizabeth had another grandson staying at that time - Michael Connors - a child of one of her other daughters.

Compared to 1901, there was a structural improvement to the family home. It now had stone or brick walls and a slate, iron or tiled roof. The official landholder of the property is no longer listed as a Kavanagh, but rather William Tackaberry indicating a change in the tenancy or estate management by 1911.  The holding had also changed from a sprawling farm, to a rather a small, self-contained rural holding. It possessed just one out-house on the land, a dedicated fowl house.  This single outbuilding tells us that the family didn't have the manpower to manage livestock, Elizabeth and her daughter Mary kept a flock of chickens or ducks right outside the door, providing a vital source of fresh eggs.

John's Working Life

Arklow was a bustling maritime hub famous for its herring and oyster fleets, as well as its agricultural land. John Kavanagh navigated both to provide for his household.

According to his children’s birth and marriage records between 1865 and 1895, John’s primary calling was the sea; civil records consistently state his occupation to be a fisherman. An exception was in 1878 when he was recorded as a ‘labourer’ on daughter Mary’s birth record. Living in Askintinny, right on the coastal fringe of Arklow, John would have been part of a tight-knit community of seasonal mariners, facing the dangers and yields of the Irish Sea.

By the late 1890s, as John entered his sixties and seventies, he appears to have left the grueling life of the fishing fleets behind permanently. Civil records from 1895 show John officially recorded as a labourer.

The 1901 census reveals that John was the landholder of a highly functional smallholding at Askintinny. The presence of a stable, piggery, and fowl house on his plot shows that the family was actively raising livestock to supplement their income.

The stable indicates they kept a horse or donkey for vital transport and agricultural labour, while the piggery and fowl house allowed them to raise animals, harvest eggs and fatten pigs. In rural Ireland, selling a fattened pig at the local Arklow market was a traditional way to secure crucial cash for rent. John combined active working trades with a self-sufficient smallholding.

Family Tragedies

While John and Elizabeth raised a large, resilient family in Askintinny, their story was also marked by heartbreak common to many families in that era. Out of the nine recorded children born to the couple, at least four passed away in infancy or childhood, falling victim to epidemics that swept through rural communities before the advent of modern medicine.

John and Elizabeth welcomed their daughter, Mary in 1857. Tragically, she passed away on 4 January 1873 at the family home in Askintinny, aged fifteen. Her official cause of death was listed as dropsy, an illness she endured for two weeks without medical attendance. John registered her death in Arklow on 10 February 1873. Following a practice deeply rooted in Irish tradition, when a young child passed away, a later sibling was often given the same name to keep it alive in the family.  John and Elizabeth named their new baby girl, born in 1878, Mary. 

Just two months after the death of Mary, in January, John and Elizabeth’s three-year-old son, William, succumbed to whooping cough on 2 March 1873. The very next day, on 3 March 1873, Elizabeth gave birth to a baby girl, Teresa. 

The most harrowing trial for the household occurred in the spring of 1879, when smallpox penetrated the family home. In the span of just five days, John and Elizabeth lost two of their young children.  Teresa, aged 6, passed away on 2 May 1879 at Askintinny. The register records that she battled smallpox for 8 days.  James, aged 4, passed away just days later on 5 May 1879 at Askintinny. His record shows he fought the illness for 13 days. John Kavanagh registered the deaths of both his son and daughter at the Arklow district office on 23 May 1879.

A Shebeen at Askintinny

On 18th January 1896, the Royal Irish Constabulary raided the Kavanagh home at Askintinny. Head-Constable Scanlon, Sergeant Lane, and Constable Lucas knocked on the cottage door at around 11pm. After a suspicious delay, the police were finally admitted, and Head-Constable Scanlon rushed into the kitchen and through to an adjoining room.

There, he caught Mrs Elizabeth Kavanagh bottling porter.

When asked what she was doing with the bottles in her hand, Elizabeth coolly replied that she was simply "bottling porter".

A further search of the room by the officers revealed a small barrel of porter hidden away, rather creatively, "concealed by a woman's dress, or something of that description”. Alongside the barrel, police discovered three full bottles of porter, two empty ones and a peppermint bottle.

When the case went to court, John Kavanagh called his children - John (Jack), Denis, and Mary - and a young woman named Julia Loughlin (who would marry Jack two years later) as witnesses. The courtroom was ordered to clear, and a constable was placed in charge of the family outside to keep them from aligning their stories.

Once on the stand, the family's defence was remarkably unified - they weren't selling drink; they were just chipping in for a family party - or a "spree" and a dance - planned for the following Sunday night.

Denis Kavanagh testified that his father's house was absolutely not a public resort on Sundays. He claimed the only drink his father ever had in the house was brought home in the winter by his brother-in-law.

Mary Kavanagh told the court that she, Julia, and her brother Jack had pooled their money (it cost 7 shillings and 6 pence) to get the porter so they could "have a dance". She defensively added that her mother "did not usually bottle the porter".

John (Jack) Kavanagh admitted he gave "half a crown" to get the drink from a Mr. Mulligan's, but fiercely denied rumours that he had frantically thrown half a barrel of porter off an ass's cart the night the police raided a nearby establishment. He also noted that Thomas Death had been at the house earlier that night but left before the police arrived.

Julia Loughlin confirmed she chipped in her half-crown on the previous Friday to have a "divarsion" (diversion/party) and an old dance at the Kavanaghs' on Sunday.

The family's attempt to pass off a disguised barrel of beer and a late-night bottling operation as a simple gathering didn't fly with the magistrates.  The Chairman of the court delivered a scathing, no-nonsense verdict:

"In this case there is no doubt of your guilt, and the evidence given was most contradictory, and we don't believe a word of what these people have sworn."

John was given a fine of £2 plus costs. This was a massive sum at the time - equivalent to several weeks' wages for a fisherman or labourer. The court gave John a stark ultimatum; pay up immediately or face "one calendar month in Wexford Gaol". The fine was promptly paid in court, allowing John to walk out a free man.

John's Death

John Kavanagh died on 6 March 1907 at the family home in Askintinny. His official death record states the cause of death as pulmonary phthisis, a condition he had endured for twelve months. Today, this illness is known as tuberculosis (TB), a deeply prevalent respiratory disease in early 20th-century Ireland that claimed many lives across rural communities.

His daughter, Mary Connors, was present at his passing and acted as the informant. She registered her father's death in Arklow on that very same day, 6 March 1907.

Elizabeth's Death

Elizabeth passed away on 12 June 1914 at her home in Askintinny. Her official death registration records the cause of death as bronchitis (10 days) followed by cardiac failure. Her son, Thomas Kavanagh, was present and he registered his mother’s death in Arklow on that very same day, 12 June 1914. Thomas’s address at the time is recorded as 'Warrens'.