Re: McCleary of County Meath, Ireland, and Illinois

I searched the Irish Family History Foundation's database. It contains 12,000,000 surviving rcds for abt 65% of Irish counties. Rcds are increasingly sparse B4 1840, rare B4 1800.

Note 1 - Without a KNOWN parish, the chance of an ancestor's rcds NOT being in this database is AT LEAST 35%.

Note 2 - Only 1/2 of Co. Cork's rcds are in this database.

Note 3 - The RC church kept control over most parish rcds from Tipperary (north). These are ONLY available thru the Tipperary Family History Research center at a substantial fee (regardless of outcome).

For James McCleary in Co. Meath, the earliest B rcd in this database is for 1838. Doesn't look like the rcds of the event survived.

Google the Foundation's name to lead you to this database. Register, opt to be notified as rcds are added and browse. Pls post your search results to my genforum msg.

Hope this helps. Good luck.