This is a war story friends. A report from the fields, the contenders on their bellies crawling through the trenches. What kind of genealogy is going to win? The canary genealogy in which little birds tell you so? The heavy duty spiritual telepathy where people have visitations in the night from their ancestors who tell them what to seek and where they are to be found? The internet junkie, the web-site spider? The Walker ship? The scholar ship? The latest in the dramatic sequels is that a Walker daughter married a Campbell and they were from Kirnan in Ireland. And since these outlaw Campbells (murdering the MacDonalds, you know) were Cowan kin, finding Kirnan might find us some Cowans. Early Cowans, the immigrant variety from the 1720's. The Walkers have never been able to find Kirnan on their navigation charts. The Campbells unfolded their Irish road-maps but didn't find Kirnan either. Not in the alphabetical tables, and it was just too damn much trouble folding and unfolding that sucker when you didn't know which side to look on, anyhow. So it got left to the Cowans to find Kirnan. Then a lady who had been there and did Irish research contacted Robert Cowan. (The internet bursts to the lead.) It was a townland. You won't find it on most maps because most maps don't show the names of townlands anymore than most U.S. maps don't show townships. (Sugarcreek Township, Bubba, in what was Westmoreland County, PA at that time, 1776, where John Cowan built his apple mill.) But she had the OS (Ordinance Survey) map that showed where what is left is, and where it had been since the early 1600's. From Bainbridge, go west. On the border with Armagh. There's a notorious lake there where in the 1640's a Chichester captain put Gaelic families out on the ice in the winter until the thin ice broke from the accumulated weight and only a couple of kids survived. It's a terrible war. In addition, Bob's correspondent gave the information from the tables in the GAI (General Alphabetical Index to the Townlands and Towns, Parishes and Baronies of Ireland.) Scholar ship is pulling ahead (a head?). At this juncture Bob passed the data on to me to see what kind of a tweek I could tweek it with. Man, I was in clover. This Kirnan was just up the pike from Sheepstown where I had found my Cowan ancestors in a lease from the Needhams, descendents of the Bagenal family, about 14 miles north of Newry. In a text I had acquired in the course of my Cowan research ( the internet, the web-site spiders are lagging behind) I found Kirnan, now spelled Kernan and Kernan Lake. The book, Place-Names of Northern Ireland, Vol VI, County Down IV, North-West Down/Iveagh, by Kay Muhr was published in 1996 as a project of The Northern Ireland Place-Name Project, Department of Celtic, The Queen's University of Belfast. Robert thinks there may be 9 other pinheads in this country that also have a copy. The book lists 32 references for Kernan, with 21 prior to 1800. Drumrolls. This is it. THIS IS THIS IS. IT. Items 15, 16, 17. Rent Rolls Down 4 and 7 from 1692. Just the right time for Cowans to be in Ireland, packing the luggage for the next generation to leave. Turning to the "Primary Bibliography," Rent Rolls Down ="Strangford and Lisburn rent roll no. 21," AD 1692, PRONI T372/E. Robert ... jot that reference down. We will check it out, PRONI T372/E, might just have some very interesting leases. Strangford ...haven't I heard that name before, something about Capt. Walker picking up Cowans in Strangford Lough? All of this is "Dirty," genealogy is "dirty," you have to search the right dirt to find your people. Location, Location, LOCATION. The resolution of the war seems to have been that Marshal Bagenal was rewarded by the Crown and Arthur Chichester for his service in the Irish Wars of the 1580's. He was granted the lands that had belonged to the Cistersian monks in and about Newry. The Cowans were Scottish servitors (hired swords, mercinaries)of Lord Deputy Chichester, who became Lord Donegall, and there are three of them listed in the Muster Roll of Donegall in 1630. They were probably from Stirling. Robert Cowan was awarded land in Donegall for his service, John Cowan acquired a lease in Sheepstown to the north of Newry for his. John's son was Andrew. Andrew's sons were John and Abraham. John's family moved to Hillsborough, Abraham's to Newry. I am a descendent of Abraham. Burke's Family Records. "John Cowan, of Sheepstown, Newry, co. Down, fled from Scotland in 1637 in consequence of a duel." It was a war. It has always been a war. john cowan maclay "Cowan of Cowansville" 14th PA Cavalry Survivor/Andersonville No Surrender