Townlands are the smallest geographical divisions. Some townlands include towns, but Cloon is just a townland, a rural area. (There is a town of Kilbeacanty just southeast of the larger town of Gort.) There can be 5 to 30 townlands within a civil parish. RC parishes may have the same boundaries as civil parishes, but are often larger. Before the beginning of civil registration in 1864, your best source for records are RC records. The National Library in Dublin has copies of most, and the LDS have filmed many. County heritage centers also have filmed RC records. Others can tell you more than I about possible routes, but if they came from the West, I suspect they travelled by land to Cork or the east coast, then caught a boat to England. The very best things you can do now are to buy a book like Grenham's Tracing Your Irish Ancestors and familiarize yourself with the National Library and Irish Times Web sites. Diane