Donegal · Londonderry · Tyrone · 1528–1901

The McCorkells
of the Foyle

They were neither princes nor landed gentry, but tenant farmers, tradesmen and a few merchants. They came from Ayrshire and the Clyde with the Plantation, settled the Laggan, Burt and Inishowen, and left a thin trail of muster rolls, hearth taxes and kirk session entries that this site follows from 1630 to the 1901 census.

McCorkellMacCorkellMcCorkleMcCorkillM'CorckleMcKorkelMcCorcleMcCorkhillMcCorkallCorkellCorkle
The signature William Corkle in brown ink, beneath that of William Ewing
The hand of William McCorkell of Curraghnagarry (c. 1750–1827), 1792. Signing the Moville vestry book as "William Corkle", in the year he served the parish. The earliest proven ancestor of the Ballyrattan line.Moville parish vestry book
Contents

The story in seven chapters

  1. IBefore the Plantation800–1600The Norse name Thorketill, Clan Gunn, Lewis and the Isle of Man, and the first McCorkells in Ayrshire and Dunbartonshire.
  2. IIThe Plantation of Ulster1610–1700Lady Cunningham's men at Portlough, the Laggan Army, Burt kirk session, and the Hearth Money Rolls.
  3. IIIUnder the Ascendancy1700–1800The 1740 Protestant census, the Bogside innkeeper who founded a shipping line, and the Flax Growers' Bounty.
  4. IVEmigration1718–1923From the Laggan to Pennsylvania and the Carolinas, on to Canada and Australia, and how Y-DNA now links the families on both sides of the Atlantic.
  5. VTree Branches1801–1901Family lines worked back from the 1901 census, beginning with the McCorkells of Ballyrattan, Moville.
  6. VIWhat the DNA tells us Y-DNAThe McCorkle surname study, the Little Scottish Cluster, and where the Donegal line sits on the paternal tree.
  7. VIIMcCorkells Worldwide NewOne-name studyFamily groups in America, Canada, Australia, Scotland and New Zealand, each traced back to a townland in Donegal or Londonderry.
  8. §The Records New1630–1901Over six hundred baptisms, marriages, deaths, census entries, tax rolls and voyages, in one searchable register.
The register

Earliest records of the name

Few families of tenant farmers left much behind. These are the surviving landmarks, each discussed in full in its chapter.

1528

Mitchell Maccorkill of Kilmarnock

Assigned lands at Myltoune, Ayrshire. The earliest Lowland record of the name.

Register of the Monastery of Cambuskenneth
1630

Andrew and John McCorkill, Portlough

Mustered with sword and pike among Lady Katherine Cunningham's men, Barony of Raphoe.

Muster Roll, Co. Donegal
1643

Robert Corkell, private

Lt Col. Robert Galbreith's company, Sir Audley Mervyn's regiment of the Laggan Army, mustered at Elagh.

PRONI muster, 20 July 1643
1657

John McKorcle, "yong cowper"

Buried in the grounds of St Columb's Cathedral, Derry.

St Columb's Cathedral register
1663

Andrew M'Corckle, Ballyhaskey

Householder in the Laggan near Newtowncunningham. James follows him in 1665.

Hearth Money Rolls, Co. Donegal
1679

Josias, son of William McKorkell

The first of the McCorkell baptisms in one of the region's few surviving early Presbyterian records.

Burt Kirk Session Book
1740

Eight householders named

In Templemore and Burt, Moville, Clonca and Cumber, placing the family in their townlands for the first time in a century.

Protestant Householders' Census
1792

William McCorkell, Curraghnagarry

Pays county cess in Moville Upper, serves as churchwarden, and signs the vestry minutes as "William Corkle". The earliest proven ancestor of the Ballyrattan line.

Moville parish vestry book
An early engraved map of Inishowen showing Moville, Green Castle, Red Castle, Lough Foyle and Londonderry
Inishowen, from an early county map. Moville, Greencastle and Redcastle sit along the Foyle shore, with Carrigans and the Laggan at the foot.
Handwritten cess list for Curraghnagarry naming Patrick Carney, Wm McCorkille, Walter Beaty and Chas Dougherty
Curraghnagarry in the cess list. "Wm McCorkille" between his neighbours Patrick Carney and Walter Beaty.Moville vestry book
Marbled cover of a bound ledger labelled Passenger Book
A Derry emigrant passenger book. Its 1853 lists include the Mary Ann, sailing for Saint John, New Brunswick.PRONI
Y-DNA

A Scottish line, proven in the blood

Male McCorkells pass down an almost unchanged Y chromosome. Testers from Donegal, Northern Ireland, Pennsylvania and the Carolinas share one paternal line, and Big Y results have now placed it precisely on the human family tree.

  1. CTS2187The Little Scottish Cluster
  2. FGC3215Shared with McKay, Barwise, Shaw, Stewart
  3. FGC3197All tested McCorkles
  4. BY71586McCorkles and the Irish Mitchels
  5. BY156610The John McCorkles of Pennsylvania and North Carolina
  6. Donegal lineWilliam McCorkell, c. 1750–1827, Moville. Exact branch awaits SNP testing.

The McCorquodales of Argyll and the Corkills of the Isle of Man carry a name from the same Norse root, Thorketill. Their Y-DNA belongs to haplogroup I, an entirely different branch from ours. The names are related; the families are not.

Our nearest deep cousins are Lowland and Border names. That fits the documentary trail from Kilmarnock in 1528 to the Cunningham estates of the Laggan in 1630.

Read the full DNA chapter

1901 census, Co. Donegal

84 McCorkells in 20 families

59 Presbyterian18 Church of Ireland7 Roman Catholic

By 2015 fewer than ten McCorkell families remained in the county, four of them on townlands their ancestors had farmed for over 300 years.

Since 2009

Formerly Ulster McCorkells

This site grows out of Ulster McCorkells, which I started in 2009 as a home for every record of the name I could find in Ireland, and its companion site Donegal McCorkells, for my own family. Over the years they were visited by McCorkells, McCorkles and MacCorkills from America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Scotland. Many of those visitors wrote to me, and their letters, trees and photographs are now part of this study. If you found your way here from one of the old sites, welcome back.