T. George H. Green, Index To The Marriage Licence Bonds Of The Diocese Of Cloyne 1630-1800, 1899-1900

Each record includes an image of the original index and a transcript for the individual entries. The amount of detail in each transcript can vary, but most will usually include:

• Name
• Year
• County
• Spouse’s name
• Denomination
• Diocese
• Record set

Thomas George Hennis Green’s Index to the Marriage Licence Bonds of the Diocese of Cloyne is a continuation posthumously of the work of Mr. Herbert Webb Gillman. In 1896, Gillman undertook the task of preparing an index of marriage licence bonds for Cork and Ross. The publication was finished a short time before his death in 1898. Green continued the index using records held by the Public Record Office in Dublin prior its destruction in 1922. This index in a significant source for genealogists because it is the only surviving index for these records.

T. George H. Green was a member of the Royal Irish Academy. He was elected into the academy as recognition of academic achievements and contribution to scholarly research.

Mr. Gillman explained the importance of marriage licences in the preface to his index. He stated, ‘In the absence of Parish Registers and of Marriage Licence Grants, the next best evidence (which in such absence become then primary presumptive evidence) is a Marriage Licence Bond. Such a bond had to be entered into before a Bishop would grant his licence for a proposed marriage, because the Bishop was open to an action for damages if he issued a licence for the solemnisation of a marriage against which there existed some “canonical let or impediment,” of some other legal objection, such as a pre-contract of one of the parties to marry some other person; and so, to protect himself, the Bishop required two solvent persons, of whom the intending bridegroom was generally one, to enter into a bond for the sum stated therein – generally proportioned to the status of the parties – that there existed no such impediment or objection.’