Spinning wheel or Flax growers (1796)
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Spinning wheel or Flax growers (1796)
As part of a government scheme to encourage the linen trade, free spinning wheels or looms were granted to individuals planting a certain area of land with flax.
The lists of those entitled to the awards, covering almost 60,000 individuals, were published in 1796, and record only the names of the individuals and the civil parish in which they lived. The majority were in Ulster, but some names appear from every county except Dublin and Wicklow. A microfiche index to the lists is available in the National Archives.The records only record the name of the grantee and the civil parish in which he lived making it difficult to confirm the relevance of any particular entry. However the Lists are still a very useful source if for no other purpose than to confirm the presence of a particular name in an area at that time.
A list of flax growers for the area is available here thanks to Robert Dooley ( rdooley @ twcny.rr.com )who has been doing genealogy research on his family in the Mirehill, Co. Galway area