Hello Bally,

From your description, it seems unlikely there is a match with my paternal forebears. Still, there might be a connection somewhere.

I am Kerry John Coyle, son of John Albert Coyle, born Glasgow, December 1928. He came to Melbourne Australia in 1950 with his mother. His parents were Patrick Coyle and Mary Sheerin, both born Glasgow before 1900, probably around 1890 and lived in Mary Hill. Either the parents or more likely grandparents of both emigrated to Glasgow from Ireland, probably circa mid-1800s. It is unclear to me if those ancestors were from Donegal, Monaghan, Mayo, or any of those counties. My father was second-youngest; Brother Donald emigrated to Canada; Marjory remained in Scotland; Julia, Mamie and Edward came later to Melbourne. The youngest was a girl, name unknown, who died at age eight. Edward died a young man in 1960. All of that generation are deceased. Only Julia, Mamie and John had children to my knowledge. Mary Sheerin had a brother Edward. There are relatives still in Ireland with the family names Heneghan and Monaghan, as well as unknown Coyles and Sheerins. Patrick Coyle served in WWI. He was part of an unsuccessful expeditionary force (BEF, not ANZAC) landed on the Turkish Gallipoli Peninsula, also served in France, survived two troopship sinkings by U-boat and was twice a victim of mustard gassing. He died circa 1938.

Like yourself, I have been trying to piece my paternal genealogy together, but have hit a wall. It is quite a contrast against my maternal ancestry, which has traced all the way back to Adam and captured thousands of kings, queens and saints, the most recent being Scottish down to James IV; and includes hundreds of history's most famous figures from all over the middle east, Europe, Scandinavia and the British Isles.

On the paternal side, I have reason to believe the titular Coyle was Conall MacComghaill, son of Dal Riada King, Comghall MacDomangairt. Irish heraldry maintains that Coyles stemmed from perhaps several unrelated progenitors, who as disciples of Comghall from a particular monastery in the Irish part of Dal Riada Kingdom, took the name MacGiolla Comghaill. I dispute this on several grounds.

As commoners, how and why should a single coat of arms survive through several of those monks, yet no coat of arms survive through descendants of Comghall, himself? Comghall was sainted by the Church for donating land and sponsoring the monastery's construction in that northeastern part of Ireland. Only a King could have done that. Historically, only Comghall MacDomangairt matches the profile for wealth, power, land title, location and chronology. Logic dictates that following William Of Orange's Irish invasion and the forced anglicising of Irish family names, MacGiolla Comghaill should have formed the families Gilhooley, MacIlhoyle, Gilfoyle and so on, while MacCool, MacCole, MacCoyle and so on should have stemmed from the royal personage responsible for that monastery. As it stands, I have established that Comghall MacDomangairt's brother Gabran MacDomangairt and their father Domangart Reti MacFergus were direct ancestors through Aedan MacGabrain in my maternal ancestry. These were all Dal Riada kings. Part of their ancestry traces back to James, brother of Jesus. Another part traces back to the High Kings of Ireland - Milesian, Tuatha and Fomorian. They include Niall Of The Nine Hostages, Conn Of The Hundred Battles, the famous Tuatha warrior Demne Fionn MacCumhaill (a second but less likely candidate as the titular Coyle); and in a period 6 centuries later through six other lineages, Brian Boru.

I have found that if one can trace one's ancestry about half a dozen generations before one's parents, the usual reason is that records have survived because of aristocratic title preserved in the annals for those privileged families - mine in particular was Ferguson through my maternal grandfather and ancestors included the Lairds of Craigdarroch and the Stewarts in Scotland. Once one finds an aristocratic family connection, especially if it is French or Scottish, it can trace right back to the legendary figures of prehistory and even god-kings of the various ancient mythologies. Mine did.

But no thanks to William Of Orange, whose agenda was to dispossess the Irish nobles I am sure, my paternal lineages remain obscure.

Cheers!

Kerry.