McHenry Surname Information

For a good many years I've been cutting and pasting and copying all sorts of information about the history of the name McHenry. I still don't know for sure what it means and where it originated and there are plenty of ideas to choose from. I'm including some here and I'll be adding more as I get them ready.

Some Scholarly McHenry Surname History

[This one is about as concise as they could come and I promise that if you think this one is a bit dry then you should stop here. There are a couple later that will send you straight to sleep. I am not kidding.]

But, if you're still reading then you possibly do care to know that there are some five thousand persons in Ireland to-day bearing the surname Henry - without O or Mac or Mc. The majority of these are Ulstermen formerly called O'Henry, the Irish form being H hInneirghe. the head of this sept was chief of Cullentra in Co. Tyrone whose territory at one time extended to the valley of Glenconkeine in Co. Derry. Fitzhenry, sometimes abbreviated to Henry, is the name of a Norman family chiefly associated with Co. Wexford but having a branch in Connacht. The latter, becoming hibernicized like so many Norman families in Connacht, were in the sixteenth century records regarded as an Irish sept: they were tributary to the O'Flahertys of Moycullen and Ballynahinch and were called Mac Einri in Irish, which in due course was made MacHenry in English. MacHenry is also occasionally to be found as a synonym of MacEnery, in Irish Mac Inneirghe: one of the anglicized variants of this is Kiniry which, pronounced to rhyme with the English word enquiry, is phonetically nearer to the principal form than MacEnery.

A sept, in case you didn't know and had to look it up like I did, is a group of people all living in the same locality, all bearing the same surname, but not necessarily descended from a common ancestor. The sept in question was one of the Ui Cairbre group, of the same stock as the O'Donovans: they were located in the barony of Upper Connelloe, Co. Limerick, at Corcomohid, now Castletown MacEnery. This name is still quite well known in Co. Limerick.

Clans and Families of Ireland and Scotland:
An Ethnography of the Gael A.D. 500 - 1750

by C. Thomas Cairney, Ph.D. From "Chapter VII: The Érainn"

The Érainn were the second of the Celtic groups to come to Ireland. They arrived from the Continent between 500 and 100 B.C., and established their La Tène culture throughout the island as a military aristocracy possessing superior iron weapons technology. They were akin to the Belgae of Southwest Britain, and were generally known as the Ulaid in the North, and as the Erainn or Desi in the South, although all the tribes of this ethnic group were known ultimately to be Erainn. The great Erainnian population groups of around A.D. 600, such as the Muscraige of Munster, gave rise in the Middle Ages to the independently branched tribal groups that follow. [There's like 20 of these things; names of different groups and septs and sub-septs and tribes and you probably don't care about any of this and I'll spare you by just including the two McHenry-related ones.]

Dal gCais [Major Group Name]

Ui Caisin / Clann Chuileain [The Clan Name.]

Mac Conmara (MacNamara) [The Sept Name.]
Mac an Airchinnigh (Maclnerney)

Ui Fidhgheinte

Ui Cairbre Aedhbha

O Donnabhain (O'Donovan)
Mac Inneirghe (MacEnery)

[Sorry for that.]

Dictionary of Irish Family Names: McHenry Entries

McHENRY:

Irish Variants: Mac Einri
Anglicized Variants: MacHenry; McHenry; MacEnery

McHENRY is a surname belonging to several distinct families in different parts of Ireland, including the SIOL EOGHAIN MAC EINRIs of Bannside in Ulster, and a Norman FITZHENRY family in Connacht. The enforced removal of the O or Mac prefix during the time of penal laws has made it difficult to distinguish between the various HENRY septs.

The Biblioteque Nationale in Paris holds papers relating to the history of many families of Irish origin in France, including several McHENRYs in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In the eighteenth century, several M'HENRYs served in various Irish regiments in France. A manuscript in Dublin's Genealogical Office shows a 1908 confirmation of the quartering of arms of McHENRY to the descendants of Colonel Henry Williamson LUGARD and Margaret Anne McHENRY, his wife, with colonel Edward John LUGARD, their eldest surviving son.

In the nineteenth century, a number of McHENRYs, all with the first name James, became distinguished American citizens. James McHENRY (1753-1816) of Ballymena in County Antrim studied medicine in the USA and, in 1778, was Secretary to George WASHINGTON. Another James McHENRY (1785-1845) was born in Larne in county Antrim and paid his medical school fees in Dublin and Glasgow by writing verse. He emigrated to Philadelphia, where he combined medicine with trade and journalism. He also wrote novels and returned to Ireland as US consul to Derry. His son, yet another James McHENRY (1816-91), a product of Trinity College, Dublin, was famous for his Virgilian researches and became a leading American financier. Mrs. Fitzhenry was a celebrated Irish actress towards the end of the eighteenth century. Augustine Henry (1857-1930), the Irish botanist, will be remembered by the names of the many species of trees and shrubs he discovered, chiefly in Asia, which bear the epithet Henryana.

MacENERY:

Irish Variants: Mac Einri; Mac Inneirghe Anglicized Variants: FitzHenry; Henry; Irvine; Irwin; MacHenry; McHenry; MacNair; Neary

Some believe that the MAC INNEIRGHE (from the Irish, meaning easily roused) were descendants of the third-century king of Munster, OLIOLL OLUM, and were, therefore, kinsmen of the O DONOVANS. County Limerick was, and remains, their territory, and their name is commemorated by the town of Castletown MacEnery. It is a remarkable name, its origins often obscured by the vast number of forms it has taken because of anglicization, including HENRY (q.v.), MacHENRY (q.v.), FITZHENRY, IRWIN, IRVINE, MacNAIR, and NEARY. The MAC EINRI who were associates of the FLAHERTYs of Connacht were anglicized to MacHENRY. Many of the MacENERY chieftains were slain in battle and, until Cromwellian times, they owned great estates in the Limerick area. After the Gaelic suppression, they fled to Europe and reached high rank in the armies of France and Spain. The FITZHENRYs came from Normandy to Wexford and, in time, their name was shortened to HENRY. Mrs. FITZHENRY was a popular eighteenth-century actress. The MacENRIs of Ulster, as well as the MacENERYs of Thomastown, County Kilkenny, are recorded in the ancient archives. Compared to MacHENRY, McENERY is now a rare name, other than in the Limerick area.

From The Dictionary of Irish Family Names by Ida Grehan, 1997,
Roberts Rinehart Pubs, Dublin, Ireland: p. 231, p. 223

Some Links to Other Sites:

Some interesting McHenry related facts and statistics are at ancestry.com
The Modesto McHenry Mansion site is interesting too.

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