THE BYRNES and the MESCALLS

Michael Byrnes (or “Byrne”) was born in 1837 in County Wicklow, married (Sarah) Jane Mescall (b. 1836 m County Clare) and was the father of Ellen, or “Nelly” Byme (b. 14/7/1864 at Epping, Victoria), the wife of Walter Martin of Preston.

 Nelly was one of five children whose father died early, and we can imagine the difficulties the family faced with no breadwinner; although as Irish Catholics they would have probably received support from their numerous countrymen who had also settled in the rural areas close to Melbourne’s north. Other siblings were Jack, Sarah (Mrs. Burns, who had a son, Alec, and a baby who died at 3 weeks), Jane (who died of T.B. at 16 years) and Elizabeth (Lizzie, who married one Macey, a Yarrawonga hotelier and, apparently, a bit of a lush).

 When old Macey died in the early 1950’s- he and Lizzie had been separated for many years- Ileen visited her aunt who was living in Prahran or Windsor to offer condolences. Lizzie died a few years later, well into her eighties. Her children, Ileen Costigan’s cousins, were Herb, who settled in Sydney and was apparently engaged in researching a family tree, Vera, who married Roy Jewell but had no children and died in the 1970’s aged 77, and Linda, who was said to have been quite pretty and about whom there was a hint of scandal- perhaps a divorce! Linda’s daughter had a baby in the Mercy hospital at the same time as Adrian Costigan’s daughter, Christina, was born: a coincidence and a brief meeting of forgotten cousins.

 Jane Mescall/Byrnes, “Grandma” Martin’s mother, died of peritonitis at the age of 54 years when Lizzie was 18 years old, probably following a horse-riding accident when trying to jump a paling fence. Jane Mescall had at least two brothers, David and Simon, who were farm workers at Kyneton and a cousin, Maggie, who lived in East Melbourne, died in St. Vincent’s hospital, and is buried at Fawkner. Simon, Ileen Costigan remembered, was a tall, thin man with golden hair, a clue to the colouring of George and Dolly Martin and Anne and Adrian Costigan, for memory and photographs of old Sullivans and Costigans indicate only dark hair.

 The last of the Mescall brothers died when Ileen was suffering pneumonic ‘flu at the Clifton Grove (Preston) house, and Elsie and Dolly attended the funeral. Ileen’s illness may have been the influenza which killed tens of millions after the Great War.

Note: .The marriage certificate of Walter Martin and Ellen Byrnes (?) has the bride’s name spelt three ways- Byrnes, Byrne and Burns! Which covers all but one option.

Children of Michael Byrnes and (Sarah) Jane Mescall
– Ellen (Nelly) m. Walter Martin. Children: see under Martin
– Jack
– Sarah m. -Burns one known child- Alec Burns
– Jane: died at 16yrs.from consumption (T.B.)

– Elizabeth m. ____ Macey. Children:
– – Herb Macey (N.S.W.)
– – Vera Macey (m. Roy Jewell) no children
– – Linda Macey (m. ) (at least one child; a grandaughter was born in the Mercy Hospital, Melbourne, at the same time as Christina Louise Costigan.

  THE MESCALLS
Children of —-Mescall
Sarah Jane, born in 1836 in County Clare; m. Michael Bymes
David did not marry
Simon did not marry
(May have been others- not remembered)