Almost in County Down!
by Mike Spathaky. Research also by Leonard Cree, Theresa Black, Leanne Errey , Trevor Cree,
We are aware that Lisburn was not in County Down but have listed it in this County Down Section firstly because it seems likely that that the Cree families there originally came from County Down and secondly because the River Lagan, whose waters fed the early linen mills which may have drawn the Crees to the town, flows through the town. Those parts of the town which lie south of the Lagan are (or were) in fact in County Down.
The earliest Cree record connected with Lisburn is somewhat sketchy. Leonard Cree, a member of the Cree Family History Network reports that the first entry in the minute book of the First Presbyterian Church of Lisburn dates from 1768 and refers to a William Cree. Unfortunately we don't yet know if it's a baptism, a marriage, a burial or some other event. From the same period Trevor Cree sends a reports that a William Cree, from Ballylenaghan (near Knockbreda) won a prize at the Linen Hall in Belfast for the quality of his weaving. (Belfast Newsletter, 9 November 1750). Ballylenaghan was a townland and is now a suburb on the south edge of Belfast and about equidistant from Ballybarnes to Lisburn - about 15 km (9 miles) from each.
We know that Andrew Cree of Ballybarnes was a flax dresser and we know there was a flax mill in Ballyrogan. We have suggested that his son William Cree was the "farmer in Lisburn" whom we have previously claimed as the progenitor of the Lisburn Cree line, but if the above reports are correctly dated, it may be that the this William Cree was the son, or even grandson, of an earlier namesake there. The verdict is open, although we are fairly certain that the pedigree must eventually lead back to the Ballybarnes Cree line.
Four Lisburn Cree branches
A little more certainty creeps into the genealogy when we state that William Cree farmer in Lisburn had four known sons: James, William, Alexander and John. We will describe the descendant of each in turn:
1. The Cree grocers of Lisburn and Plymouth
James Cree of Lisburn married Mary Ann Chapman in 1830 and so must have been born a few years before his brother William. James and Mary Ann had three sons, one of whom died of tuberculosis at the age of seventeen. The other two joined the Army.
Theresa Black wrote, The fact that both families had a daughter called Mary Ann possibly lends weight to my hunch that James Cree's wife was called Mary Ann. We later found that she was Mary Ann Chapman.
-
John Cree, the elder of James' two surviving sons, joined the Royal Marines in 1847 giving his occupation, significantly, as weaver. Theresa Black, his great-great-granddaughter says that he left the Royal Marines in 1870, having risen to the rank of Colour Sergeant. He then became a grocer in Plymouth, Devon, like his father had been in Lisburn. His shop was at 45 Admiralty Street, Plymouth.
-
One of John's sons, James Cree, emigrated to Sydney, where he was married and divorced, and then to New Zealand where he died in 1924.
-
Another son, William John Cree died aged 28 afew months after marrying Florence Bentley. They had a daughter, born after his death, who was Therea's great-grandmother. Theresa Black wrote,
William John Cree, John's youngest son, married age 28 in March 1898, died in July 1898, after catching pneumonia playing rugby. Then his only daughter, my grandmother, Ada Emma Denslow Cree, was born 31st December 1898. In the circumstances, my grandmother was brought up by her mother and her family. She was given the name Denslow, which she detested, by Susan Cree (née Denslow), when she attended the christening. My grandmother... used to tell my mother about visits to the Crees in Stonehouse [Plymouth] and, apparently there were at the time three Ada Crees; herself, her aunt and a.n.other - maybe a daughter of Wilmot Cree.
-
Mary Ann Cree was born in Lisburn in 1832 and married William John Gardner at Legacurry Presbyterian Church, Dromore.
-
William Cree was born in Lisburn in 1834. He was a carpenter but joined the army at 20 and was discharged after 11 years with a back injury. In 1864 he died in Lisburn aged 30.
-
James Cree born 1836 and probably died in infancy as we have no further record of him.
-
Thomas Cree was another son of James Cree of Lisburn. He joined the Antrim Militia at 19 and was transferred to Plymouth where he married, serving in the army until he was 39. He then became an Assistant Warder at HM Prison, Dartmoor. He and his wife, Wilmot Seddon, had twelve children in Plymouth, of whom three sons joined the Royal Navy. One of them was:
-
Carleton Cree was the youngest of James Cree's son. He died of tuberculosis at the age of 19.
2. William Cree and the Cree weavers of Lisburn
William Cree (c. 1820-1880) married Jane Wills in 1839 and was noted as a weaver at Lambeg near Lisburn at the age of 51 in 1870. He had sons John, William and George as well as four daughters.
-
John was born in 1840; nothing further is known of him.
-
William Cree, the eldest son married Mary Gill and lived with their large family (11 including 9 girls of whom two died young) in Wesley Street. They worked in the linen industry in Lisburn. He was involved in the original Wesley Football Club of Lisburn, County Antrim founded in 1887.
-
His son George became a tailor.
-
His son William was a soldier, who had seven children, including James (who joined the Royal Navy and was killed on convoy duty in the Atlantic in 1941), Arthur and Leonard (father of Cree FH Network member Leonard Cree).
-
George Cree married his first cousin Jane Cree, daughter of Andrew Cree Jr and Jane McGimpsey (see the Cree in Bangor page). They had twelve children. They moved around and had a different address at the birth of almost every one of their children. He may have worked as a shepherd or as a general farmhand. The children are described in Cree Database; see the links from their parents' pages. We will only mention here those who had Cree descendants - the seven sons:
-
William Cree was born in 1892 and married Lizzie Shanks at 20. She must have been about 16 because she had children from 1892 to 1919! They lived in Belfast, mostly we think in Pernau Street, where he was a carter. Of their children we know that William, born in 1892, married Charlotte Jones in 1917 and George, born 1907, married Bridget McAteer in 1930.
-
Andrew was born in 1875 and was a colour maker, presumably in the linen trade. He married Lizzy Higginson in 1896 and they lived in Lisburn all their lives, having six children there. Andrew died at the age of 40.
-
George Frederick Valentine Cree was born in 1876 at Redburn House, Holywood near Bangor, where his father worked as a "herd." At the age of 19 he was a witness at the wedding of his brother Andrew and a year later he married Annie Topping at Dunmurry Presbyterian Church. They had four sons:
-
Samuel was born in 1897 and migrated to Canada at 17 following his brother George. Two years laters he enlisted in the army. He returned to Canada as a sergeant and in 1921 was living in Montreal with his brother George and maternal gradmother Lizzie Topping (née Carlisle). In 1925 he married Jean Swan and they had two children. He died after a long illness at the age of 72.
-
George was born in 1899 and migrated to Canada with his maternal gradmother Lizzie Topping (née Carlisle) in 1915. He joined the army in 1916 at the age of 16, giving his age as 19. He returned from the war at the age of 22 and died at 28 in 1928.
-
Andrew was born in 1903. He stayed in Ireland and at age 19 he married Mary Mercer. They lived in Belfast and had seven children. He died in an accident at the age of 37.
-
William James was born in 1907. At the age of three he and his parents were living with his maternal grandparents, Samuel and Lizzie Topping in the Ballygomartin area of Belfast. In 1924 at the age of 17 he followed brothers Samuel and George to Canada. In 1932 he married Mary Montgomery and they had a daughter, Mary (1933-2004).
Samuel, George, William and probably their half-brother John, all worked for chemical company Canadian Industries Limited in McMasterville, La Vallée-du-Richelieu, Quebec Province. (We are indebted to Caroline Hale for details of this family.)
In 1911 at the age of 34, Annie Cree (née Topping) died three weeks after having a stillborn baby. George married again the following year, a normal occurence for a widower with young children. George was now a bookkeeper and they lived in Belfast. He and his new wife, Mary Atkinson, had six children including John Cree born in 1913.
-
John Cree migrated to Canada 1929 at the age of 16. He married Agnes Simpson in Quebec Province two years later and they had four children, the first of whom died in infancy. Much later they moved to Nova Scotia. Agnes died there at 62 and John remarried Mary Gracie the next year. They had 25 years of marriage, John surviving Gracie by thirteen years and dying a week short of his 102nd birthday in 2015.
-
John Carsewell Cree was born in 1878 in Holywood. At 19 he married Harriet Ferris and they lived in Belfast having seven children of whom six were girls.
-
David was born in 1881 and married Minnie Waterworth in Lisburn. They had a daughter, Florence, in 1929.
-
Robert born 1884 married Letitia Hill in 1907 and they had three chidren of whom one died in infancy.
-
Arthur was born in 1891. At 19 he was a tenter at a linen mill but he died at the age of 22.
Alexander Cree of Legacurry near Lisburn was the fourth Cree who seems to have been the right age to be a brother of William, James and John. He had at least four daughters. There were Mary Jane who married Andrew Mitchell; Agnes Annie who married Robert Scott in Dromore; Sarah who married Samuel Croll at Duncairn, Belfast, and was described then as third daughter of the late Mr. Alexander Cree, Legacurry, Lisburn; and Rachel who married Alexander Bowman in 1873 at Hillsborough, and was a minor (unde 21) at her wedding. Rachel was described in the Belfast Newsletter as "fourth daughter of the late Mr Alexander Cree, Legacurry, Lisburn".
We have found no sons of Alexander so there is no Alexander Cree line of Lisburn as far as we know.
4. The line of John Cree, coachman
John Cree was another Cree of the generation of James Cree the Lisburn grocer, William Cree the Lisburn weaver and Alexander Cree of Legacurry. He was born in 1823 or 1824 so his father, recorded as William Cree, a farmer, at John's wedding in 1848, would have been born roughly thirty years earlier.
John was employed as a coachman at Montalto House near Ballynahinch, then the home of David Stewart Ker of Portavo House, one of the wealthiest of Ulster landowners at that time. John Cree still described himeslf as a coachman in 1864 although then living in Lisburn. He married Susanna Douglas in Ballynahich in 1848 and they had five children. There is a Cree descent from one of them:
|
Sam Cree, playwright (1928 - 1980)
Sam Cree is well known in Northern Ireland as a playwright and is from the Lisburn Cree line. The following brief biography is from the Irish Playography web site.
He wrote popular comedies, pantomimes and sketches. His wrote his first play prompted by James Young of the Group Theatre, who asked Cree to adapt an English play, The Love Match, for a local audience. His next play, Wedding Fever (1960), was hugely popular, and ran for 42 weeks. Cree also wrote film scripts including for the English Carry On series, and Let's Get Laid (1977), about a chicken farm.
A reviewer of "Separate Beds" by Sam Cree wrote on the web site Craic (link no longer available):
A comedy in which the night before the wedding of the only daughter of the Marshall house, her mother arrives back after an absence of 3 years, with some unexpected results.
This comedy was written by the profilic Sam Cree who was best known for his script writing for the "Our Jimmy" series featuring James Young. His many other plays include "Cupid Wore Skirts","Don't Tell the Wife", "Family Fever" and "Second Honeymoon".
|