Corliss

Corliss is a townland of 381 statute acres and 16 perches (including 35 acres of mountain and 7 acres of water) about two miles north-west of Crossmaglen off the road to Castleblaney. It is bounded on the north by Teer, on the east by Annaghmare and Creenkill, on the south by Loughross and on the west by Tullyard and County Monaghan. Seven acres of the townlnd is accounted for in Corliss Lough. Tithe Applotment Books of 1828 record the total acreage as 181 acres 3 roods and 35 perches (Plantation Irish measure).

Name of Townland

Cor Lios, "The round fort" ⁽¹⁾.

There is no other townland of that name in Ireland.

Ordnanace Survey Name Books: Creggan Parish ⁽²⁾

CORLISS (OSNB ii 7): A considerable part of this td. is bog and uncultivated land, the remainder nearly all under tillage of which portions are tolerably good soil [?] very indifferent producing the ...crops oats, potatoes and flax. There are two large forts one in the N. the other in the S. of this td. Corliss Lough on the W. situated amongst bogs in which are pike, trout and eel.
It contains 381..1..33 of which 109..0..24 is uncultivated and Bog.

Valuation

Although the decimalisation of the currency was introduced only in 1971, all of the valuations in the following table have been converted from £sd for convenience.

Year	1828	1837	1851	1864	1871	1881	1891	1901	1911	1926	1935	1952	1957	1974
Valuation	£123.36	£147.59	£171.00	£221.85	£221.10	£200.85	£218.85	£211.85	£209.60	£208.35	£223.60	£222.85	£238.10	£247.60

The 1837 Townland Valuation recorded only houses worth £5 or more a year. There were but one such houses in the townland -

• Abraham John Wm. Ball.

Griffiths Valuation records that the townland was owned by Thomas P. Ball.

Census of Ireland 1901

The Census enumerated 88 persons in 23 households; a ratio of 3.8 people per household. The households occupied a total of 57 rooms; a ratio of 2.5 rooms per household and 1.5 persons per room. One household had 6 rooms, seven had 3 rooms and 15 had two rooms. One household of 9 people occupied 3 rooms.

Native Irish Speakers

Of the 23 households enumerated in the Census five contained one native Irish speaker. Since theirs was the last generation to have been born into a predominently Irish speaking environment, their names, occupations and ages are recorded here. All were born in Co. Armagh with the exception of James markey, born Co. Monaghan-

• James Markey, farmer, 70
• Patrick Quinn, farmer and carpenter, 76
• Michael Cowan, caretaker and water baliff, 63
• Kate McNulty, wifw of Patrick, 60
• Neal Ruddy, farmer, 83

Population Decline

The following table sets out the number of houses and population enumerated in the townland in each of the 11 Censuses held between 1841 and 1951.

	1841	1851	1861	1871	1881	1891	1901	1911	1926	1937	1951
Houses	42	40	37	33	28	27	23	20	18	19	19
People	240	217	197	154	130	113	88	69	66	55	75
People per house	5.7	5.4	5.3	4.7	4.6	4.2	3.8	3.5	3.7	2.9	3.9

In the period of 110 years, the number of households more than halved (55%) while the population dropped by 69%. From an initial fall of 23 people between 1841 and 1851 (the Famine period) there was a steady reduction for over 70 years before it slowed in 1926 with a slight rise by 1951.

Names of House and land Holders ⁽³⁾

The following table sets of the names of those who owned or rented houses and land on the townland at the time the valuation records or population censuses were compiled.