A History of the Wexford Codds¶
Introduction and Map¶
This map of Ireland shows the location of the county of Wexford. Many of the locations (in red) within Wexford county represent areas where Codd family members resided according to the following article “A History of the Wexford Codds”. Our branch of the Codd family became Anglican (Church of Ireland) and initially resided in Wexford County. They eventually moved north into southern Wicklow County. Due to wars and rebellions resulting in the destruction of church and township records, the ability to trace direct ancestry is limited. At this point we do not know which of the Codd individuals listed here were direct ancestors, however, the text does provide some interesting information.
The Wexford Codds¶
THE first of the Wexford Codds who came with the Normans is said to have been Osbert or Osborne, the third son of Walter Cod or Code of Morevale in Cornwall, and his wife, the heiress of the Damerells of Gidleagh Castle, Devonshire. The family became established at Carne where they built castles at Castletown, Clougheast and Ballyfane.
The first definite record of the name in Ireland refers to Hivelot Cod who witnessed a charter of Raymond le Gros about 1175-1185. Next there was Hugh Cod who attested a grant to Dunbrody Abbey before 1200.
The earliest record of land held by a member of the family is in 1247 when Martin Cod held Ballywitch in the old parish of St. Helen's (Forth) in 1324. The Codds also possessed Ballyhire (St. Helen's) before it passed to the Lamberts in the fourteenth century. Around the same time, they acquired the manor of Rathaspeck where Osborne Codd built a castle in 1351.
The following names appear in the Seneschal of Wexford's Accounts in the Pipe Rolls: Geoffrey Cod, 1263 to 1272; Osbert Cod, 1287 to 1289; Adam Code, 1289 to 1293; Robert Cod, 1293 to 1298. John, Robert, William and David Codd were summoned on 11th November 1307, to appear as jurors on the Inquisition taken at New Ross, relative to the lands in Co. Wexford belonging to the Countess of Pembroke.
Laurence Codd was Chief Justice of Assize at Wexford in 1327; Henry Cod was one of the Attorneys in Co. Wexford of Maria Countess of Pembroke in 1324; Raymond, William and Geoffrey Codd were summoned to attend the Lord Justice with horse in 1345; Roger Codd, Abbot of Tintern, died 6th December, 1354; another Roger Cod was Sovereign of New Ross in 1397. Around the mid-fourteenth century one of the Carne Codds obtained an estate at Rathaspeck where Sir Osborne Codd built a castle, c. 1351. This family became Protestant in the seventeenth century and the property passed to the Richards family through the marriage in 1680 of Jane Codd to Thomas Richards of Park. Martin Codd of Castletown was summoned with his brother Nicholas in 1476 to appear before Parliament or lose his title to three ploughlands in Rathaspeck.
Osborne Codd of Castletown, son of Martin, married a sister of Nicholas Comyn, Bishop of Waterford, who was consecrated Bishop of Ferns in St. Paul's, London, in 1509, and later translated to Waterford and Lismore, where he died in 1551. In 1532 Osborne's son Nicholas and Jasper Codde (presumably of Clougheast) were on the jury to inquire into the plundering of the town of Fethard by the Bishop of Ferns and his allies the Kavanaghs under their chief, Cahir MacArt.
A seventeenth-century writer relates that ‘the family of Codd of Castletown expressed singular loyalty and valour in Queen Elizabeth's wars, several of them being slain' and further that the Codds in general who by now had offshoots at Clougheast, Ballyumphane (Ballyfane) and Garrylough (in the Murrows) ‘were considered with the Staffords and the Rossiters as the prime gentlemen and freeholders in the barony of Forth'. In 1608, Martin Codd of Castletown and Jasper Codd of Clougheast are mentioned by Carew as among the gentlemen of Forth.
Martin Codd (died 1627) was the first of the family to become a Protestant. He had extensive lands in the Carne area. Buncarrig and Ballyumphane were held by the Barrys and Codds of a junior line, respectively. Martin Codd left a will dated 24 April 1627 in which he named the following children: Nicholas, Ann, Chritian, John, Margaret, Andrew, Martin, Osborne, Manon, Ellen and Anthony.
The following Codds are mentioned at this time: Balthazar of Garrylough, James of Ballyumphane, John of Ballynaclash, Walter of Wexford, Jasper of Sumertown, Carne; Stephen and his son Walter of Newtown, Carne, and David of Buncarrig.
Martin Codd's son Nicholas, who succeeded him, was not only a Protestant but a Cromwellian as well. At the outbreak of the rebellion in 1641, he fled to Wales with others, leaving his house, goods and corn in the charge of his brother William. William Esmond, who was one of the Confederate leaders, and others came armed with muskets and forced themselves into the house and seized a third of Nicholas Codd's corn for the use of the Irish.
Colonel Nicholas Codd was the last of his family to hold the Castletown estate, which was sold in 1712 to Colonel Thomas Palliser for £3,597.8/-.
The Clougheast, Ballyumphane and Garrylough families remained Catholics and, having participated in the rebellion of 1641, were all dispossessed. James Codd of Clougheast was a captain in the Confederate army in Rossiter's regiment, and was killed at Duncannonin 1643, leaving, it is said, an only daughter. The Book of Survey and Distribution of 1655 notes that in 1641 James Codd, an Irish Papist, owned 194 acres in Carne parish, of which 186 acres, including Clougheast, were granted to Edmond Waddy, a cornet in the Cromwellian army. The last of the Waddy family in Clougheast was Dr John Waddy who died in 1875.
The fate of the Codds of Garrylough is typical of an Anglo-Irish family in the seventeenth century. This property was situated in St. Nicholas's Parish, Barony of Ballaghkeen, and had been land confiscated from the native Irish. It was acquired in Elizabethan days, probably through Robert Codd, knight of the shire 1585, and also a Commissioner in 1582 and 1591 to report on the lands of the Kavanaghs and their kindred septs in Co. Wexford.
In the report on the Wexford Plantation of 1622, Balthazar Codd is noted as owing 771 acres in the Murrows and is styled a native. His two sons joined the Confederates. Jasper, the youngest, became a captain, and was killed at Carrickmines near Dublin. Thomas, the eldest, was a member of the council at Enniscorthy and in 1649 was one of the leading county gentlemen to support Ormonde, being appointed a Commissioner to raise money for the Supreme Council.
By an Inquisition taken at Wexford in 1663, it was found that on 22nd October 1641, Thomas Codd was seized in fee of Garrylough and other property amounting to 905½ acres, all in the Barony of Ballaghkeen, and that he was in rebellion. The property was consequently forfeited.
According to Owners of Land of One Acre and Upwards (1876), there were only 5 holdings of land by Codds in Co. Wexford. The largest was the 424 acres at Churchlands, Ballycoyle, followed by the 324 acres at Whitestown, 288 acres at Ballytory, 28 at Holmestown and 12 at Commons.
It was the Catholic Codds who survived to form an important segment of Wexford families in modern times. The most distinguished of these was Dr. William Codd, Bishop of Ferns (1918-1938). A native of Wexford town, he had been parish priest of Blackwater from 1912. Previously he had been president of St. Peter's College, Wexford, from 1903.
Clougheast Castle¶
Clougheast Castle, Co. Wexford. Codds from Castletown, Carne, Wexford in the International Genealogical Index
The old stone coach houses in the courtyard of the castle have been renovated, and the castle, with its own enclosed formal gardens, stands in open farmland, close to the beach and only 20 minutes from Wexford town.
This is situated about two miles from Our Lady's Island, off the road towards the wind farm. It was built by a Norman family - Codd - in the 15th century. Cromwell seized the land and bestowed it on Edmund Waddy.
Additional Codd family Members¶
Partial listing of additional Codd family members noted in Ireland records:
Nicholas Codd (born c. 1511, married Catherine Mayler c.1535 and died 10 November 1571. A son Martin Codd born c. 1536).
Nicholas Codd (son of Martin Codd who left a will dated January 1609).
Nicholas Codd left a will dated 18 April 1609 in which he mentioned children: Martin, Osborne and Richard.
Margaret Codd (daughter of Martin Codd and Catherine Keating) married Nicholas Devereux, April 1627.
Loftus and Jane Codd had two children: Nicholas Codd (born c. 1661, married c. 1686) and Jane Codd who married Thomas Richards at Ferns, 16 October 1680.
Nicholas Codd of Ferns left a will dated 13 May 1661 in which he mentioned his children: Loftus, Anne and Sarah.
Loftus Codd (born c. 1687) married Mary about 1712. He died 3 December 1755. Six children: Nicholas (born c. 1713), Richard (born c. 1715), Loftus (born c. 1717), Elizabeth (born c. 1719), Anne (born c. 1721) and Bridget (born c. 1723).
Loftus Codd left a will dated 5 November 1696 in which he mentioned his children: Nicholas, Sarah, Jane and Anne.
Nicholas Codd had two children: John (born c. 1690) and Frances (born c. 1699).
Nicholas Code and Eleanor Kehoe (married c. 1784) had a son Nicholas (born c. 1785).
Barony of Forth¶
“My ancestral Codd family had come out (to Canada) in 1820 at the same time as Samuel Boyd - and later became Codes and Coads. While detailed suggestions of a community's origins are often lost to "official" records, my great aunt, Laura (McCreary) Ferrill (who 's buried at Boyd's) as an amateur historian put together much of the ancient Codd family tree data before such practices were common. She records the histories of the Codds who also arrived in 1820 and who later married into the McCreery family. The Codd (or Code) family came to Wicklow County from the "Barony of Forth” County Wexford (17th century). Their origin was English - and ultimately Anglo-Norman - coming over from Normandy with William the Conqueror and arriving in Ireland at Castletown in Wexford with Strongbow in 1190 as landed gentry.” This would likely include the areas of Ballyfane, Castletown, Clougheast and Buncarrig in southern Wexford County (see map at beginning of this document).
As mentioned in the previous text: A seventeenth-century writer relates that ‘the family of Codd of Castletown expressed singular loyalty and valour in Queen Elizabeth's wars, several of them being slain' and further that the Codds in general who by now had offshoots at Clougheast, Ballyumphane (Ballyfane) and Garrylough (in the Murrows) ‘were considered with the Staffords and the Rossiters as the prime gentlemen and freeholders in the barony of Forth'. In 1608, Martin Codd of Castletown and Jasper Codd of Clougheast are mentioned by Carew as among the gentlemen of Forth. It is therefore possible that Martin or Jasper were our direct ancestors, but it is not verifiable at this point. The following is an early map of Barony of Forth.
