From http://www.arborealis.ca/blog/19thC-genealogy-kennedy/
What happens when such a family claims an ancestral connection to a Baron or an Earl? and the family history was not recorded, for example, in a "received" genealogy such as Burke's? [2] or documents to support the claim either cannot be found or were never recorded? Well, then and in that case (to coin a phrase often encountered in Irish deeds), 'tis time to sink the genealogical wimble and burrow for research evidence once again.
The genealogical outline of the Kennedys of Carland, [3] as penned by J. Carmichael-Ferrall who, in turn, drew upon a manuscript by the Rev. Dr. James Kennedy-Bailie, D.D., F.T.C.D. (1793-1864), [4] is one such example. The great great grandson of Thomas Kennedy's brother, the Rev. Gilbert Kennedy (1627-1688), Dr. Kennedy-Bailie composed his genealogical notes about 150 years after the death of his forebear. He even went so far as to engage an agent to ferret out court records in Scotland—plus ça change.
As useful as this article proves to the construction of a goodly sized Kennedy family tree, it makes two ancestral claims which have yet to be substantiated, that is, corroborated to other sources, viz.—:
firstly, that the father-in-law of the Rev. Thomas Kennedy, Major William O'Brien of the Bawn,[5] was "nearly related to the Lords Inchiquin and Ibrican."—The phrase, nearly related, means closely related but not in the direct line of primogeniture (male inheritance). The phrase is also used to denote a degree of relationship somewhat removed from the hereditary line—cousins of the first, second, and even further degree. While several printed genealogies exist for the Earls of Inchiquin, unfortunately I have yet to find which one shows a William O'Brien whose daughter married the Rev. Thomas Kennedy. Major O'Brien may well have been a cousin-german to the main line of that noble house (or not), and his name and father simply not recorded.
secondly, that the Rev. Thomas Kennedy and his brother, Gilbert (also a Presbyterian minister), descended from the Earls of Cassilis of Ardmillan in Ayrshire, Scotland. Specifically, Dr. Kennedy-Bailie asserted the following, based on court documents which his agent in Scotland discovered:
Gilbert second Earl of Cassilis, had, as appears from the
Charter of the mains of Cassilis and other lands, several
sons, of whom Gilbert, the eldest, inherited the honors,
etc., and Thomas, the second, had a charter of the lands of
Ardmillan, or Ardmilland, in Ayrshire. He was succeeded by
his eldest son Thomas, who died in November, 1586, and was
succeeded by Thomas, his eldest son, as appears from his
retour* of heirship, dated 9th May, 1609. This last Thomas
Kennedy had three sons——Thomas, Hugh, and Gilbert, as appears
from the College of Glasgow, where the first and last studied,
and the records of the Court of Chancery, where the retour of
the second son as heir was discovered by Dr. Kennedy’s agent
which retour took place in 1640. The records of their
matriculation bear date, respectively, 1637 and 1642.[3]
*According to Merriam-Webster, the word, retour, is chiefly Scottish,
meaning “the return made to the court of chancery on a brieve of inquest
with the jury’s verdict thereon.” Source: merriam-webster.com (accessed
2016-07-06).
Whether these retours have survived is not known. A scan of the catalogue entries under PRONI ref. D2315, the Gaussen, Kennedy, Bailie, and Magill papers, shows a sub-fond at ref. D2315/9 entitled, Printed material and miscellaneous family papers, which would need to be checked for the existence of these documents. If the documents survive, they may have been deposited in another archive.
However, another problem exists, in that the outline above varies not only with the genealogy printed in Burke's, but also that given in McConnell's Fasti. [1] To illustrate, the first image below depicts extracts of the genealogy given for the Earls of Cassillis in Burke's Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary (1878) supplemented by Burke's Landed Gentry (2001) [2]:
