School Registers (SCH)...
Registers of pupils.
Registers of pupils who enrolled in some 1,500 national schools in Ulster are held in PRONI, and for over 1,000 schools these registers date from before 1900. They thus can serve as a substitute for non-existent census records prior to 1901. They record the age (indeed, often the date of birth) of the pupil on entry, occupation of the pupil’s father or guardian, and often the address of the last school attended. This last piece of information provides a unique record of the migration from country to town that was a feature of late-19th-century Ireland.
It is a particularly useful means of tracing individuals in a rapidly growing city like Belfast which was, in the last quarter of the century, the fastest growing city in the United Kingdom. The references for pupils registers of schools in Newry are:
| School | Earliest Date of registers |
PRONI ref. |
|---|---|---|
| Newry Model | 1868 | SCH 64 |
| Ballybot | 1875 | SCH 106 |
| St Patrick’s | 1894 | SCH 775 |
| Commons | 1885 | SCH 780 |
| Rockvale | 1868 | SCH 781 |
| Windsor Hill | 1866 | SCH 791 |
| Sheeptown | 1871 | SCH 626 |
