1766, Marriage License Bond, Simon White Esq. of Bantry and Frances Eyre of Macroom.
As the bride came from Macroom in the Diocese of Cloyne the licence bond emanated from the Bishop’s Registry in Cloyne.
In 18th century, Ireland because of the Penal Laws, only marriages performed by the State Church, the Church of Ireland were legal. Those of Catholics, Methodists and Presbyterians while accepted as the century moved on had no legal validity. As late as the 1820s a Father Kelleher then in Kinsale was prosecuted for performing a ‘mixed marriage’. In fairness to the local mostly Protestant Magistrates they petitioned to have the charge dropped.
From this White/Eyre marriage came in the 1820s the mining royalties of Allihies Copper Mines amounting to about £2,500 year about a quarter of the entire rent roll of the Bantry Estate.
The extended White family had mixed fortunes with marriages. A marriage to a Miss Dillon was set aside because it was performed by a ‘Popish Priest’. In the 19th century the ette was nailed out by the dowry of 30,000 of Miss O’Briens of Dromoland Castle a descendant of Brian Boru on the marriage to the Earl of Berehaven. Later in the 19th the marriage to Miss Guinness proved remunerative but Lord Ardilaun of the Gunnnes family was unimpressed by the Whites financial management.
The extended White Family had mixed fortunes with marriages.
West Cork History 