McCabe History
Retyped from Famous Irish Names Hilary Murphy Popular Series
THE McCABES
As leaders of gallowglasses they
Played a vigorous part in history.
The name McCabe, in Irish derived from the Irish word Cabach, the wearer of a large, awkward cloak or helmet. It is suggested that this probably became a sort of nickname Cabach meaning the big awkward fellow.
In his account of the family in the Clogher Record. P.O. Gallachair says that this fits in with what we know of the stature of the first of the McCabes to come to Ireland one of the tall Norse-Irish gallowglasses from the isles of Scotland, who played a major part in helping the native chiefs to force the Anglo Normans back to the confined limits of the Pale.
The McCabes, like their kinsmen, the MacSweeneys, MacDonnells and other gallowglasses were men of great stature, they were courageous, even fierce in battle, they were dressed in coats of mail to the knee, were armed with battle-axes and were the most dependable body of troops in the Irish armies,to quote from G. A. Hayes-McCoy Scots Mercenary Forces in Ireland.
The first of the McCabes settled in Breifney (Leitrim and Cavan) where they became captains of gallowglasses to the O'Rourkes and O'Reillys. They are frequently mentioned in the Annals of the Four Masters, the earliest mention being at the year 1358.
Continuing his account in the Clogher Record, P.O. Gallachair quotes what Dr. John Donovan wrote about the McCabe's over a hundred years ago
The family of McCabe is now widely spread through the midland counties of Ireland, especially through Leitrim, Cavan, Monaghan and Meath, where they are remarkable for their *xanthous complexions, their vivacity and vigor. They are evidently a branch of the MacLeod's of Arran (in Scotland) and they would appear to have migrated to Ireland in the fourteenth century, men of Germanic decent with fair hair and blue eyes.
They were thenceforth leaders of gallowglasses to the O'Rourkes, O'Reillys and MacMahons of Ulster for many generations, and their chiefs were followed to the tombs by their followers bearing battleaxes over their shoulders. But after the defeat of Kinsale (1602) they settled down as tillers of the soil and are now very numerous as farmers in the counties mentioned.
In the centuries after Kinsale they also gave many clergy to the same counties and in the late 19th century gave Ireland her second Cardinal. The headquarters of the Clan in Ireland was in Cavan where the chief of the name, An Cabach (The McCabe), was the Gallowglass Chief of Breifne. When Henry MacCabe, their chief, died suddenly in 1460 the Four Masters tell us he was carried to Cavan, to be buried there, attended by two hundred and eighty gallowglasses, armed with battleaxes.
Moyne Hall, outside Cavan was the established seat of Clan MacCabe for many centuries and the site of MacCabe's Castle is still pointed out near the present Moyne Hall House. Even after Kinsale there were still many freeholders of the McCabies in the barony of Cavan, although many of their leaders, like Captain Seamus Og. had immigrated to Spain.
O Gallachair tells us that the first MacCabes came to Fermanagh and MacMahon County about the same time they arrived in Breifne. They were undoubtedly responsible for the belligerent image and nickname of the great Maguire Lord who brought them into his Fermanagh forces, Pilip na Tuaighe, or Philip of the battleaxe, who reigned, 1363-95.
The MacCabes soon became an important part of the Fermanagh Establishment. By the year 1580 we find them listed among the five top Fermanagh families, apart from the Maguire's, now in request and power within the county, MacManuses, Clan Caffrie, the Hughes, Clanncaba, and OHoines.
O'Dolan describes the MacCabes here:
They were stout forward people. Maguire employed them for his militia. They bore the name of Galloglachs, Hugh, son of Cuchonnacht, who was Maguire in Fermanagh, settled a freehold for the chief of his family in Glack, and are now (1719) in a manner extinct in Fermanagh, though in former times men of respect and liberty.
The Fermangh MacCabes as P.O. Gallachair tell us, were loyal to Maguire through nine years War. Their chief Brian, was captured by anglophile Niall Garbh O'Donnell in 1602, pardoned by the Crown and represented his people on the Fermanagh jury of 1603. Feilimi Dubh leased lands at Drumscollop near Derrygonnelly in 1615, but his descendants conformed to the planters.
But others, like Donncha Carrach, fought and fell for Maguire again in the 1641 war
The remaining McCabes stayed long concentrated in North Fermanagh, especially in Culmaine parish, and also in Aghalurchar.
As constables (or gallowglass chiefs) to MacMahon, the MacCabes also became an important family in MacMahons County, the present County Monaghan, being concentrated in the baronies of Monaghan, Dartry and Farney. By 1591 apart from the MacMahon's families and Duffys, they were the largest freeholders in the barony of Monaghan, were they held most of the ballybetaghs of Ballyleck and Clonaugre.
By 1620 the MacCabes had sold most of their lands in the former Ballybetagh, while in the latter, they still had many of the name paying the hearth-tax in the 1660's. For instance, the hearth-tax in Cortubber townland, Ematris parish, was paid in 1663 by Brian, and in 1665 by Shane McCabe.
From P.O. Gallachair account we learn that even at the end of the war-scarred seventeenth century, which broke most of the old Irish families in County Monaghan, the MacCabes here were prominent enough to have one of their leaders, Alexander MacCabe, appointed among the counties commissioners for assessing and collecting the poll tax for King James II in 1690.
And two centuries later, in 1890 MacCabe was the seventh most common surname in county Monaghan. Today it is sixth.
After the Ulster Plantation when many a soldier MacCabe emigrated to fight abroad,
the remainder here settled down with the rest of the native Irish, where, like many others, they had become more Irish than the Irish themselves. In these past three centuries they gave good priests to the Diocese of Clogher, some whose records are lost.
The most prominent man of the name in modern history was Cardinal Edward McCabe, Archbishop of Dublin, who died in 1885. He succeeded Cardinal Cullen, to whom he had been and assistant while parish priest of Kingstown, now Dun Laoghaire, in 1879. He was created Cardinal in March, 1882. Cardinal McCabe is remembered as not having had much sympathy for the Land League.
William Putman McCabe was a noted United Irishman, born near Belfast in 1775. His father, a watchmaker, was part owner of a cotton mill. Williams connection with the United Irishmen dated from Wolfe Tones visit to Belfast in 1791 and he soon became one of the most active organizers and propagators of the principles of the Society, chiefly in Leitrim and Roscommon . In 1798 he was arrested in Dublin while acting as one of a bodyguard to Lord Edward Fitzgerald, but he tricked his own guard of Scottish soldiers into allowing him to go free.
He subsequently went to France and established a cotton mill at Rouen. He died in Paris in 1821 at the age of 46.
Another well known man of the name was Alasdair MacCaba, who died in 1972. Born in 1886 at Keash, near Ballymote, County. Sligo, he became a teacher, politician and founder of the Educational Building Society. He was elected a member of the Supreme council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (I.R.B.) in 1914. He was jailed for six months in 1917, being released after thirty days on hunger strike.
Supporting the Anglo-Irish Treaty, he became and Adjutant in the Free State Army during the Civil War. He was Sinn Fein T.D. for South Sligo, 1918-23; for East Mayo-Sligo, 1921-1923 and for Leitrim-Sligo 1923-24.
The most noted person of the name in recent times has been playwright Eugene McCabe from County Monaghan.