The Lewis Topographical Directory was first published in 1837 in two volumes, with an accompanying atlas. The first edition is available online. A second edition was published in 1842.
Lewis relied on the information provided by local contributors and on the earlier works published such as Coote’s Statistical Survey (1801), Taylor and Skinner’s Maps of the Road of Ireland (1777), Pigot’s Trade Directory (1824) and other sources. He also used the various parliamentary reports and in particular the census of 1831 and the education returns of the 1820s and early 1830s. Local contributors were given the proof sheets for final comment and revision. The names of places are those in use prior to the publication of the Ordnance Survey Atlas in 1838. Distances are in Irish miles (the statute mile is 0.62 of an Irish mile).
Kilmessan, a parish, in the barony of Lower Deece, county of Meath, and province of Leinster, 5 miles (N.W.) from Dunshaughlin, on the road to Bective bridge; containing 812 inhabitants, of which number, 146 are in the village, which contains 25 houses. It comprises 3184 statute acres, as applotted under the tithe act. Swainstown, the seat of the Rev. Mr. Preston, is a handsome residence in an extensive and well planted demesne. The living is a vicarage, in the diocese of Meath, united episcopally, in 1828, to the chapelry of Macetown, and in the patronage of the Marquess of Drogheda, in whom the rectory is impropriate. The tithes amount to £225, of which £50 is payable to the impropriator, and the remainder to the vicar; and the gross value of the benefice, tithe and glebe inclusive, is £321. There is a glebe house, with a glebe of 12 1/2 acres, valued at £28 per annum. The church, which was built in 1731, is a neat structure, for the repair of which the Ecclesiastical Commissioners have recently granted £297. In the R. C. divisions the parish forms part of the union or district of Dunsany, and has a handsome chapel at Kilmessan. Here is a public school, in which about 150 children are educated.
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Slater’s Directory, 1894
Kilmessan, a parish and village in Co. Meath, barony of Lower Deece, union of Dunshaughlin, diocese of Meath, with a station on the Midland Great Western railway, 5 miles northwest from Dunshaughlin, containing 10 townlands. Swainstown is the seat of N. F. Preston esq. j.p. The area comprises 3,326 acres; the population in 1891 was 376. Post Office.Letters through Navan. The nearest money order & telegraph office is at Dunsany.
Church of Ireland; Rev. Anthony Drought T.C.D., B.A. Catholic; Rev. Michael Jones P.P.; Rev. Robert Barry Adm. & Rev. John Corcoran, curates.
Private Residents:
Drought, Rev. Anthony T.C.D., B.A.
Barry, Rev. Robert Adm.
Jones, Rev. Michael P.P.
Preston, Nathaniel F. J.P. Swainstown, Navan.
Farmers:
Anderson, Matthew, Kilmessan.
Collier, John, Ringlestown.
Doran, John, Kilmessan.
Gearty, John, Kilcarty.
Gearty, William, Kilcarty.
Healy, Thomas, Ringlestown.
Loughran, Francis, Tullykane.
Reilly, James, Proudstown.
Reilly, Robert, Kilmessan.
Sheridan, William, Ringlestown.
Wilkinson, Pete T, Kilcarty,
Wilkinson, Robert, Ringlestown.
Wilkinson, William, Kilmessan.