Origins of surname
This name is either derived from the Gaelic innis, meaning 'island' or from the village of Ennis in Cornwall.
However, an Ennis descendant offers a different view:
- " Don't be confused by the spelling of Ennis, Ennes, Hennesey, Angus and similar words. All are derived from the Irish name Aonghus, meaning "unique choice."
- "Gaelic pronunciation goes very soft on what in other language are hard vowels so that the Englishman in trying to copy the delicate sounds made by a Gaelic saying "Aonghus" comes up with
"Hennesey." Ennes and Ennis has come about by a similar process. Ennis, a town in County Clare, Ireland, is the result of an Englishman trying to pronounce Gaelic - this time the word "inis" meaning island.
- "It was said that the surname Ennis sprang up and spread out from the borders of Heath and Lough north of Dublin until it was common throughout Ireland and Scotland. Irish history tells that in Donnegal in the 15th century, more than half of the entire population were Ennis or their kin."
Early records
James Ennis, from Plymouth, married Susanne Vautier at St Saviour in 1780. He soon settled into the island way of life, because he was called Jacques in the records of the baptisms of their two children. James/Jacques married for a second time to Elizabeth l'Her in 1786 in St Helier and had three more children with her. The marriage record shows his name as Jacques Innes.
Variants
- Ennis
- Innes - there are records using this spelling for the Ennis family in Jersey, but they are probably mistakes
Family records
Family trees
Church records
- Ennis baptisms in Jersey
- Ennis marriages in Jersey (groom)
- Ennis marriages in Jersey (bride)
- Ennis burials in Jersey
Family histories
Great War service
- Francis Thomas Charles Ennis (1888-1916) (St H) son of Francis Edwin and Emelie Jane Garnier, Corporal, Hampshire Regiment, diedof wounds
- Arthur Balleine Ennis (1863- ) (St L) son of James and Jane Elizabeth Balleine, Major, Hampshire Regiment
- Arthur Herbert Ennis (1889-1950) (NZ), son of Abraham George Ennis, of Jersey, Private. Auckland Infantry Regiment
- Louis Reginald Ennis (1882- ) (Southampton), son of Louis Ennis and Evelina, nee Collas, Corporal, RASC
Family wills
These wills created by members of the Ennis family are now held by Jersey Archive. By visiting the archive site and using the names, dates and reference numbers shown here, it is possible to view a copy of each will. You will have to subscribe to the Archive's online service to do this. To find out more about this collection, which covers the period from 1663 to 1980, and how to search for your family's wills there, visit our Jersey wills page
- Elizabeth Ennis, St Helier - 11 November 1904, D/Y/A/63
- James Ennis of St Helier, now of St Lawrence - 27 March 1885, D/Y/A/44
- Louisa Ennis, Brookside, Gorey Village, Grouville, widow of Philip Esnouf and Edward Elias Valpy bequeaths to her four sons Brookside, to be sold - 24 April 1911, D/Y/A/70
Burial records
Family businesses
1887 advert from L'Almanach de la Gazette de Jersey for blacksmith and mechanic George Peter Ennis
Family gravestones
Click on any image to see a larger version. See the Jerripedia gravestone image collection page for more information about our gravestone photographs
The grave of Great War casualty Francis Thomas Charles Ennis at Niederzwehren Cemetery, Kassel, Germany
Tips
The church record links above will open in a new tab in your browser and generate the most up-to-date list of each set of records from our database. These lists replace earlier Family page baptism lists, which were not regularly updated. They have the added advantage that they produce a chronological listing for the family name in all parishes, so you do not have to search through A-Z indexes, parish by parish.
We have included some important spelling variants on some family pages, but it may be worth searching for records for a different spelling variant. Think of searching for variants with or without a prefix, such as Le or De. To search for further variants, or for any other family name, just click on the appropriate link below for the first letter of the family name, and a new tab will open, giving you the option to choose baptism, marriage or burial records. You will then see a list of available names for that type of record and you can select any name from that list. That will display all records of the chosen type for that family name, and you can narrow the search by adding a given name, selecting a parish or setting start and end dates in the form you will see above. You can also change the family name, or search for a partial name if you are not certain of the spelling
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New records
Since August 2020 we have added several thousand new records from the registers of Roman Catholic, Methodist and other non-conformist churches. These will appear in date order within a general search of the records and are also individually searchable within the database search form
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