Corcoran Family Crest, Coat of Arms & Corcoran Name Origin

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Origin of the Name Corcoran

The origin of the name Corcoran was found in the allfamilycrests.com archives. The name Corcoran is derived from the Gaelic MacCorcrain and O'Corcrain septs that both take their name from the Gaelic word 'corcair', meaning 'purple'. When Gaelic names were anglicized during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries they were often changed to Anglo equivalents that sounded most like their original Gaelic name. These septs were located in Counties Offaly and Fermanagh respectively. The O'Corcorans were an ecclesiastical family located near Lough Erne in Ulster. They produced a number of ecclesiastics of note from the eleventh to the fifteenth century including the Bishop of Clogher in the year 1373. A notable bearer of the name was Brigadier General Michael Corcoran, 1827-1863, who was an Irish -American General in the Union Army during the American Civil War and was a close confidant of President Abraham Lincoln. In modern times the name Corcoran is still well represented in Offaly as well as Counties Tipperary and Cork but less so in Ulster.