Found Another Phil

     I’ve been fooling around with the IFHF site to see if there was anything I might have missed there, OK actually I was bored and couldn’t think of anything else to do at the moment.  Howbeit, it was a good thing that I did.  I’ve been trying to find the parents of Edmond Power, my third great grandfather.  Edmond’s wife Honora Crotty came to America, as did all their known children, but Edmond doesn’t appear to have made the trip.  It’s possible he came and died between census years so I missed him, but I’ve found nothing to indicate he was ever here. 
 
     Except… there is an 1870 census entry that keeps niggling at me, Edward Powers, born in Ireland, age 42, working and living at a hotel in Palmyra, New York as a currier.  Could this be him?  Edmond would have been 61 not 42; we all know censuses get ages wrong all the time, but that seems like a very big leap. Two of the Power children, Ellen and Mary are living within just a few miles of Palmyra in 1870, Mary with her husband Thomas Ryan and Ellen is in service with a farm couple.  It’s feasible that Edmond and the two oldest children came over to raise passage money for Honora and their young son Philip.  So I’ve been researching Edmond, and have now found his baptism.

     The Power family lived in Cullen Castle, Waterford, in the Catholic Parish of Tramore.  A large chunk of the Catholic baptismal records are missing for Tramore, 1831-1856 to be precise.  This is the exact period the older Power children would have been born so only Philip’s baptism has been found, considerately born in 1857.  Philip is not that common a name in Ireland, though Lord knows you can’t toss a rock in Waterford without hitting a Power, so I knew I’d have to be careful looking for Edmond’s parents.  Given the location, the year and the parents, I think I’ve found him.  Ed’s oldest daughter is named Mary; his only son that I know of is named Philip, baptized in Tramore Parish.  The same parish his wife Honora Crotty was baptized in.

Ed's parents Phil Power & Mary Kervan

     
     That makes three known Philips in this family as young Philip married in New York and had a Philip of his own. Of course this doesn't get me any closer to finding Edmond's death date, or whether he came to the US, but it satisfies my curiosity about his parentage.