A Tale of Two Cemeteries

     

Entrance to Saint Anne's in Palmyra, NY

     Thursday afternoon the Rochester, New York area broke the record with a daytime temperature of 65 balmy degrees!  It's doubtful we'll see that sort of warmth again for a very long time, so I took advantage of the day to visit the Catholic cemetery in Palmyra.  Besides being good exercise, it's enjoyable to get out of the house and visit some old, (deceased), relatives.  I recently read a blog by Irish genealogist John Grenholm in which he observed, in speaking of the Irish, "Apparently we find it very hard to let go. Maybe that’s the reason we have such a thing about graveyards. Because we certainly do have a thing about graveyards".  If I'm any yardstick, that is an indisputable truism. 

     Being such a nice day, I was loathe to leave after making my usual rounds so I decided to take a stroll through the much larger village cemetery that abuts Saint Anne's as well.  The village cemetery has some very old and unique graves while Saint Anne's cemetery, being created sometime after 1850, lacks really old burials.  Come take a walk with me...

   

     Entering Saint Anne's, one is greeted by a life-sized angel.  The gravestone behind her left wing is that of my 2nd great-aunt Ellen Power from County Waterford and her husband Thomas Mahoney born in County Kerry. 

     The shot below is no man's land, the road dividing the Catholics from everyone else. Saint Anne's is on the left.

     As I left Saint Anne's and walked on into the village cemetery, I saw on a rise what looked from a distance to be palm trees on the side of a large monument.  That was odd, palm trees are definitely not native to New York but there they were.  On viewing the front of the marker, the explanation for the presence of palm trees became clear.  It read, "Dr. Henry Pebbine born Brooklyn 1797 Killed by the Seminole Indians at the massacre of Indian Key Fla. Aug 7 1840 Aged 43".  I had never heard of this massacre nor the doctor before, and I was somewhat doubtful he had been brought from Florida to New York for burial, (in August yet), so I googled it.  One website that came up contained an article written in 1912 that described the terrible events of that summer's day and mentioned a Dr. Henry, but his last name was Perrine.  A closer look at the picture I had taken of the stone showed it was indeed Perrine, not Pebbine as I had first thought.  The article concluded by noting Dr. Perrine's remains were recovered from Florida many years after the tragedy and interred in the family plot at Palmyra.  Another site claims the doctor's remains could not be located in Florida, making the monument in Palmyra a cenotaph.  I tend to believe the second site.

     In the photo below is one of the several zinc markers that dot the village cemetery.  Erected in 1886 this monument looks as though it could have been put up yesterday, the inscription is that clear.  I wish all my ancestor's markers were made of this blueish grey metal.  Their production began in 1875 and being hollow, they were actually an inexpensive option.  Unfortunately, they never gained in popularity with some cemeteries banning zinc markers on the grounds maintaining them would be costly and they might not hold up... the opposite has proven true.

     

Charles H. Kingman M.D.

     

     The marker on the right below is exactly what it looks like, a boulder set on a base memorializing the Chase family.  The other is erected entirely from cobblestones for the De Chard family.

Left, De Chard - Albert 1842-1933 and Cordelia 1842-1923

     The small oval stone below struck me as unusual, I haven't seen many of these but there are a few in the village cemetery; none are found in Saint Anne's. This one was placed in remembrance of Little Cornelia who passed away in 1836 at the age of three.

 

     While Saint Anne's Cemetery is all on level ground, the village cemetery behind it contains both level and hilly sections. One prominence is pictured below.  There are some uneven, timeworn steps placed at intervals on the hillside, but it's still steeper than it appears in the photo.  From the top it does offer a panoramic view of the two cemeteries though...

     

     Looking down from the top of the hill, Saint Anne's cemetery is the farthest section seen in the above photo.

     Three hours have slipped by, the temperature is beginning to drop now and the clouds are lowering; rain is expected before sunset.  It's time to get back to my car parked at the end of that far road.  I hope you enjoyed this brief look at Palmyra where I spend a good deal of my free time.  To be continued...  

(In May)

The Mystery Couple

  

     Shortly before an older cousin of mine died a few years ago, he entrusted to me a stack of old photos. His reasoning was his daughter, who had no interest in family history, would merely discard them upon his passing. Especially since a few of them were older and the persons in them unidentified.  I expect he was correct in his assumption; I fear the same for my genealogy efforts which is why I’m posting all I can to Ancestry.  An imperfect solution to be sure, but until a budding family historian appears in my clan will have to suffice.

    The photograph above has intrigued me since it first came into my keeping. The young lady on the right is my teen-aged grandmother, Mary O’Hora. The names of the couple holding the poodles are unknown to me, (as are those of the poodles). They are in one or two other pictures I have from approximately the same time, so I believe they are most likely relatives, but who they are continues to confound me. The obvious first step was to date the photograph. Grandma was born in 1912, it appears to me she looks to be about 16 years old in this picture give or take. That suggests it was taken around 1928.

     If they are indeed family members, I’ve narrowed the obvious possibilities as to their identities.  My grandmother’s father, Edward O’Hora, died in 1920 when Grandma was eight years old. Edward’s oldest sister Mary passed in 1907 as did his sister Anna; his brother James died in 1881. The next, Michael, never married, and Sarah Jane died in 1902. That left Winifred, who lived until 1939, and her husband Andrew Fitzpatrick who survived until 1928 and lastly, Edward’s brother Daniel who lived until 1951 and his possibly common-law wife who passed in 1937.  I tend to discount Daniel as there was some bad blood between him and the family and too, the gentleman in the photo seems shorter than what the O’Hora’s were from I’ve seen, but Winifred and Andrew are a real possibility. 

    On the other hand, the photo may be of relatives of Edward’s wife Ellen White. Ellen survived Edward and lived at the family farm until the mid-1930’s. Her siblings Margaret, William, and Julia were all deceased by 1923. Of those remaining, her brother Thomas never married, Cornelius disappeared, and John lived in California, leaving Mary, who lived until 1939 and her husband William Stevenson who survived until about 1937. 

    Census records show the Stevenson's living at 17 West 11th Street on Long Island in 1925, but they did visit Ellen on the farm occasionally.  In fact, the local newspaper published this line the first week in October of 1928, “Mr. and Mrs. William E. Stevenson of Long Island are visiting Mrs. Nellie O’Hora and family!” That’s quite interesting, I had forgotten the date of that short notice in the paper until I was looking at my notes for Mary while writing this blog. It certainly places her at the farm in 1928.  I don’t know if they would have brought their pets all the way from Long Island but they were childless...who can say? 

     So which couple could it be, Winifred and Andrew or Mary and William?  I dug out the other photos I had of the possible Mary and William and gasped, the lady who appeared in the photo was seated on the front steps of, get this, number 17!

     Here is "William" in front of the same house.  The two appear younger here than in the picture at the top of this blog, but I'm sure it's the same couple.  I may just have answered my question!  This is why I blog, I figured this whole thing out just now, while blogging.  It makes me focus and think things through like nothing else, I highly recommend it.

Of Immigrant Ships and Shell Games

 

The Barque Star Queen

      Looking around the net today I stumbled across an article titled, "How To Find Your Australian Ancestors". It wasn’t particularly helpful and linked to mostly pay sites, but it got me thinking about my cousin Alice Dwyer/O’Dwyer who left Tipperary in the spring of 1875 to begin a new life in Queensland. I wrote about Alice earlier, and reading through that blog I remembered I still hadn’t figured out who in Australia had paid her fare. I didn’t figure that out today either, but I did find the incredible details of her journey.

Alice O'Dwyer

     One free site I found useful was that of the State Library of Queensland, where I ran a search for Alice’s ship, Star Queen. Among the first hits was this manuscript-- "Isaiah de Zouche Diary, 1875". Hoping it was digitized, I opened the description to find that this man was the ship’s surgeon in 1875! While not digitized, it apparently could be borrowed. The cost for an international interlibrary loan was $45, not bad but I had my doubts the library in Australia would just ship an almost 150-year-old manuscript to New York. Maybe there were excerpts online? I tried a google search which didn’t produce the diary, but something almost as good did come up. That something was the website, Trove, a free Australian newspaper site that is very easy to search. I typed in, Isaiah de Zouche 1875, and flung open the door of the rabbit hole.

Dr. de Zouche

     One of the first hits began with news that on September 14th officials had signaled the Star Queen to stop at Cape Moreton, Australia, short of its destination of Maryborough, but its Captain Downing had refused to comply!  It went on to say the Colonial Secretary’s Department in Australia had received a telegram from Dr. de Zouche and as a result of its contents had ordered the ship brought to Moreton Bay.  Part of what Dr. de Zouche had written:

There should have been provisions on board for 140 days. Our biscuits were exhausted on the eighty-ninth day, when in longitude 65 E., with the exception of three and a half bags reserved for the crew. On the 31st, of August the date of our arrival, [at Melbourne] having been out 110 days from Gravesend, we had no biscuits, no preserved fresh meat, no potatoes, no molasses, and only six day's supply of salt meat and eight day's flour for passengers and crew. The passengers have conducted themselves throughout the voyage in the most exemplary manner.

     No wonder Captain Downing didn't want to stop in Moreton.  At the time Alice left Tipperary a program was in place to aid emigrants relocating to Australia, with the Colonial Office there and its counterpart in England sharing the cost. A look at the passenger manifest of the Star Queen shows that only twenty-six of its 322 passengers paid their own way, the rest were assisted or free. The Star Queen had left England on May 13th, supposedly stocked as required for 140 days at sea. That is where the trouble began. A fraud was hatched between the ship’s captain, the purser and the third mate to line their pockets using supplies intended for their passengers. 

     Conditions became so bad that on August 31st the Star Queen was forced to put in at Hobson’s Bay in Melbourne to take on provisions, this must have been when Dr. Z was able to send his incriminating telegram to officials.  In his testimony at the later enquiry, Dr. Z added that the captain was intemperate and had used threatening language in addressing him. The press had a field day with the story, Trove found far too many articles to read them all, but a common theme came through. Only a single newspaper, The Age, attempted to downplay the incident asserting the ship had, “merely put in to replenish supplies then continued on its way”, but that was early on before all the facts had come to light.

     Further testified to at the enquiry, and indeed verified by Australian officials, was the existence of barrels marked bread on one side and split peas on the other in order to deceive inspectors in England into believing the proper number of stores were onboard. Mr. Bellamy, the third mate, testified that before sailing, biscuits that had been counted and stowed were surreptitiously brought back on deck by him to be counted a second time. It was further found that Mr. Wright, the purser, had weighted the scales on the ship, the buckets supposedly holding 30 pints of water in fact held only 20, the ship was “disgustingly dirty”, there was insufficient deck space for the number of passengers, and incredibly, nineteen men from Wales and County Clare had emigrated under assumed names provided to them by crew members. The skullduggery didn’t end there, as supplies dwindled the captain ordered provisions intended for the assisted passengers be diverted to cabin passengers.

     Nor did Mrs. Currie, the ship's matron, have anything good to say for the Captain, accusing him of not supporting her in the performance of her duties and complaining of the short rations that left all the "girls" hungry, as well as the lack of water for them.

     Captain Downing was found culpable and given the choice of paying a fine of 211 pounds or spending three months in prison for breaches of the Passenger’s Act. He chose the fine. Oddly, no mention was made in the newspapers of any charges against the purser or third mate being pursued. After slogging through more articles, it came to light Dr. Z had promised to request immunity for the pair if they revealed to him all they knew of the scheme, which the Colonial Secretary agreed to.  As a result, they were never charged. It’s well known that this sort of embezzlement went on during the years of famine immigration, but with the passage of various passenger acts such flagrant violations became thankfully, not as common. The outrage over the events on the Star Queen was universal, inspiring the song below within months:

     The writer of this amusing ditty, cursing the Star Queen’s beams, would get his wish a few years later when at the end of July in 1878, the ship ran aground on the treacherous Murray Reefs located off the coast of southwestern Australia and was wrecked, fortunately with no loss of life.  I would imagine Alice and her fellow immigrants, who were unfortunate enough to have been passengers on the horrendous voyage of 1875 aboard the Star Queen, shed  few tears.  As for Captain Downs, his name appeared on the passenger list of the ship Ramsey, bound for London on the 12th of November in 1875.  A few names away from his in second cabin was that of Mrs. Currie. That must have been an interesting trip.

End of the Line Part Deux, in Which Facts Are Twisted and a Scandal Comes to Light

 

     As we saw yesterday, Edward S. Wheat Jr. was the last surviving child of Emma Spence Wheat.  Edward's grandfather had brutally murdered his father, shooting him in the back on a Nashville street, and his two brothers were deceased.  The last days of Edward Jr.’s life have been reconstructed here using mainly contemporary newspaper articles -- not an ideal source, but other than dry vital records, are all that’s available.  

     It should be kept in mind that journalistic standards in the 19^th century were basically nonexistent. The primary goal of papers then was not to impart the facts, but to titillate readers and make money. If that could be achieved by altering a story, reporters had no qualms about doing so.  As an example, another of my ancestors who died during this era was linked, in a fanciful newspaper account, to a US senator of the same name when in fact no such connection existed. The articles in Edward Jr.’s case  are full of false assertions, some possibilities and, I assume, a few facts.  Bearing that in mind, this is the story of Edward’s demise.

     The first I learned of Edward’s death came in the form of a short notice in a Nashville newspaper informing its readers Edward had died the previous day in St. Louis and his remains were expected in Nashville for burial.  Missouri death records and a burial permit added the bare-boned facts such as his place of death, 814 South Fourteenth Street in St. Louis, the date, 14 June 1892, and the cause, gastroenteritis accompanied by heart failure.  That scant information left the St. Louis newspapers to reveal the sordid story behind those facts which they were happy to do:

    

     There are some obviously false claims in the above story.  For one, it alleges Edward’s father was killed “about a year ago in a fight", when in fact he had died eight years earlier and certainly not in a fight.  It also states that Edward Jr. was living in St. Louis for the two years before his death but no trace of him is found in city directories and the line on his burial permit for length of residence in St. Louis was left blank. Further, he was arrested in Nashville the month before his death after a fist fight with another young man, and an obituary in a Nashville paper noted he was visiting St. Louis at the time of his death. The part about Sallie Chamberlain knowing him in Nashville is also false. With a bit of sleuthing I found "Sallie" was in fact Clara Mayer, the daughter of immigrants, who was born about 1870 right there in St. Louis.  In the year 1887 Clara married a man named Charles Allen from whom she separated three months later and afterwards divorced.

     The wording of the article is also curious in that it does not say Edward Jr. died at the residence of Sallie Chamberlain, but that he passed at, “a house kept by Mme. Sallie Chamberlain”.  That and her alias immediately aroused my suspicions.  Also, how strange is it that the doctor who attended Edward refused to certify his death but shortly after relented and did so?  Were I a cynical woman, I might suppose some form of persuasion may have been deployed.

     My doubts about Sallie, aka Clara, were confirmed by another death notice published in a rival newspaper that read, “Edward S. Wheat, a wealthy and well-connected young Tennessean, died yesterday morning in a disreputable house, No. 814 South Fourteenth Street…”.  It went on to invent his last words as, “Allie, the disgrace is all over”.  The part about Edward being an alumnus of the Keeley Institute, an early center for the treatment of alcoholism, may be true though I've found nothing more to support that and no further articles about Edward's time in the city. 

     The St. Louis newspapers are however, filled with stories about Clara Allen.  They mention her handsomely furnished parlors there at number 814, the elaborate funeral she provided for Darling, her beloved Scottish Terrier whom she had buried in Pickett's Cemetery in a custom made white coffin, along with accounts of dances and robberies that took place at her home over the years.  Clara Allen was only about aged thirty when she died in 1899, leaving a sizeable estate to her sister’s family.  Interestingly, that sister, Emma Mayer Fairham, lived for a time on Chamberlain Street in St. Louis, quite possibly the inspiration for Clara's nom de guerre.  When Clara’s home was listed for rent after her death, it was not only identified by its address, as were other listings in the real estate section, but also as, “the former home of Clara Allen”.  The inventory of her estate makes fascinating reading, a music box worth over $700 in today's money, a piano valued at over $1,600 today, and an expensive gold bracelet, along with five beds, (one brass), assorted rugs, draperies, and decorative objects.

     The heartbreaking truth seems to be that Edward S. Wheat Jr. developed a fondness for alcohol and died in a St. Louis bordello. It's unclear how much his mother knew of the details surrounding her son's death, but scandal spreads quickly and only 300 miles lie between Nashville and St. Louis.  Emma, her family now gone, must have at least had an inkling of the circumstances.  According to her obituary, she died at her home in Pensacola, Florida in 1920 and was taken to Nashville for burial.  Thus ends the story of this once promising family.

The End of Edward S. Wheat's Line

     

     Moses Wheat of England was among the first settlers of Concord, Massachusetts, arriving there in about 1695.  Moses along with his wife Tamzen Brooks, was the founder of the American branch of the family and they were fruitful, multiplied, and scattered far and wide.  In the summer of 1795, my line left Massachusetts and relocated to the Town of Phelps, New York where they began the back breaking work of clearing a homestead from the dense forest and undergrowth.  A grandson of those original Phelps pioneers, Benjamin F. Wheat, left New York in 1896 for Michigan.  It was there he met and married Mary Hermance, beginning a family of his own in Branch County.  Their daughter Luany was born there in 1840, followed in 1841 by a son, Edward S. Wheat.

   When the American Civil War erupted in 1861, Edward Wheat enlisted in the Union Army as a sergeant in the 1st Michigan Light Artillery, rapidly advancing through the ranks.  While stationed in Murfreesboro, Tennessee near war's end he met a local girl named Emma Spence.  Her father William Spence had been a resident of Murfreesboro for many years, but was born in Ireland, in the north I strongly suspect.  A few months after hostilities ended, Edward and Emma were married, beginning their new life there in Murfreesboro near her parents.  Had Emma possessed a crystal ball and caught a glimpse of the tragedies that lay in store, she likely would have declined Edward's proposal.

      I found at Google Books, a biographical album of the sort so popular in the late 19th century.  It contained a short biography about Edward and another about his father Benjamin and his early life in New York State, but what really caught my eye was the next to last sentence, "Edward S. Wheat came to his death by violence in the streets of Nashville, Tennessee, being shot on March 11, 1884."

     My mind raced with questions; who would have killed Edward and for what reason?  Foremost in my thoughts was the animosity that existed in the south towards the north after the war.  The book mentioned that after leaving the military Edward had been appointed Revenue Assessor and later, US Marshall for the Middle District of Tennessee.  None of those jobs would have endeared him to the locals.  The possibility that Edward was murdered by one of them seemed reinforced by the Freedman's Bureau records at Ancestry.  Among their papers was a report mentioning Edward once being threatened by an angry rebel with a loaded, cocked, pistol, "pointed in his face".  A newspaper at the Library of Congress site told a much different story however:

     Col. Edward S. Wheat was murdered by his father-in-law Col. William Spence in Nashville Tuesday morning at the corner of Church and College streets.  Spence was crossing the street behind Wheat and shot him in the back, the ball passing through the heart.  He then ran up to his victim placed the pistol at his side, and fired the second shot.  Wheat was about 43 years old and Spence 65.  The difficulty grew out of a disagreement about business transactions and had been of long standing.

     After picking my jaw up off the floor I began looking into this shocking crime.  I found Edward and his young family, along with his in-laws, had moved to Nashville after Edward was appointed US Marshal.  He and Emma were the parents of three boys, William F. born in 1868 died of typhoid fever in 1884, nine months after his father's murder; Edward S. Jr. was born in 1870 and passed away in 1892.  The youngest was Harry Elliott, born in 1873 who died in 1875 at age two from tuberculosis of the abdominal lymph glands contracted by drinking milk from an infected cow, not uncommon in those days before pasteurization.

     And what of William Spence?  He mounted an insanity defense but was found guilty of murder at his trial and sentenced, "to be hanged in the jail yard on the 18th of July".  His family sprang into action, petitioning Tennessee Governor Bate for leniency.  Bate reduced William's sentence to a life term, but the family filed another petition with the new governor of the state, the first signature on that document was that of Edward's widow Emma!  The second was his son Edward Jr.  Their petition was warmly received and on February 5, 1887 Governor Robert Taylor granted William a full pardon. Soon afterwards, William, his wife Matilda, and their daughter Emma Wheat along with her one surviving son, Edward Jr., all moved to Pensacola Florida.  William died there in November of 1892, followed by Matilda in 1894.

     As a young man, Edward Jr. became involved in the grain business, a fitting occupation for one bearing the Wheat surname.  He passed away in St. Louis at the age of 22, from gastroenteritis and heart failure, on the 14th of June in 1892.  His death came five months prior to that of his grandfather William's.  Edward's burial permit, issued in St. Louis, noted that his remains were transported to Nashville for interment in the family plot at Mount Olivet Cemetery in that city.  It should be noted, the dates for Harry Elliott Wheat are incorrect at Find A Grave as well as on his marker.  State death records have the right dates, and interment records of Mount Olivet show that Harry was buried there in October of 1875, then reinterred with his father when he was killed in 1884.  That may be the year the monument was erected and Harry's dates were not remembered correctly.

     I was about to post this blog when I decided to do one more newspaper search for Edward Jr.'s obituary in the St. Louis papers and was I in for a surprise!  The circumstances surrounding the death of the young grain merchant from a good family were not at all what I had believed them to be!

More tomorrow...

     

     

      

New Ancestry Database in Time for the Day of the Dead

Hospital Ship Daniel Webster

     Ancestry has a new database that may hold some clues for those researching Irish ancestors.  Called, "New York, New York, U.S., Bodies in Transit, 1859-1894", this is a database of bodies transported into, out of, and through Manhattan during those thirty-five years.  There are a significant number of Irish names included, and the available years cover the civil war period, potentially making it even more useful to family historians.

     I tried a few searches and in a matter of minutes had found two members of my family.  Cousins, both named Daniel McGarr, who were Union soldiers born at Cayuga County, New York to Irish immigrants.* The transcription of the transit record that came up on Ancestry looked like this, there are no images of the records there:

     

     This Daniel McGarr was the son of John McGarr, who I believe was the brother of my 3rd-great-grandfather Daniel McGarr of Ballyraggan, County Kildare.  The lack of an image was annoying however, after a little poking around on the net, I found the books have been digitized, and can be viewed here. It seems the easiest way to find your ancestor would be to do a search at Ancestry, find the record and date, then go to the book and use its index. The index is arranged by the first letter of the last name, then chronologically so having the date is very useful. That's how I found Daniel, whose entry differs markedly from the transcription at Ancestry:

     The transcription is not well done, the record clearly says Mc Garr with an abbreviation for Daniel-- Dan'l, there is no "Dane".  Makes me wonder who does these?  I knew from my research over the years that Daniel did in fact die at sea as noted in both the book and the transcription; on a hospital ship carrying him homeward:

Auburn Daily Bulletin May 19 1862-- Daniel McGarr, son of John McGarr, a member of Kennedy's Battery, died on the way from Williamsburg on board the hospital ship Daniel Webster the 12th inst. age 18 years. The remains were interred at Long Island but removed by friends who went to NYC for that purpose. The remains arrived at Auburn Sunday morning and were interred at the State Street Catholic burying ground.

     The register gives Daniel's cause of death as wounds and Cypress Hills Cemetery as the place of his initial interment.  It was an existing cemetery, located in Brooklyn, at that time part of Long Island. During the Civil War burial space was needed for the numerous soldiers dying in the military hospitals around New York City.  To meet the need, the federal government established a soldier's lot at Cypress Hills in April of 1862.  In 1884 the government purchased a large tract of land in the cemetery to create Cypress Hills National Cemetery, the only National Cemetery in New York City.

     The bottom entry above is Daniel's.  I'm not sure how to interpret all of it.  It looks like it could be the name of an official, JM Ars? then probably an abbreviation for, "Sanitary Commission Ship Daniel Webster".  The other soldier's entries above Daniel's end with MD and Surgeon, but of course poor Daniel had no use for either. The ship's name is a small detail, but one that would be of interest to a genealogist.  I did have that information from Daniel's obituary but if he hadn't had one, I would have missed learning about the ship if not for the register.  

     I also would have missed the eyewitness account of a nurse, found at Google Books, describing how on May 11th patients were taken onboard the Daniel Webster which sailed for New York early on the morning of the 12th; the day Daniel died on the ship.  Arrival was expected in New York the night of the13th.  The transit permit issued the 14th suggests Daniel was buried that day, four days later he was reburied in Auburn.  Proving once again that it's worth taking the time to check the original record when possible.

* A third cousin, Michael McGarr, who was born in County Wicklow, the son of William McGarr, also perished in the war.  He was buried in North Carolina where he died so doesn't appear in the database. 

                      

 

Don't Forget Your Shillelagh, in Which a Man is Assaulted With Sticks on His Head and a Traffic Light Turns Upside Down

 

     Ryan Whips.  That vaguely sinister sounding phrase appeared in my blog a few weeks ago.  I’ve found no relationship between that family, (for that is what the Ryan Whips were), and mine but they did reside in the same area of Tipperary as my Ryans and O’Dwyers.  Often written as "Ryan (Whip)" when speaking of one of them, it makes perfect sense that in a place where every second person was named Ryan, (the rest were Dwyers), a way to differentiate between them was needed.  I first encountered the Ryan Whips in an essay written by an Irish schoolchild in the 1930's describing that family as having a banshee.  That sounded right, I've heard all the old Irish families have one that laments their deaths.  Not much else turned up about this family in Google searches, but now that I had access to Irish newspapers for a short time, I thought I may as well run a search for them.

     It would be difficult to form a valid opinion of the Ryan Whips from just a few news articles, so let’s just say they seem like a fractious lot.  I wouldn’t want to anger them, but some of my ancestors apparently did.  The following article published in 1866 gave the circumstances:

     Andrew Dwyer/O'Dwyer, born in about 1780, was my fourth-great-grandfather, this clearly wasn't him but he did have a son named Andrew born about 1816, and a grandson of the same name born in 1838, at Churchfield in Tipperary.  I would think it was the son or grandson involved in this fracas.  A look at the map shows Rathnaveene, site of the attack, lies about halfway between Tipperary Town and Churchfield, anyone traveling between those two places would indeed pass through Rathnaveene.  Although Andrew was one of the less common forenames in the area, I still couldn't be positive this was one of my relatives.

     Since I was researching my O'Dwyers, I decided to check my old notes on them.  Some of those files haven't been opened in nearly a year and I like to skim them every once in a while to see if earlier finds fit in with more recent ones, and in this case they certainly did!  I opened a screenshot I had taken of a page in the Tipperary Petty Sessions Order Book and saw this:

     

     Andrew Dwyer of Churchfield, Parish Donohill Complainant.   Defendants, Philip Ryan and James Ryan (both Whip)!  When I first found this record I couldn't quite figure out what the word after Ryan was. Now, being older and wiser, I recognize the word as Whip.

                     

     The space containing a description of the charge gives the place of the assault as Rathnaveene and the date as the 9th; this was the prosecution of the crime detailed in the newspaper article above!  Unlike the news article, this document gave Andrew Dwyer's address, Churchfield.  This really was a member of my family!  Philip and James Ryan tried to counter charge Andrew, but the judge dismissed their attempt and sentenced them both,"To be imprisoned in Clonmel goal for two months and be kept to hard labor".

     Looking through the old newspapers it soon became evident, Tipperary in the mid 19th century was a rather violent place.  The Ryan Whips were often in court, not to mention goal, but they were far from the only ones.  There are numerous accounts of  physical altercations and arrests.  One article described a group of Dwyers from Donohill, bordering Churchfield, as fighting and throwing stones at the Ryans.  I've read that the phrase "Tipperary Stone Throwers" is a very old one, which reminds me of a tale from here in New York.

     On Syracuse's westside, about an hour from my home, lies the neighborhood of Tipperary Hill.  As one might guess, this section was home to numerous Irish immigrants, many of them from Tipperary.  Even today, Tipp Hill is a sea of green shutters, green doors, green roofs, and Irish flags.  The story begins almost 100 years ago, in 1925, when the city of Syracuse installed an electric traffic light there at the intersection of Tompkins and Milton.  That light, like every other traffic light in the USA and most other countries, had a red light on top, yellow in the middle, and green on the bottom.  That did not sit well on Tipp Hill.  To make their point, some youthful locals began a stone throwing campaign, regularly smashing the light until the city gave in and turned it upside down, placing the green on top as it should be.  And so it remains today. 

     In 1997 the community raised money to fund a small memorial park and erect a statue in honor of the stone throwers; a family dressed in 1920's clothing, the father gesturing towards the light where the green still proudly beams from the top.  

     We take our heritage very seriously in upstate New York...

     

A New Source. In Which a Seduction is Revealed and a Connolly is Cornered

  

     Last week I purchased a one-month subscription to a site featuring Irish newspapers.  I've came across several articles that mention family members so I can say I've found the small investment well worth it.

     One such member is Ellen Crotty, a perennial sticking point here at Ellie's Ancestors.  I'm not sure what to make of the clues I've discovered about her, though I have a pretty good idea.  I've written before about Ellen here and this blog will make more sense if you skim that blog, but here's the synopsis; Ellen was born around 1848 at Cullen Castle in County Waterford to Bridget O'Brien and David Crotty, the brother of my third-great-grandmother Honora Crotty Power.  Their townland is part of the Catholic Parish of Tramore.  Unfortunately, Tramore has a large block of missing records, from November 1831 to January 1857.  Given that loss, it's important to find any available scraps of information about even distant family members in the hope something may turn up relating to those closer.

     After sifting through conflicting, contradictory evidence concerning Ellen, I came to the conclusion she was, how do I put this?  A fallen woman?  It appears all three of her children were born out of wedlock, and though illegitimacy in Ireland was not as rare as I'd been led to believe, I would think three such births would make the neighbors sit up and take notice.  Especially since Ellen's children were born in the second half of the nineteenth century, after the devotional revolution, when the number of births outside marriage was declining.*

     The article I found in The Waterford Standard, 6 April 1867 edition, doesn't specifically mention Ellen, but her father David Crotty is named, and his residence is given as being within two miles of Tramore.  That fits, as Cullen Castle is indeed about two miles north of the town --

     

          

     It's interesting that in April of the previous year, Ellen gave birth to a son she named Patrick.  His baptism does not mention a father's name.  One might think the above-mentioned Patrick Connolly may be a good candidate.  It's a shame the Standard was so prudish, I would have liked to read the unfit particulars.

     Ellen gave birth again in 1876, to a son whom she named David.  This time a father's name is recorded in the church baptism register, it's David Connolly.  The forename could be a mistake by the priest or the transcriptionist; only transcriptions are available online for Tramore during this time period.  The following year Ellen delivered a baby girl, Bridget, whose father's name is absent from her baptism record altogether.  None of the births are recorded in civil records.  Later, the deaths of the two youngest children appear in civil records, but under the surname Crotty, not Connolly.  The oldest, Patrick, immigrated to America so he doesn't appear in the civil records.  However, the common tombstone erected by, "Nellie Crotty", uses Connolly for all three of her children.  The stone notes that Patrick died in America.  Likewise, the 1901 census shows Ellen Crotty and her son David Crotty living in a 3rd class house in Summerhill in Tramore.  Bridget had died of consumption two years earlier, and David would perish from the same disease in five more.

     The ten years between the births of Patrick and his two younger siblings makes me wonder if Patrick Connolly was the father of Patrick, and David Connolly fathered the two younger children?  I may never figure that out, but who can say?  I never thought I'd find an article like the one above either.

       

* This source-- Illegitimacy and Pre-Nuptial Pregnancy in Ireland before 1864: The Evidence of Some Catholic Parish Registers, can be read for free by registering at the JSTOR site.

     

That Old Black Magic

      

     In the spirit of the season, I return to the matriarch of my family "witches", Mary Williams King Hale.  Mary was born in England around the year 1606, as her deposition taken in a Boston deed transfer in 1656 states, she was "aged about 50 yeares".  In that deposition "Mary Hayle" at least three times referred to Hugh Williams as her brother.  Mary may have been born in or near London; in another Boston deed her brother Hugh Williams, (called a feltmaker in this deed and a hatter in another), sold property in Boston to his brother, John Williams, also a feltmaker, of Barnaby Street in London, England.  Nathaniel Williams of Boston may have been another brother of Mary's, but that has yet to be proven.  

     Further evidence of Hugh Williams being Mary's brother comes from two sources; one was a 1654 meeting of Boston's selectmen during which they agreed to allow Mary, widowed by this time, to reside there on security provided by Hugh Williams. The other is Hugh's will made on 1 October 1674 and probated on 12 October 1674 in which he left two thirds of his estate to his "sister Haile and her children".  The other third was left to his "brother Hilton's children at Charlestown".  During probate, "Mary Hale of Boston", was appointed co-executor of Hugh's will by the court.  I've found no records for a Hilton Williams. 

     Mary was twice married but the identities of her husbands remain elusive.  As she was using the name Hale by 1654, it can reasonably be assumed she was the widow of a man by that name.  Her first husband's surname can be inferred from the name of her daughter Winifred King, the notorious Witch of Wallingford.  From reading Hugh's will we know Mary had at least one more child in addition to Winifred.

     The relationship between Mary Hale and Winifred King is established by Winifred's deposition given in the same case her mother Mary Hale was deposed for.  In it, Winifred calls Hugh Williams her uncle.  The connection between Mary and Winifred is further strengthened by surviving depositions from a witchcraft case against Mary Hale in 1680, that mention her "granddaughter" Joanna Benham, who was the child of Winifred King and Joseph Benham.

     Mary Hale was not a reserved sort of woman who hesitated to speak her mind, a trait that landed her in hot water even before 1680.  A neighbor sued her twice in 1677, once for assaulting his wife and again for defaming both him and his wife; she lost on both counts.  Mary operated a boarding house in Boston and was learned in herbal medicine, indeed, she often took in sick people to care for them.  Here we have a quarrelsome, elderly widow with a knowledge of herbs, all the ingredients for suspicions of witchcraft; so when a young mariner named Michael Smith fell ill Mary became the prime suspect.

     Michael Smith boarded at Mary's establishment and the widow took a liking to him, so much so that she encouraged a match between him and her granddaughter Joanna Benham.  Although Michael was willing, Joanna refused to consider the match and eventually Michael found a new love interest, Margaret Ellis, and left Mary's roof.  Reportedly, Mary Hale was not pleased the romance had ended.  Witnesses reported her stalking Michael and slandering Margaret Ellis.

     Not long after, Michael stopped by Mary's house to see two friends lodging there, during that visit he consumed a drink made by Mary.  Before long, Michael was taken violently ill and insisted Mary Hale had poisoned him.  Though he recovered, he blamed Mary for his illness.  Before long, Michael was ill again, more seriously than the first time.  Joanna Benham visited him, bringing along a warm drink Mary Hale had prepared for him but Michael dared not drink it.   That evening however, Margaret Ellis brought Michael the drink claiming she had made it for him.  Within hours Michael was on his deathbed.

     To those gathered around him he again accused Mary Hale and wove a fantastic tale of being transported by her to a house in a nearby town where he saw a coven of twenty witches drinking wine. He called for authorities to arrest Mary and bring her blood to him, believing it would cure his bewitchment.  Raving and railing against her, Michael Smith died.

     Mary was brought up on charges of witchcraft following Michael's death and a number of witnesses testified against her.  One who spoke on her behalf was Joanna Benham who provided a deposition to the court that gave her relationship to Mary Hale as granddaughter, to wit, "Margaret Ellis told me that I and my grandmother Hale was the cause of his death and she hoped in the Lord to see my Grandmother Hale burned before she went out of the country".  That did not happen, Mary was acquitted and faded from the pages of Boston records.  Nothing more is presently known of Mary's life after her trial, she was in her mid-seventies at that time and probably did not live many years longer.  We do know history repeated itself when in 1692 her daughter Winifred Benham was charged with witchcraft for the first time.  In 1693 she was again investigated for witchcraft, and in 1697 Winifred and her daughter Winifred Jr. were both charged.  The elder Winifred was searched for incriminating marks and underwent the water test, eventually being released along with her daughter.  After this ordeal they left Connecticut, fleeing to Staten Island in New York State where Winifred had a married daughter residing.

     Hugh William's will can be found at Ancestry.com.  The land transaction and depositions, along with many other records from early Massachusetts, are available at the UMassAmherst website--  https://guides.library.umass.edu/c.php?g=672399&p=4737789    

     Never stop research with just the sources on Ancestry, there are many, many records online that are not available there.  County and state sites, Google Books, library sites, and Family Search are some of my favorites.

    

     

A Glimpse of the Past

      

     The dearth of new Irish genealogy records continues, so I continue to seek out new avenues of research.  Today I did some simple searches using terms like Goldengarden, Donohill, Churchfield, etc... along with the word, history, to see what the search engine could uncover.  The results did not disappoint.

     For instance, as we all know there are no extant Irish censuses before 1901 however, statistics from earlier censuses do survive at Google Books.  The earliest mentioning my little corner of Tipperary,  (the townlands of Churchfield, Donohill, and Goldengarden), was the 1871 census that appears in a bound British document, "Accounts and Papers of the House of Commons, Vol. 87".  Fortunately, also included were statistics from 1841-1861.  It began -- Goldengarden contained a little over 330 acres; in 1841 there were 24 houses in the townland with a population of 161.  The 1851 statistics revealed a much different scene, only 14 houses and 103 people, a drop in population of 58 persons and 10 fewer houses.  Of course between 1841 and 1851 a catastrophic event occurred-- the famine, but this had the stench of a clearance.  Between the years 1851 and 1861, a further 16 souls and 3 more houses vanished.  At least half of the departed 16 that decade were my ancestors Cornelius Ryan, his wife Alice O'Dwyer, and most of their children who decamped for New York in the summer of 1860.  There was one more statistic for the year 1871 only, the status of the remaining houses.  It noted that of the 11 left in Goldengarden all were inhabited, with residents numbering 86.  Where an increase in the population over those forty years would have been expected there was instead a decrease of 75.

     Churchfield, where Cornelius and Alice lived at the time of their marriage, and where their first child was born, was surprisingly the opposite.  A much smaller townland of 108 acres, it's population nearly doubled, from 28 in 1841 to 54 in 1851 and the houses increased from 4 to 7.  There were 53 inhabitants in 1861, and 57 in 1871.  To what could the population jump during the famine years be attributed?  Here was another possibility for research.  

     Also among the search results was a link to the Library Ireland site which contained, The Book of Tipperary, published in 1889 with a mention of my Uncle Andrew Dwyer, a farmer in Churchfield   Another hit was, The Schools Collection, found at  https://www.duchas.ie/en/cbes.  This project's goal is to digitize Ireland's folklore for future generations using manuscripts, photographs, and of course, The Schools Collection, which dates to the late 1930's.  That collection was a compilation of folklore as set down by schoolchildren in the Irish Free State who heard the tales they recorded from older community members, parents, and grandparents.  One of the essays written at Anacarty School, referred to Goldengarden and was titled, Fairy Forts, immediately piquing my interest.  

     The fort in this case was located on "Cooney's land".  That name was familiar to me, the Cooney families were a few names from my ancestor Connor Ryan in the Valuation records of Goldengarden.  The essay went on to impart the information that, "people never interfere with forts in the parish as they believe in the existence of  the good people."  It further discussed the forts being frequented by the Banshee who in that location especially laments the deaths of  the Ryan Whips, Kellys, and Briens.  Ryan Whips?  After a search, the only hits for that phrase were the original essay, a description of a wrestling move, and a porn site.  That perplexed me, so I consulted Dara at Black Raven Genealogy who graciously searched for and found a reference to a Ryan family who were whip makers and referred to as the Ryan Whips.  Thank you, Dara.

     The Schools Collection is a wonderful resource, it and the entire folklore collection, which is searchable, is probably the closest we will get to understanding what our Irish ancestor's thoughts and daily lives were like.  I wish collecting had begun decades earlier, though I understand citizens were busy with other things, like expelling an occupying army from their country.  As the past recedes further with every passing day, it's well worth a backward glance at the words of our ancestors through this important site.

     

     

The Graveyard at Donohill

      

     As a member of the group, Ireland Reaching Out, I receive regular newsletters from them in my e-mailbox.  One communication in April contained a fascinating discussion of Irish graveyards. The article noted among other things, ancestral burial grounds are the holy grail and finding yours is a huge accomplishment; it also reminded researchers not to underestimate the importance the Catholic Irish placed on being buried with their kin. Even if the death occurred in a different parish it was common for the deceased to be brought "home" for burial; and notably, this held true even if those kin were interred in a protestant graveyard.  Some of those ancient parish burial grounds had come under control of the Church of Ireland during the reformation and penal times; however, being buried with one's family far outweighed the importance of the burial place.  That could actually be helpful to researchers I would think, as protestants were much more likely to have kept burial records for us to find.

     But how, I wondered, could a graveyard have been in use for centuries and not be enormous?  An article online answered that question.  The graves were reused.  When a family member passed away the grave would be reopened for them.  In the 19th century laws were passed that limited this practice, but no doubt it continued albeit at a lesser rate.

       Recently, completely by accident, I may have stumbled upon my O'Dwyer ancestor's burial ground in County Tipperary.  I was attempting to get a look at Churchfield in the Parish of Donohill, on Google Maps, but the site wouldn't allow me to set the wee street view person down in that place.  The village of Donohill was the closest I could get, so I landed there and took a stroll down Davis Street, inching my way closer to Churchfield on the map. When directly across from Churchfield I turned the "person" and looked across the fields towards it.  There upon a rise was a large graveyard!  That's me on Davis Street down in the bottom left corner.  The red balloon on the map is Churchfield.

     I was not expecting that. I quickly opened another window to do a search for "Donohill Graveyard" and found that the place was an historic landmark located on the lands of Churchfield, but surprisingly little else, next to nothing in fact.  I'm not even sure it was designated a landmark because of it's antiquity or because Daniel Breen, leader of the Third Tipperary Brigade and considered the man who fired the first shot in the War of Independence in 1919, was buried there.  A photo online shows the remains of vegetation shrouded walls in the middle of the graveyard, making it appear to be quite old, it once may have been a church yard.  The Tithe Applotment Books actually refer to the place as "Church field of Donohill".  I find it odd there isn't more information available online about the place.  Not even Google Books has much.

     In looking at the old 6 inch OSI map of Churchfield from about 1830, my suspicions about a church yard were confirmed as was the supposition the burial spot was very old.  On this map the grave yard can be seen delineated from the church with the words, "in ruins", next to it.  Even at that early date there was nothing left but remnants of the church.  Above it on the map can be seen St. James' Well, a vestige from pagan times, converted after the coming of Christianity to a sort of shrine to St. James the Apostle.  Pattern day at this well was 27 July, when the faithful gathered there with Mass sometimes being said.  In my mind's eye I can see the O'Dwyer family walking the short distance to the well, gathering there with their neighbors to recite a Gaelic prayer to St. James.

     Of course, without knowing where my fourth-great-grandfather Andrew O'Dwyer was born I can't say this is positively the long lost burial ground of my O'Dwyers though it could well be given it's age and location.  All I know for certain is that Andrew's daughter Alice, my third-great-grandmother, was living in Churchfield in 1824 when she married Cornelius Ryan and that there were other O'Dwyers there as well, Jeremiah, Timothy, and Andrew, as shown in Griffith's Valuation.  Andrew in the Valuation may be Alice's father or her brother Andrew Jr.  The best bet I've found for Andrew Sr. in the earlier Tithe Applotments is an Andrew Dwyer living in Silverhill, about a mile and a half south of Churchfield.  In Churchfield itself, Timothy, Darby (being a variation of Jeremiah), and John Dwyer appear in the Applotment Books.  Perhaps Andrew had left Churchfield to find work nearby, ending up in Silverhill, and Donohill Graveyard, so close, is indeed the right spot?

     

     

What Was the Relationship? In Which a Pugilist Breathes His Last and a Family Disappears

Bridget Hogan Ryan (1834-1902)

     The Hogans; I don't want to call them a thorn in my side, but...  My third-great-grandfather Cornelius Ryan and his son Con Jr., from the Tipperary parish of Anacarty/Donohill, both lie buried in Darby Hogan's family plot at St. Anne's Cemetery in Palmyra, New York.  Why is that?  Cornelius Sr.'s older son Andrew Ryan married a woman named Bridget Hogan from Knockavilla, Tipperary though her father was Thomas Hogan, not Darby who lived far away on the other side of Tipperary.  Was Darby a brother of Thomas?  What was Darby's tie to the Ryan family, was it Bridget's marriage?  I can't say, and so I continue tracking the Hogans looking for that elusive link.  

     I'm currently researching the descendants of Thomas Hogan and Catherine O'Dwyer, parents of several Hogans who left Tipperary and settled in Wayne and Monroe counties in upstate New York.  That much I'm sure of since Bridget's marriage record contained her parent's names.  There's also that naming pattern that confirms it further.  Bridget had a brother named Michael Hogan who was a witness at her marriage to Andrew in Palmyra.  Michael married Mary Dolan and lived close to Bridget and Andrew in Perinton, New York near Palmyra.  Bridget also had a sister, Catherine Hogan, who married fellow Irish immigrant William Slattery at Palmyra.  Their marriage, while cut short by Catherine's untimely death three years later, did produce a son named Timothy born at Palmyra and named for William's father.  Catherine's is the only Irish baptism I've found, (this parish's records don't begin until 1835), and it names Thomas Hogan and Catherine O'Dwyer as her parents with their address as Knockavilla.  There are three others I believe were brothers of Bridget, Michael, and Catherine, though the links are somewhat tenuous.

    The oldest would have been James Hogan who in 1860 was married and living in Galen near Clyde, New York, about twenty miles from Palmyra. There are several indications James was a brother, the first being his only son was named Thomas, as was Bridget's second son, and Michael's first son.  Secondly, a newspaper article noted James' son Thomas worked at a glass factory in Muncie Indiana, the importance of which you will see in just a minute.

     Another probable brother was Peter Hogan who was two names from James in the 1870 census of Galen.  He and James were both railroad workers according to that census which may explain how they wound up in Galen. Peter died in 1875 at about age forty, afterwards his wife Ellen married the widower, Michael Carroll.  Peter's son Thomas died from consumption at his mother's home in the spring of 1902.  His obituary read: "Thomas Hogan, the pugilist who died in Clyde Monday night of consumption, is said to have relatives living in Perinton. Mr. Hogan had been employed for the past year at the Muncie Ind. Glass Works."  The clear implication being, this Thomas and his cousin Thomas both worked in the glass industry in Muncie and the relatives in Perinton, mentioned in the obituary, would have been the deceased's father Peter's two siblings Bridget and Michael.  In one of those strange twists of fate, Michael Hogan in Perinton lost his own son Thomas six months later when the man fell into the Erie Canal there and drowned.

     William Hogan is the individual I have the least information on.  He lived closest to Bridget and Michael and was a baptismal sponsor for one of their children.  William appears in the Palmyra census of 1870 along with his wife Mary and children Thomas and Sarah.  A burial record at St. Anne's in Palmyra memorializes, "Mary Lawler wife of William Hogan", who was buried 30 August 1874.  The 1880 census shows the widower William Hogan still in Palmyra with his children Thomas 25 and Mary 23.  After that year they simply vanish, I've never found another trace of any of them.  Sarah may well have married and changed her last name, but she, William or Thomas should have left some trace.  In years of searching however, I have not found that trace.

    Returning to Catherine Hogan who married William Slattery, it should be noted that after her death William married again.  This time to Sarah Ryan, none other than the daughter of Cornelius Ryan Sr., interred in Darby Hogan's cemetery plot.  And who do you suppose William Slattery's parents were?  Timothy Slattery and Johanna Hogan.  Another Hogan!  As if the four Thomas Hogans weren't enough.  It would seem I have come full circle and ended up where I began.

     The Slattery family is interesting not just for Johanna Hogan, but because it appears they had roots in Knockgorman, Tipperary, part of the very same parish Cornelius Ryan lived in.  I found baptisms for three of the Slattery children in parish registers, Sarah in 1822, Julia in 1825, and Timothy Jr. in 1832.  Timothy Jr. would later turn up near William in Palmyra as a young adult.  The one baptism I didnt find was William's, who married Catherine Hogan and Sarah Ryan. However, after playing with the search engine at Find My Past I came up with the following baptism in 1828 at Anacarty/Donohill;

 "Wm of Tim ??? & Judy Hogan, the address was Knockgorman.  FMP thinks Tim's surname is Mathew, I'm not so sure.  It could just as easily be the letters SL as the letter M beginning that name. The image below shows how the parish priest formed the letters M and the letter S in his abbreviation for Sponsors.  The man was S challenged.  To top it off, one of this William's sponsors was Patt Heffernan -- all the other Slattery children had a Heffernan as their sponsor too.  I'm not ready to rule this out as William's baptism just yet.

     Knockgorman was less than two miles from Churchfield where Cornelius Ryan was living when he married Alice O'Dyer in 1824.  These two families, the Slatterys and Ryans, knew each other in Ireland, but the question remains, did they know Darby fifty miles away in Killeen?