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Topics - Alonza0

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1
Ireland / 1851 Irish Census Search Confusion
« on: Monday 05 June 17 20:50 BST (UK)  »
I've hit a snag in my genealogy work, in that I seem to have stumbled across a relative that was either in two places at once, or I've been completely wrong about a branch of my family tree.

My second great-grandfather, Charles McCahill, was from a townland called Drimalost (formerly Drumnalost) in Co. Donegal. I was very fortunate in that I have his family's information from 1851, because his brother, Peter, submitted a search request for the 1851 census return, in which he named his parents as William and Catherine, and scribbled the names and rough ages for all of his siblings in the margin. According to the National Archives, these census searches were usually carried out by people who wanted to collect a pension in Ireland, as the census records were considered to be a reliable proof of age.

Now I'd taken some of those siblings' names and traced them - I thought reliably - to a town in Lancaster Co., Pennsylvania, in the United States. The problem began when I realized that, among those McCahills, now McCalls, in Pennsylvania, there was a Peter too.

This Peter has a death certificate that seems to match what I know about my family in some respects, but not in others:
  • Pennsylvanian Peter also had a father named William, but his mother is given as Mary Thomas. (Some of the other McCalls in the same town listed their parents as William McCall and Catherine Thomas).
  • The birthplace of his parents is given as "Drimloost," but his own birthplace is given as "County Mead."
  • His birth year is given as 1852. US censuses seems to suggest that he may have even thought he was younger, as his birth year was typically listed as anywhere from 1854-8.
Now, either I have been wrong about the Pennsylvania connection, or the Peter in Pennsylvania and the Peter who did the census search in Ireland are the same person. But why would Peter McCall have gone back to Ireland and submitted a census search request, when he didn't need to collect an Irish pension, especially if he thought he hadn't been born in 1851? This would have entailed traveling to Ireland in February at age 63, since the Peter McCahill who requested the census search was staying on Castle Street in Donegal Town with a Mr. James Williamson. By all accounts, he never got the return either, as it seems the clerk wrote that no return had been found.

tl;dr What reason would someone have had to do a search of the 1851 Irish census if they weren't collecting an Irish pension, or even living in Ireland?

2
US Lookup Requests / Newspaper Obituary for Alexander Stockmal
« on: Monday 29 May 17 09:57 BST (UK)  »
I'm looking for a newspaper obituary for Alexander J Stockmal (possibly Stochmal). He's not coming up in any searches, so unfortunately I don't have a link to provide, but I'd like to be sure this isn't a case of the word recognition just not picking him up.

Most news regarding his family was published in the Philadelphia Inquirer, so I imagine that any obituary he had would be there. He died March 10, 1980 and was buried March 14, so I'm looking for something published between those dates. If anyone would be willing to check the obituaries on the off chance that he's listed, I'd be extremely grateful.

3
United States of America / Curious Missing Relative in Pennsylvania
« on: Friday 12 May 17 15:29 BST (UK)  »
I was researching a distance branch of my family tree when I came across a relative who I can only find listed on two censuses, which struck me as very odd, because she has quite a peculiar name - Blossom. I would have thought someone with a name like that would stand out, but I'm not seeing her on any of the searches I've done.

  • Blossom M McCall shows up as an 8 year-old on the 1920 census. It's unclear who her parents are, as she's listed as the granddaughter of Hugh and Augusta McCall.
  • She shows up again on the 1930 census, aged 19. Again, she's listed as Hugh and Augusta's granddaughter (on a separate page here).
Apart from that, I can't find her. I'd like to know what happened to her, but I'd really like to know who her parents were. As far as I can tell, she was probably born out of wedlock to one of Hugh and Augusta's oldest six children given that she would have been born 1911-2. So the options would be:

  • Edith McCall Wilson - born 1885, but married and with other children by 1903, so unlikely.
  • Harry John McCall - born 1888, never married and lived in the same house as Blossom until his death in 1931, but when asked on his WWI draft card if he had any dependents (including children under 12), he wrote "brothers and sisters."
  • Anna McCall - born 1890 and disappeared after the 1910 census. Unsure if died or married.
  • Lillian McCall Griffith - born 1892, but had married and had a daughter by 1914. If she was Blossom's mother, she didn't bring her daughter with her when she married and moved house. She lived quite close to her parents and witnessed her brother's death certificate in 1931, so I can't imagine it was a case of hiding a child from her husband.
  • Margaret (Margie) McCall - born 1895 and died single in 1919 of influenza and epilepsy.
  • George M McCall - born 1896 and lived in the same house as Blossom through 1930, but wrote "no" when asked if he had dependents on his WWI draft card.
The next sibling wasn't born until 1901, so these seem the only possible options. Does anyone have any idea how to narrow down which of these siblings Blossom might have belonged to?

4
United States of America / Cormac McCall in Lancaster Co./Philadelphia
« on: Friday 05 May 17 02:41 BST (UK)  »
I'm trying to connect the dots on a relative named Cormac McCall who immigrated to the United States from Co. Donegal, Ireland. Here's what I know:

  • 1879 - He is born and listed as Cormac McCahil. He is the only person with any variation of this name on record on IrishGenealogy that I can find.
  • 1901 - Living in Ireland as the oldest son of a large family, his name is given as "Cormick Mc Cahill." His age is given as 2 years younger than he really is. He is the only variation of this name listed in the county.
  • 1909 - Cormac travels from Londonderry, Ireland to the U.S. with several family members/neighbors in tow. At this point, he says he's lived in the U.S. since 1905 and gives his last residence as Sansom St., Philadelphia. One assumes he traveled to Ireland and back to help his friends and family make the trip.
  • 1920 & 30 - Cormac revises his immigration year to 1904 on both censuses. He claims to have naturalized. He also ages himself down, first 2 years, then 12.
Now I've been searching around trying to find his initial immigration documentation and I came up with another immigration record from November 1904 for a "Cormack McCahill." This Cormac only says "Donegal" as his place or origin, which isn't very helpful, but I think there's a lot of circumstantial evidence suggesting he's a match:

  • It's another trip from Londonderry to New York, like his 1909 trip.
  • The timing is 1904, like the censuses say, but quite close to 1905, as this trip was November.
  • Ancestry transcribes the age here as 73, but it appears to be a 23 in reality. (Several other 2's on the page are similarly sloppy.) This is two years younger than Cormac's actual age, but the 1901 and 1920 censuses also put him as two years younger.
  • IrishGenealogy and the 1901 Census suggest there weren't any other Cormac McCahills in Donegal besides him.
  • He says he's going to stay with an Uncle Cormick McCall in Columbia, Pennsylvania. I know that he would have had an uncle named Cormac.
  • There were only two Cormac McCalls in Columbia that I can find, a father and son who lived at 531 Union Street, slightly further down from the 236 Union Street that this Cormac intended to visit. The fact that there are only two suggests that the nephew who immigrated there didn't stay.
  • The Cormick McCall in Columbia's parents were named William and C Thomas. My Cormac's grandparents were "William and Catherine."
  • A Hugh McCall who lived in Columbia, PA for a time listed his parents as "William McCall and Catherine Thomas," which suggests "C Thomas" was Catherine. My Cormac would have had an uncle named Hugh, born around 1836. This Hugh was born 1839. This Hugh also was from "Mt Charles, Donegal," which is the largest town near where my Cormac was from.
  • The Cormick McCall in Columbia was born in 1828, which matches the "abt 1829" birthdate for my Cormac's uncle.
  • The Cormick McCall in Columbia died in 1906, which might explain why my Cormac ended up in Philadelphia (where I know his mother's brother lived).

Now here's the problem - the Cormick in Columbia has an extensive family, many of whom use Ancestry. There are 11 trees that match. None of them mention my Cormac. Three of them give him quite different siblings than the ones he'd have to have to be my Cormac's uncle. Two of them list him as from an entirely different part of Co. Donegal. Most of them list each other as sources of information and I can't for the life of me find where they would have gotten this information.

I'd like to be able to declare that I've made a match, but the number of people who say otherwise makes me hesitate, especially given that my evidence is circumstantial. Does anyone have any thoughts on other ways I might confirm that the Cormac McCall that immigrated in 1904 to live with his uncle in Columbia is the same as mine?

tl;dr Part of me in concerned the evidence I've built isn't as strong as I think it is when viewed from outside eyes. What do you all think? Can you think of anything I might be missing?

5
US Lookup Requests / Patrick Sweeney in Philadelphia
« on: Sunday 23 April 17 13:28 BST (UK)  »
    I'm looking for a Patrick Sweeney. He's mentioned on a gg aunt Catherine (Cassie) McCahill's immigration papers as being the person she's going to reside with (uncle). I assume he's the younger brother of her mother, Anne Sweeney, but I can't find anything mentioning parents or relatives for him.

    Here's what I know.
    • 1905 - Cassie McCahill immigrates to the United States and mentions "Uncle Pat Sweeney, Brandywine 81, Phila" as her destination.
    • 1905 - a Patk Sweeney, laborer, is listed as living at 3737 Brandywine.
    • 1910 - A Patrick J Sweeney still lives at 3737 Brandywine, with a wife, Mary. He's was born about 1873, which is a significant difference from Cassie McCahill's mother, who would have been born around 1848. It says he immigrated in 1895 and has naturalization papers.
    • 1918 - A Patrick Joseph Sweeney registers for the draft with that address, born 1872, but he's listed as "native born," not naturalized. His wife is still listed as Mary.
    • 1920 - A Patrick and Mary Sweeney are now at 3731 Brandywine, and Patrick's back to being a naturalized citizen, immigrated 1893.
    • 1923 - A Mary Sweeney, wife of Patrick, passes away. She's mentioned as being from Mount Charles, Co. Donegal, where Cassie McCahill's family is from.
    • 1927 - A Patrick Sweeney dies. Not much information is given, except for a wife named Mary and a birth year around the right time. The witness' address is a few blocks from the Sweeneys on Brandywine.
    • 1927 - This Patrick is given an obituary in the paper, again, without much info.

    I'm not sure that these are all the right Patrick, given how much the information fluctuates, but I'd love to know. If anyone can give me any help, I'd much appreciate it. Ultimately, I'm trying to connect this Patrick to one of Cassie McCahill's parents. Her mother's maiden name was Sweeney, so it seems most likely that he's her maternal uncle, though I don't know much about that family except that they're from Co. Donegal, Ireland. The other possibility is that he's the husband of one of her father's sisters - either Mary (b. 1842) or Sarah (b. 1831), though it seems unlikely.

    If anyone could track down his immigration info (1893-5) or marriage info (1895-ish) or anything at all with a parent's name, I'd be extremely grateful.

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