Railway Workers Limerick 1858 circa

[AuntyGene]

Hi

I am trying to find information on  a John Joseph O'Dwyer born in Limmerick about 1840.  He emigrated to America around the time of the potato famine and it is how he got there is the mystery.  We think he sailed from Limmerick or a nearby port, probably working his passage,and got off at Boston?  He worked for the Illinois Central Railroad before enlisting with the Confederates in the Civil War in 1861. He fought in battle such as Shiloh and Kenesaw Mountain. He was taken prisoner and sent to a prisonin Johnson's Island in Ohio. He escaped at the end of the war and fled to Tennessee, where he met and married his wife in 1972 - Eliza Luckett of Milan, Tennessee.

I have a feeling that he may have worked on the railways before he left Ireland as the main station in Limrick was opened in August 1848, as as soon as he arrived in Illinois, he found work on the railway there.
 Are there any records of workers on the Limerick railway line?   I believe the Waterford & Limerick Railway was sold o Great Southern & Western Railway in 1901. 

Has anyone any information on this man, or indeed find him in any railway records either in Limmerick or Illinois.

Many thanks
AuntyGene

[morenae]

LOOK (HISTORY OF IRISH RAIL WAYS IN IRELAND.
IRISH RAILWAY ARCHIVES.

JOHN