Hi Shellyesq and Oldohiohome
Hmmm, very interesting about the death record of the John Martin in 1880.
I have built a very extensive family tree around the Martins of Doagh on Ancestry and thought I'd exhausted all the records on irishgenealogy.ie. but I've just checked the death record out and realise that I've never come across that one before.
I do know that in Ireland back in those days, it was common to name a later child after an older sibling who'd died, so it wouldn't be unrealistic for that to have happened with 'Radersburg John'.
Equally, I also know from experience that dates of birth in these situations are very 'flexible' to say the least, certainly in my family from that era!
Incidentally, the other John Martin born in 1880 in Doagh was actually my Dad's father, who's mother was also called Ann (but married to my great grandad, Terence Martin).
Looking around my family tree, there is yet another John Martin of Doagh with a mother called Anne who was married to Frank Martin, but their John was born in 1882.
So, thank you for that - a great find! I'm now going to explore this because it looks like there is a gap amongst his siblings in 1885 for 'Radersburg John' to feasibly have been born then.
Can I also say huge thanks to Oldohiohome for the cutting about "The Club" in Radersburg, owned by Martin & Martin. That is not at all what I was expecting from the brothers - I thought they'd just be working on farms, but it does explain why John's occupation on his US naturalisation petition is given as a 'merchant' - a liquor merchant I guess ..... or maybe The Club was also a saloon of some sort.
This is pure gold in terms of my research because in a town of about 60 people, The Club must have been a prominent business and this may explain why, according to the earlier cutting you sent me, Michael Martin's funeral in 1908 was allegedly the biggest ever seen round those parts!
Maybe it had something to do with the whiskey they sold that guaranteed "no headaches"!!!!
All I can say is, you've opened up some great research avenues for me that I never expected.
Massive thanks again.