Friday Faces From the Past ~ 50 years ago today

50 years ago today, most of these people were together. Ronnie and I were recently married and Jeannie and Mac would soon be engaged.
Jeannie and I were at the Salem Employment Office inquiring about part time jobs. I was enrolled at Glassboro State College part time and would take my first course in January..

I feel like I remember that there was a TV station was on at the Employment Office but maybe it was the radio. We did leave. I was stunned.

That night Ronnie and I had arranged to have our marriage convalidated in the Catholic Church. We had had a small civil ceremony for that reason as Ronnie was not yet Catholic. Checking with the priest he felt we should proceed with that plan. Joe Harrington "stood up" with us ..and my sister Carol maybe? I only remember Joe..

St. James church was mobbed with people praying and lighting candles..rosary beads..black head coverings ( pre Vatican II).. My church was in mourning for one of their own..a Catholic boy..

My family was in mourning for one of their own.. an Irish boy..

Would anything ever be this bad, my own folk felt?

Apparently it would.. 50 years later we are still divided as a country into Catholic and Protestant...Democrat and Republican..Black and White..

50 years later I still cry..and want to scream and throw things... Because of divisiveness that is just as bad and just as ugly.. uglier maybe? I was young then and idealistic..
I am not sure..

Requiescat In Pace Et Lux Perpetua ~ John Kennedy and Ronald Morrison ~ that is what my ain folk said then and would say now..

Thankful Thursday- One Family ~ Carrows of Delmarva and North Carolina

                                                          Carrow House  Bath NC
So very thankful today that after seven years of DNA testing and eleven years of genealogical work we know that  at least one line from the North Carolina Carrows and at least one line from the Delaware Carrows descend from the same male. We are all distant and not so distant cousins. Would we know this without the advent of DNA testing? Quite possibly not as definitively.

I should really say that today I am very thankful that I live in such a time where DNA testing and computer research has become commonplace and affordable. Thankful also that I have been able to afford such a hobby financially and time wise, as I could have been still working. Thanks Jim!

I am enraptured at the serendipity that led Jim and I to North Carolina in retirement where I happened upon the research on our family. Thankful that I found distant cousin Don who took this journey with me. Thankful indeed for the new cousins who are just as thrilled as we are.

Just imagine, a man came from the British Isles very, very, long ago and despite all odds founded a small family that still exists. When John Carrow came in 1643 the Britain that he left was barely past the middle ages to come to a country where  conditions were  primitive and wild. Living conditions were stark at best and abysmal at worst. That he had one or more children who lived to move up and down the eastern seaboard and themselves have families is astounding.

We do not know for sure if John Carrow was joined by brothers or cousins whose names were not registered and if he himself was the patriarch  of all of us. The research suggests that he may have been. We are all grateful for whatever life event led to his journey and now, of course, hope that we will finally be able to figure out from whence he came.

Surely a day to celebrate our family.

                                      Idalia Manor ~ Carrow farm in St.Georges Delaware

Surname Saturday ~ Kirwans of Meath

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday, thanks to a price reduction at Roots Ireland.ie I was able to locate the death certificates for Patrick Kirwan's father Michael and his grandfather Sylvester. They lived in Ladyrath Rathkenny Meath and Moynalty Meath , an unknown county for me.

Patrick Kirwan was my father's Great grandfather who he knew well.. He took Patrick as his confirmation name. Pat, according to my Dad had a wooden leg. I assume this from a runaway wagon accident which cost him his wife and newborn baby in June 1890. He was a liveryman for the town of Swedesboro. Patrick's wife Lizzie Sweeney delivered a daughter, Maggie, prematurely from the anxiety of Pat's runaway accident. Lizzie died a few days after the delivery and Maggie within the month.

Sarah "Sadie" Kirwan was my great grandmother,she was very young when her mother died. Patrick
apparently found another wife Mary Murray, from Carlow Ireland at some point. They have a daughter Katherine born in 1893. I find Mary and Patrick with Sadie, Sylvester and Katie in the 1900 census and Pat and Mary with Sylvester in 1910. Sylvester dies of TB I believe in 1912. At some point after that Mary and Patrick do not seem to live together but continue to state they are married until their deaths.

Pat was immersed in a murder trial on circumstantial evidence in Swedesboro somewhere around 1894. He and a man named Delaney Armstrong were accused of murdering a man named Gans. A body had washed up on the Delaware shoreline which was declared to be his. Kirwan and Armstrong were last in his company and had argued with him. The public defender did not believe the men were guilty but the trail went on.

At the end of the trial, amazingly enough, the actual body of Mr. Gans washed up on the shore. He had drowned. There were no marks on his body, his clothes were identified as were documents on his person. Patrick and Delaney Armstrong were freed.

Mary Kirwan, his wife was at his side during the trial although it was noted that they were legally separated. They reconciled after the trial and apparently lived together until 1910 or so. Patrick's last residence was in New Jersey in 1930 and he dies in 1939 in the State Hospital in Trenton. They are interred together in Montgomery County PA. with Patrick's only son Sylvester.

I suspect that Pat may not have been the ideal husband although I do not know that. Possibly just a few bad breaks, the "luck of the Irish", he might have said.
 

A Friend of Friends Friday ~ Some Eastern North Carolina Records

Records found while searching for other records which may be important to some families. Two different  counties involved.

Parker of Gates County NC.  A Will from 1825

One half Negro Man Jacob
One Negro Woman Ama
One Negro Girl Cate
One Negro Boy Luton (Suton?)
One Negro Girl Edith 

 Dec. 18, 1832 Sold under Order of the Court Abram Parker Decd.
Negro Boy Guy                                                   
Negro  Girl Dhama                                              
Rent Gared ( David?) until Janry. 1834              

          

The Carrow Family of Delmarva and North Carolina ~ A very fine book by Don Carrow

I was very thrilled to be mentioned in Donald Carrow's very well done family book titled
The Carrow Family of James Franklin Carrow of Bath NC  which was sent to the publisher this week.
The Dedication and Acknowledgement  page reads this way "The genealogy herein would not have been possible without the untiring efforts of my wife Jane and my second cousin Bea Latham....
Additional exhaustive study was provided by genealogical researchers Kathy Carrow Ingram and Vern Skinner. Kathy's input, effort, data and interest is priceless and ongoing".

A great deal of information is included in this small document which is a culmination of years of effort. It will be placed in the Brown Library, Washington  and Bath Library, both in North Carolina.

Friend of a Friend Friday - Kent Island Queen Anne County MD

 

Edward Ringgold of Cox's Neck to my dear wife Rebecca my negroes Maria Nichols, Harriet Robinson, James Robinson, Frederick Nichols, Richard Hazzard, Delia Nichols and Harry. It is my will that Maria Nichols and Harriet Robinson shall be free at the death of my dear wife or soon if they reach the age of thirty years and the other negroes bequeathed to her shall be free as they reach the age of thirty excepting Harry who shall be free at the end of the term to which he was sold to me by the executor of William S. Constable.

Item I bequeath to my son John Fletcher Ringgold my negro boy Jacob Hazzard to serve him until the age of thirty years when he shall be free.

Item to my son James B. Ringgold and the lands he possesses I charge the lands pay to my Negro woman Susan Berry the annual sum of twelve dollars. 

Item I give and bequeath to my daughter Mary R. Rasin my negro girl Hannah Robinson until she shall attain the age of thirty years.

Item I give and bequeath my daughter Jane Eliza Tilden my negro woman Ann and her children ( excepting her child Marion) and my negro woman Drusilla Harrison and also my negro boy Wesley until they shall reach the age of thirty.

Item I give and bequeath unto Martha Cummins ( granddaughter) my negro girl Athalia Nicols until the age of thirty.

Item, unto my son John Fletcher Ringgold my negroes John and Emory until the expiration of their servitude.

Item unto my Granddaughter Mary Rebecca Ringgold  my negro girl Sarah Jane until she reaches the age of thirty.

Item I give unto Louisa Ringgold widow of George my negro woman Harriet Hazzard until thirty...

 I give and bequeath unto Elizabeth Smith the sum of one hundred and  thirty dollars and the negro girl Marion daughter of negro Ann until thirty...

Item, I manumit and set free at the end of the year next after my death my negro man Moses Berry and that he be paid ( paraphrasing here) annually the sum of twenty five dollars.
 
Item I will and direct that Susan Berry alias Susan Chase be free at the end of the year following and paid the twelve dollars listed above from the land of my son John Fletcher Ringgold.

Item that my negroes Richard Worrell, Washington Smith, Henry Anderson and May Hazzard shall be free at  the end of the years after next.

Item, I give and bequeath unto my negro woman May Hazzard her female child Emily until she is sixteen when she shall be free.

May 6th, 1854

Afterward: Looking in the 1860 and 1870 census many of these folks are living in and around Chestertown MD

Mappy Monday ~Leckpatrick Tyrone near Donegal

 James Sweeney and Mary Jane Huey are my great great  grandparents who arrive on the Mohongo from Derry in June 1853. Mary Jane's family were Protestant and James was Catholic. They are in Southern New Jersey with their first child in 1855 as farmers in Mannington Salem County.

Where did they marry, as they would have had to have  consent for her to marry in the Catholic Church,  I am told. James Sweeney was very possibly from NewtownStewart or Strabane and they could have easily slipped over the line into Donegal.

Mary Jane's family was Protestant but her Mother Letitia's parents James and Isabella Moorhead were Catholic so perhaps she converted. They purposely came to the Southern NJ area to farm and brought five barrels and a trunk off possessions with them, which for those days was a lot.

The Hueys and the Moorheads ( Muirhead) came to Ireland from Scotland some time before this. Moorheads for sure were living on that same border of Donegal and Tyrone in the 1630s. The English King allowed settlement of Scots to be in charge of the Irish in what was called the Plantation period. I am not sure  where  the Sweeneys although they were not Scots.

Mary Jane and James are buried in St. Mary's Cemetery in Salem New Jersey, both died in 1878. The tombstone emblem suggests  James was a member of the local grange in Salem, probably a founding member.

Their children moved further north into first Oldmans Township and then Centre Square. Their daughter Lizzie Sweeney Kirwan  and her daughter Sadie Kirwan Carrow are buried in Old St. Joseph's Cemetery next to Lizzie's brother James.  Lizzie Kirwan died young after giving birth prematurely after hearing that her husband had suffered a runaway accident. He was driving a team of horses and a load of produce and he lost his leg.  Baby Maggie Kirwan followed her mother to the grave a month later.



                                                           Always  Farmers
                                              Plantation Settlers County Donegal 1630s

Adair, Alexander, Allen x2, Arnett x2, Barkley, Barry, Bauld, Black, Blair, Boyd, Boyle x2, Brisbane, Brown, Bruce, Bryce, Buchanan, Burne, Calwell x2, Campbell x2, Carr x3, Cloggie, Colguhoun x2, Coohoone x2, Crawford, Cunningham x15, Dick, Donnell, Dougal, Dunne x3, Dunsayer, Ekyn, Ewart, Flemming, Forecheade, Fullerton, Fulton, Fyieff, Galt, Flabreth, Filmour, Glass, Glen, Gordon, Grynney, Hall, Hamilton x11, Harper, Henrison, Henry, Homes, Hood, Huggins, Hunter, Hutchins, Johnston, Julius, Kennedy, Kernes, Kilpatrick x2, Knox, Laycock, Leckie, Leitch, Leslie, Lindsay, Lockhard, Lodge, Machell, Machen, Martin, Maxwell, Montgomery, Moore, Moorhead, Murray, McAlison, McAuld, McCamuel, McClairne, McCullough, McErdy, McIlcheny, McIntyre, McKay, McKinney, McKym, McLintagh, McLoran, McMath, Nelson, Nesbitt, Orr, Patterson, Patoun, Patton, Peere (Perry), Pont, Purveyance, Rankin, Ritchie, Robin, Robson, Roger, Sawyer, Scott, Sempell, Semple x4, Simpson, Smelley, Smith x3, Smythe x2, Spence, Stephenson, Stevenson, Stevin, Stewart x4, Sutherland, Teyse (Tees), Thompson, Thomson, Valantyne, Vance, Watson, Wilson, Witherspoon, Wood x2, Young