But Where in Ireland? Answer Buried in Records

In 2018 I traveled to Belgium to attend a friend's wedding. Afterwards, my cousin Peter and I spend 10 days driving around Ireland and Northern Ireland. Peter and I share Irish ancestors but we also have Irish ancestors on other branches of our separate family trees.

I loved Ireland. I especially loved the natural beauty of Northern Ireland. Being there did somehow make me feel closer to my Irish ancestors even though, like many Americans with Irish ancestry, I don't know exactly where most of my Irish ancestors were from. Once most immigrants arrived in the U.S. they didn't identify themselves by the town they came from, just the country.

On my paternal grandmother's side I know my great-great grandmother, Annette Hinch-Henry came from Barnamelia and Hackettstown, in County Wicklow. Also on dad's side, I know my Hughes came from Liscolman, Clonmore, again, in County Wicklow and my Grays came from County Cavan. 

My mom's side is more elusive and they suffer from very common Irish surnames; Joyce, Kelley, O'Neill, and Fay. Their U.S. records just record their place of birth as Ireland. No towns, no counties, just Ireland. Even if I may not have been in my ancestors' exact footsteps, I felt very at home in Ireland.

Years later, in 2021, suffering from the wanderlust caused by the Covid-19 world health crisis, I set about visiting the graves of my direct ancestors in this sort of cemetery marathon on which I dragged my cousin Peter. Actually for one cemetery visit I dragged both Cousin Peter and Cousin Ashlee all the way to Dayton, Ohio. I wrote about that adventure in this blog post: https://diggingupthedirtonmydeadpeople.blogspot.com/2021/06/third-great-grandpa-john-joyce-dayton.html 

Prior to that visit to the grave of my third great grandfather, John A. Joyce, I ordered his military pension file from the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Washington D.C. In fact, I ordered the file on April 22, 2021. I made that trip to Dayton in June 2021. In November 2021 I finally received John's file; a 89 page pdf related to his military service as a First Class Boy in the U.S. Navy during the Mexican-American War. It took more than 6 months to obtain the file.

Now if you are like me, you don't know much about the Mexican-American War; but you see that word Navy and you feel all queasy - sea sickness sets in, right? It does for me. I have so many seafaring souls in my gene pool but any body of water makes me a little green. Ugh, I can't with the boats, people!

Anyway, John was in the Navy. He enlisted January 19, 1846. 1846!! His whole military service was a surprise to me really but I did not expect him to be in the U.S. before the potato famine.

Ireland suffered the famine between 1845 and 1852. It was a period of starvation, disease, death, and immense emigration. The poor were leaving Ireland in droves for America where they had the hope of not starving to death. Often Americans refer to their Irish immigrants who came during that period as Famine Irish. John enlisting in U.S. Navy in January 1846, that was pretty early on in the Great Famine, so it's likely my Joyces were pre-Famine Irish immigrants; that they arrived in the U.S. before 1845. 

Another great surprise is that John enlisted in the Navy in Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia! My people are all New Yorkers. Philadelphia? Really? So this has put me on the path of searching for John, and perhaps his parents, yet unknown to me, immigrating through Philadelphia rather than New York. We'll see if I can find anything now that I have that lead.

The most amazing discovery in John's pension file, though, was the name of the county in Ireland where he was born. Yup! On page 24 of the 89 page pdf, at the bottom of the page it states "...born at ___, in the County of Armath, and State of Ireland..." Now Armath has to be County Armagh because there is no Armath. 

County Armagh is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. I don't think Peter and I drove through Armagh though. The closest we would have gotten would probably have been Banbridge on route between Belfast and Dublin. Guess I gotta go back!

Thank you, Officer Heney

The headline of the Brooklyn Daily Times from Monday, December 22, 1924 reads,"16 RESCUED, HERO COP OVERCOME IN SEVENTH AV. FIRE. Patrolman Heney Collapses After Turning in Alarm and Rousing Tenants. 7 CANARIES SMOTHERED. Family of Four Awakened by Fireman, Escape in Night Clothes by Ladder"

Three of the tenants rescued by Patrolman Joseph Heney were my great-great aunts and uncle; Gertrude Joyce-Sheridan (February 7, 1863 - April 21, 1934), George Joyce (November 30, 1854 - March 6, 1931), and Mary Isabelle Joyce (June 1, 1861 - January 24, 1940). They were three of my great-great grandmother, Agnes C. Joyce-Fay's four siblings.

In the image below I have highlighted where my family members' names appear. 

The article reads as follows:

Sixteen persons were rescued during the cold early hours of today when fire in the basement of the three-story brick building at 89-90 seventh avenue sent clouds of heavy smoke billowing through the structure. Fireman Joseph Denato, of Truck 105, standing at the top of a thirty-foot ladder, awakened Gustav Burkhardt, his wife and two children when he smashed a window in their apartment with his axe. In their night clothes, except for coats. Mrs. Burkhardt, her husband and their children, Henry, 20 and Mildred, 16, went down the ladder to the street.

Previous to this, Patrolman Joseph Heney, after discovering the fire and sending an alarm, rushed through the hallways on the second and third floors, awakening occupants of apartments and helping them to the street those he aroused were James Seayth, his wife, and their sons, Kenneth, 17, and Alexander, 15, asleep on the third floor; Charles White, Mrs. White, their daughters, Catherine and Dorothea, and their son Charles, and the occupants of an opposite apartment, Mrs. Gertrude Sheridan, her brother, George Joyce, aged 70, and their sister Mary, 61.

Heney collapsed after every one was out, and was relieved from duty after having been restored by an ambulance surgeon.

Seven canaries were smothered in the Seayth apartment. Mrs. White brought out her pet canary, but when she slipped on the sidewalk, the bottom dropped from the cage and "Pete" fell into the freezing water from hose lines. Mrs. White kept him warm in her hands thereafter.

The women from the burning building were put into the heated taxicab of Louis Kirsch, of 424 Albany avenue, where they remained until arrangements were made to take them into neighbors' homes.

The fire was confined to the basement and the stationary store of Samuel Weiss. A third alarm was sent as a precautionary measure.

The news was picked up in several other newspapers of the day. I have chosen to share this one because it has a photo of the officer who risked his life to save the tenants of that building, including my family.

There are not many descendants of my third great grandparents, John Aloysius Joyce (February 11, 1829 - September 30, 1910) and Mary Ann O'Neill-Joyce (about 1829 - January 11, 1911). They had 5 children, George, John (about 1857 - February 27, 1896), Mary, Gertrude, and Agnes (my great-great grandmother). Three of them were present at this fire. John had passed many years before this event. There are no records of George, John, or Mary ever marrying. Gertrude had no children. It was only my great-great grandmother who had any offspring; eight to be exact. Although George, Mary, and Gertrude were all considered elderly at the time, 70, 63, and 61 respectively, I cannot imagine what it would have been like for Agnes to lose all 3 of her living siblings at one time had Office Heney not saved them from the blaze.

Moved by this patrolman's efforts, I researched him a bit and reached out to a descendant of his that I found researching the family on Ancestry. I haven't heard back from Officer Heney's grandson yet but I hope he'll respond. It is not often one finds a photo of a relative in the newspapers, and certainly not one attached to such a heroic deed.

52 Ancestors Challenge Week 5: "Branching Out" - Great-great grandparents Michael & Agnes Fay

For the last few years I have been working a lot with genetic genealogy. Mainly helping people find their biological parent or parents. In the summer of 2020 I decided I would dive more deeply into my own AncestryDNA results. My goal was to place 100 of my matches into my family tree. In order to do that, I most certainly had to expand my family tree; branch out as it were. I'll explain a little bit about how I did that.

Last week, though, I received an Ancestry message from a DNA match suggesting we might be 2nd or 3rd cousins based on what AncestryDNA suggested. Well, I already had built Cousin Lori in my tree and was able to quickly say, "Oh, we're 2nd cousins once removed on my mother's side." I Love it!

Ideally, Step 1: Make a fleshy tree! 

I really think it is best to do your DNA testing after you have developed a really fleshed out family tree. Get back at least to a few great-great grandparents and expand the tree by including everything you can find on your direct ancestors' siblings and their offspring. Make a fleshy tree!

I do realize though that it is not always the order in which genetic genealogy research comes into play. For example, I had a friend who had a good fleshy tree. He took an AncestryDNA test and linked it to his tree. And oddly, none of his matches popped up in ThruLines. 

ThruLines is a feature of AncestryDNA that shows you how you may be related to your DNA matches. It is based on information from your DNA matches' family trees. Now if you have been doing genealogy research for sometime you know how shitty some family trees can be. Lots of "researchers" just copy information from other people's trees without vetting the information themselves and backing it up with documentation. In short, you can't trust ThruLines. It might not place your DNA matches in the right place - - BUT once you link your DNA to your tree, ThruLines should recognize some of your direct ancestors in the trees (even shitty trees) of some of your DNA matches. For my friend it did not.

I had to break it to him that he was adopted. 48 years-old and the thought never crossed his mind. That is when genetic genealogy comes to play a bigger role. For most of us though, we aren't adopted and our fathers are our biological fathers. Thus, once you link your AncestryDNA results to your fleshy tree, ThruLines will show how some of your matches may be connected to you. If it doesn't, hate to break it to you but you're probably adopted or you have some bad research going on in your tree.

I generally, I did not use ThruLines to get my 100 matches in my tree though.

Step 2: Look at your match list.

That ethnicity pie chart is junk science if you ask me. It's interesting, sure, but it's not going to tell you who your great-great-great grandparents were or where they lived. I wish people would stop caring about estimates so much. Sure busted fender, need a kitchen remodeled, want to know how long the wait will be for dinner, go get all the estimates you want. Genealogy isn't an estimate.

And ThruLines I already discussed. 

You want to figure out who you have in common with each of your matches!

I am fortunate to have a lot of known family members who have tested through AncestryDNA. Let me count... 43! 43 of my DNA matches on Ancestry are people that I have either spoken to face-to-face in-person during my lifetime or conducted online genealogy research with and expected to see in my DNA results. That's a lot. Then again though, it is a big family.

When you open your match list, Ancestry now asks you if you know the person. You want to fill that out if you can.

Step 3: Link the known family members into your tree!

You should know almost everyone in the following groups: Parent/Child, Full Siblings, and Close Family. 

Towards the bottom of the Close Family group there might be a few people you don't know; typically some cousins of your parents or some second cousins wind up there. Second cousins are people with whom you have the same great grandparents in common. A majority of your Parent/Child, Full Siblings, and Close Family should already be in your fleshy tree. If not, maybe your tree isn't really that fleshy. Go flesh it up! Or maybe we need to have that heart-to-heart.

When you click on the name of a match in the list, it opens their DNA profile.

Next to their name you'll see a symbol which to me looks like the face of the Man in the Moon; a circle with a little pedigree shaped Y and a plus sign. Like this: 

Right? Looks like the Man in the Moon's face, doesn't it? Well, that is what I see. Anyway...

Once you click on that, a panel will open to the right and you can search for the person in your tree. If they are in your tree, it will link the match to the tree. 

Done!

Wait! What about the other 57 people that I worked into my tree that I didn't know in real life??

Well - - - 

This is when the work starts!

Step 4: Look at their linked and unlinked trees.

Sometimes Ancestry will show you that you and your match have a common ancestor in your respective trees. That will look like this:

Examine their trees. Build their line down into your tree from the ancestor you have in common down to the person you match to. Making sure you review their connected documents, etc. Build them right in. THEN you can use that "Man in the Moon"-tool and connect that match to your tree.

That technique added about another 30 linked DNA matches.

The remaining 27 to 30, you ask. Well about a dozen or so had unlinked trees that or "unavailable" trees. It took a few more clicks then to open their trees and look around for our possible common ancestors.

The additional dozen required much more work to link them to my tree. I had to apply the Leeds Method, look at what shared matches we had, email some of them, snoop for them on social media, etc. I used a bunch of techniques but you can do this. YES you can!

AGAIN, Branch out! 

Explore the siblings of your direct ancestors through documentation. Add them into your tree.

So, when my 2nd cousins once removed on my mother's side reached out to me because we had a DNA match - - remember her, back in paragraph 2 - - Cousin Lori - - she was already in my tree because I "branched out." 

Based on her Ancestry tree, which was not linked to her DNA, I could see exactly who we had in common; Michael Fay (October 1852-  13 January 1915) & Agnes Joyce-Fay (12 August 1865 - 12 December 1933), my great-great grandparents.

The Family of Michael & Agnes Fay

Michael Fay, my great great grandfather, was born in Saugerties, New York in October 1852 to Lawrence Fay and Bridget Kelly (or Kelley)-Fay who were both born in Ireland. Based on census records and records from St. Mary of the Snows Roman Catholic Church in Saugerties, New York, I believe that Lawrence and Bridget had 7 other children after Michael from about 1854 to 1869: Thomas, James, John, Martha, Joseph, Anne, and Lawrence J.

Agnes Joyce-Fay, Michael's wife and my great great grandmother, was the daughter of John Aloysius Joyce (11 February 1829 - 30 September 1910) and Mary Ann O’Neil-Joyce (about 1829 - 11 January 1911), again, both of whom were born in Ireland. Agnes was the youngest of their five Joyce children. Her four older siblings were named James, John, Mary, and Gertrude; all born between 1854 and 1863. 

Michael and Agnes Joyce-Fay had six children of their own: Leo (28 January 1888 – 27 January 1819), Anna (3 February 1889 – 5 February 1819), James (my great grandfather - 11 February 1893 - 1 October 1964), Mary Ann (17 June 1897 – 1965), George (7 October 1898 – 6 April 1976), and Agnes (April 1900 – unknown). 

This is what I mean by "branching out" and making a "fleshy tree". I had all these siblings in my tree when Cousin Lori contacted me. I descend from Michael and Agnes's son, James. Cousin Lori descends from their son George. I had already had documents attached to George including his marriage record and census records identifying his children. Years before I had already communicated with other cousins from this line. So although I don't "know" Cousin Lori, she was already in my tree thanks to that DNA match and good old fashion genealogy research through documentation.

Genealogy Lesson #21: Vital Records: A Different Death Index

In the last lesson, posted on Tuesday, April 28, 2020, we moved from searching the NYC Municipal Death Records Index on the German Genealogy Group (GGG) website to the NYC Municipal Death Records Index provided by FamilySearch.org.

If you were able to find the death of my 3rd great aunt, Gertrude Joyce-Sheridan (born circa 1865 - died 1934) in the FamilySearch index, you can see their index provide much more detail about the death certificate. FamilySearch’s index provides the following data:

Gertrude M. Sheridan
New York, New York City Municipal Deaths, 1795-1949

Name: Gertrude M. Sheridan

Event Type: Death

Event Date: 21 Apr 1934

Event Place: New York City, Queens, New York, United States

Address: 905-Troy Ave

Residence Place: B'klyn, N.Y.

Gender:Female

Age:70

Marital Status: Married

Race: White

Occupation: Domestic

Birth Year (Estimated): 1864

Birthplace: U. S. A.

Burial Date: 24 Apr 1934

Cemetery: Calvary Cemetery

Father's Name: John Joyce

Father's Birthplace: U. S. A.

Mother's Name: Mary O'Neil

Mother's Birthplace: Ireland



These are details taken from the actual death record. The name of her parents and thus Gertrude’s maiden name confirms that this indeed is MY Gertrude Sheridan.

This death certificate could now be ordered if one desired or one could got to their local Family History Center and view an image of the document for free.

It is good to also see the actual document because sometimes there are details that are not in the index, such as the cause of death, which might be of use or interest to the researcher.

You can certainly see though that not all indexes are built the same. Some of you might wonder why then anyone would look at this New York City Municipal Deaths Index anywhere other than FamilySearch. In short, human error. That is to say that sometimes there are records that make it into one index and not the other. 

When doing genealogy research you want to make sure you look everywhere possible and thus conduct what is known as an exhaustive search. It should be noted that there is also an index for New York City Municipal Death Records on Ancestry.com if you have access to that database.

Before moving on to marriage records, in the next lesson I will write about death records outside of New York City.

John Joyce, Is That You?

About 10 years ago I finished collecting the names of all my third great grandparents of which there are 32. All of us have 32 great grandparents but it's an accomplishment to be able to name them all. I can't say that I know all their dates of birth and death though. One in particular has always plagued me; John A. Joyce. 

He was the great grandfather of my maternal grandmother; Marilyn Irene Fay-Gardner. Grandma Marilyn died before I was born so I had very little reference for researching this branch of my family. In fact, my mother's whole side of the tree has proven to be quite challenging given the nature of the relationships among the living relatives. No one speaks to each other. In any case...

I knew virtually nothing about 3rd Great Grandpa John. Based on U.S. Census records I know he was born in Ireland in about 1828 or 1829 but I didn't know when, or where, or who his parents were - still don't know any of that. I knew he married Mary Ann O'Neill but I don't know when or where. And obviously he's dead but I can't find a death certificate or burial record for him which is the most befuddling part. 

My Joyces have a huge headstone in Calvary Cemetery in Queens, New York. A big flashy thing! No branch of my family has big flashy headstones. Most of them don't have headstone at all. I am not of a wealthy stock. But here it is; a big shiny, showy headstone.

Years ago I wrote to Calvary and purchased what they call the Interment List; basically a list of every person buried in a single family plot. The cost of such a record begins at $120 and increases by $10 for every additional name. If you have a family plot with 10 bodies interred in it that will run you $210 for that list. Pricey if you ask me. I mean, I come from people who couldn't afford headstones, you think I have $210 laying around for lists? I don't! So I saved up. Yes, yes I did. And when I got the lists I was stunned to learn John A. Joyce bought the plot but he's not buried in it. I then combed the NYC Death Index for records that might possibly be him but nothing that jived. So I gave up.

Recently though I have been meditating on the fact that I tell my genealogy students to forget everything you think you know. Maybe he didn't die in NYC. Maybe there were no remains. Maybe he died in some awful fiery blaze. Or maybe he dies in another state and they never brought his body back to NY. Hmm. Maybe they spent all they had left on that flashy freakin' headstone.

Last night while poking through some Ancestry.com hints there was a records for a John A. Joyce in a U.S. National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers. Actually, there are many of them all for the same man. A careful read revealed that he was married to a Mary Ann Joyce who resided at 763 9th Ave. in New York City. 

1910 Census

That's her!

The above image of the 1910 census clearly showed my John Joyce, his wife Mary Ann, son George, and daughter Mary J, all living at 763 9th Ave. in Manhattan. 

My 3rd great grandmother, Mary Ann O'Neill-Joyce, died on January 11, 1911. Her death certificate listed her as married, as opposed to widowed so I assumed that she pre-deceased John. But maybe not...

According to the military records for John he died on September 30, 1910 in Dayton, Ohio; just months before his wife. 

I am still trying to corroborate this information to confirm that is my John Joyce but that address makes for pretty solid evidence in which case, this is my 3rd great grandpa's headstone...

John Joyce, Where Are You?

Common names are so frustrating to research. My John Joyce is killing me. If he weren't already long dead I might kill him myself. Grrr. 

Where are you buried great-great-great grandpa o' mine?

I can't find a death certificate for him in the NY City Municipal Archives records. There are John Joyces, many of them which is the problem but maybe he didn't die in the City of New York even though all his children were born and died in the city.
 
His wife, Mary Ann O'Neill-Joyce is buried in Calvary Cemetery. I suspect John is interred there...somewhere. I went through the hassle and expense of ordering the list of plot interment. Mary Ann is one of seven people interred in one family plot which means I paid $120; $90 for the first name and $5 for each additional name. I did this with the hope that John was along side of her and that it would lead me to his death certificate. But nope! No, John.

This investment is not a total lose, of course. I did receive a list of six other individuals buried with Mary Ann. This included four of her six children and two grandchildren. 

The four children buried with her are:

• John A. Joyce Jr. who died at age 38 on February 27, 1896.
• George Joyce who died at age 76 on March 6, 1931.
• Gertrude Joyce-Sheridan who died at age 70 on April 21, 1934.
• Mary J. Joyce who died at age 79 on January 24, 1940.

The two grandkids were the children of my great-great grandparents, Michael Fay and Agnes Joyce-Fay. They were two children that I knew nothing about and would not have known even existed if I depended on census records alone. They were:

• John Lawrence Fay who died at 2 months old on September 21, 1894.
• Michael Fay who died at 1 year old on July 22, 1897.  

The next time I have the chance to visit the NYC Municipal Archives I will look at the death certificates for these family members as I am curious to see their causes of death. Cause of death is one of the things not indexed on any list of NYC death certificates.

But again, when did John die and where the heck is he buried?