It was sometime before 1860 when Anna Flanagan Malloy arrived in Chicago from her homeland in County Limerick, Ireland. I'm not sure how she got there, or even why she chose Chicago, but there she was in the 1860 census to let me know that at least she made it.
Along with her teenaged daughter Catherine, Anna Malloy resided with a forty year old Irishman named William Flanagan, for that time period, a scandalous thought—until you realize that William was Anna's own brother.
It was William, confirmed bachelor to his dying day, who years ago gifted me with my first clue about tracing the Flanagan line. Found in an old Chicago cemetery, the monument erected to his memory proudly declared that he was a "native of Parish Ballygran" in County Limerick, Ireland.
Parish "Ballygran," as it turned out, was actually Parish Ballyagran, lying toward the southern border of County Limerick, just above County Cork. That discovery, along with further information linking William to a niece, Johanna Flanagan Lee, brought my Flanagan count in Chicago up to four people: William, his sister Anna, her daughter Catherine, and his other niece Johanna.
There was, however, at least one other Flanagan family member in Chicago. One may have been Johanna's own father, whom I have yet to identify. Whether that father was one and the same with Edward Flanagan, whose name has popped up as I've worked on this line over the years, I can't yet say. However, I'm convinced it's time to use the network-building capabilities available at Ancestry.com to explore just who Edward was, and whether we can find anything more that would link the right Edward Flanagan to this line.
After all, there were a lot of Flanagans in Chicago back then. Hopefully, sorting them all out will help us find the right one for this family.
No comments:
Post a Comment