The Mother of Gobineta's Children

 

Tracing the descendants of Johanna Falvey's sister might seem like a great way to confirm Johanna's place in the Falvey family—at least by DNA—but there is one drawback to such a plan. That sticking point is Johanna's sister's actual name.

Johanna's sister was baptized as Gobineta, back in their homeland in County Kerry, Ireland. Her February 27, 1830, baptismal record clearly shows her parents as Patrick Falvey and Anna Fleming. Thus, if we can map her connection to descendants who happen to be my husband's DNA matches, that would support the theory of this sisterhood.

There's only one problem with this plan. A name like Gobineta—actually Gobnait—doesn't translate well from the original Irish version to either Latin or English. Thus, it would be no surprise to discover that records of her children might list their mother's name as something other than Gobineta.

Take one son, named Timothy. We'd expect to see his October 7, 1858, baptismal record listing his name in its Latin version, Timotheum. But the Latin was not helpful for his mother's name. In that record, Daniel Cullinane's wife was listed as Debora Falvey, not Gobnait.

But we already knew that. Armed with a name equivalent chart, we've been forewarned to be on the lookout for aliases like Debora or Abigail. So when I followed that one Cullinane son of the next generation to his immigrant home in Boston, I wasn't stumped by the vital records bearing his name. When Timothy Cullinane of Boston decided to marry Margaret McCarthy one cold January day in 1883, it made sense to see his mother's name entered as Deborah. Likewise with his death record, recorded late in 1893 listing his mother as Abbie Falvey.

Timothy Cullinane, son of Gobnait Falvey and Daniel Cullinane, is just one example. In Timothy's case, with his early death, he was predeceased by his only child, a namesake son who died in 1891. As far as I can tell, there will be no DNA matches linked to Timothy's line.

However, Timothy was not the only Falvey descendant to immigrate to Boston. There is apparently another Cullinane brother who also chose that New England port for his move from County Kerry. He, predictably, is also causing problems with verifying his line, not the least of which sticking points is that same particular detail about his mother's name.

I've reached out to some DNA matches who appear to be this second Cullinane son's descendants. Hopefully, on the other side of this weekend, we'll be able to get a fuller picture of this other potential Falvey descendant of the woman with multiple aliases.