Eight Family Stories by Tom O’Connor

1. PEI ANCESTORS [included] Page 2

An overview of the several of my surnames of Prince Edward Island

2. PETER HERON/AHEARN, MARINER Page 24

First three generations and where they fit in my family history;

3. DESCENDANTS OF PATRICK MACKIE & MARY MYERS Page 20

What I have found so far of Pat I, Pat II and Pat III and their families

4. PADDY AND LIZA JANE MACKIE’S FAMILY Page 39

More anecdotal story of my grandparents and life in Tignish

5. FAMILY OF THOMAS O’CONNOR&CATHERINE MACKIE Page 43

Our life in Holbrook, Mass and beyond

6. TERRENCE FARRELL AND ELLEN CONDON Page 47

Traces my wife mother, Ceclia (Farrell) Schultz’ forebears

7. Edited; SIR CHARLES DALTON, FOXMAN origin of; Allan Rankin Page 50

8. TRAVELS OF THE LANGNERS as told by Alex Page 63

Plus A brief summary of Poland’s history during this time; from Encarta 99

Link to Web Page

http://www.familytreemaker.com/users/o/c/o/Thomas-P-Oconnor/

SURNAMES of interest of Thomas P O’Connor;

(O’)CONNOR, CRAWFORD Worcester, MA[1850],

FLAHERTY, MCCAFFREY Pawtucket, RI[1870] ,

O’CONNOR Cascumpec[1826],

MACKIE/MACKEY, Tryon [1840],

WHELAN, Kildare[1830],

AHEARN,HERON, HEARN, Malpeque[1780] ,

DALTON & MCCARTHY, Tignish[1830] &

KINCH Cascumpec, PEI[1826],

of Margaret (Schultz) O’Connor;

FARRELL, LANNIGAN, O’CONNOR, MURPHY, [1821] Sturgeon,

SCHULTZ, STEINER and SCHMIDT of Lubianki, Vyschchi, (Wyzsze) Zbarazh,

Ternopil, Galicia, Ukraine.

Thomas P. O’Connor 395 Liberty St Braintree, MA 02184

tpoc@beld.net

PEI

ANCESTORS

of:

Thomas P. O’Connor

Including the surnames:

Mackie, Kinch, Whelan, Heron/Ahearn, Dalton, MacDonald, McCarthy, O’Connor, O’Hara and others

Since the early Seventies when I first saw the reprint of Meacham’s 1880 Atlas I have been working on the story of my maternal ancestors, most of who arrived on PEI in the early 1800’s; some first in Tryon, Lot 28 and many “up West,” but most of them finally settled in or near Kildare, Lot 3, Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada. At first I called it a “genealogy” but as I became more familiar with what that term meant it became clear that using true genealogical standards would limit the story to types of proof that would require leaving out interesting parts that seemed clearly true but were based on circumstantial evidence. Accordingly, I’ll call it a “family history story” and try to make reasonable arguments to justify any parts for which I don’t have original source documentation. I hope readers will not be too critical of some of my broader leaps of faith.

One of the first steps I took was to collect as much vital record data as possible and input it on a computer Filer Program with eight data fields. This allowed me to sort the information in several different ways and thereby detect reasonable relationships that would not otherwise be evident, among persons on different parts of the Island. Unfortunately it required the use of common spelling of surnames that were spelled in a variety of ways in the records. For the most part I have retained that common spelling throughout this narrative, but have tried to justify my assumptions that the different names were those of the same family.

The amount of space devoted to each name, except “Mackie” does not reflect my consideration of their importance, but simply the amount of data I could find out about them. I have written more about the Mackies in my unpublished, Some Descendants of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers, but have found little about the Myers’, for example and much about others. The Ahearn name is not that close to me genetically, Ann Isabel Ahearn [nee MacDonald] was my great great grandmother, but I have written a lot about the Ahearns because I found a lot; and because theirs is an interesting story. In fact the searching for information, analyzing it and theorizing about it to build a reasonable story about my forebears is the most interesting and enjoyable part of this whole endeavor.

The story starts with a family chart of my PEI Ancestors on the next page that is an end product, to this point.

Overview

My mother, Catherine (Mackie) O’Connor was born on, May 5, 1886 of Patrick Mackie (6) (1855-1945) and Eliza Jane Kinch (7) (1857-1921.) Patrick’s father, Patrick (1821-1870) and his paternal grandparents, Patrick and Mary Myers were born in Ireland (prior to 1781 according to the 1841 census.) His mother, Catherine Whelan (1829-1899) and grandmother, Ann Isabella Ahearn (1806- <1881) were both born on PEI. Catherine’s father, James Whelan was born about 1801 in Ireland. Ann Isabella’s father, Joseph Ahearn was born, if my theories are correct about 1780 on PEI, and her mother, Mary MacDonald was probably one of the group of Scotch settlers from the Island of Barra that settled at Grand River, Lot 14 about 1790.

Catherine’s maternal grandparents, Lawrence Kinch (1830-1868) and Catherine Dalton (1832-1880’s) were both born on PEI. Lawrence’s parents, William Kinch (1806-1851) and wife, Margaret O’Connor (1811-1846) were probably born in Ireland. There is a good possibility that Michael O’Connor and Catherine O’Hara of County Wexford were her parents. Catherine’s parents, Patrick Dalton and Margaret McCarthy emigrated from County Kerry, Ireland. Margaret immigrated with her father John McCarthy and probably with her husband or husband to be Patrick Dalton in 1822.

The summary above was based on information from a variety of sources collected over twenty years and now in a computer file which contains over 5,500 names with records of birth, deaths, baptisms, marriages and census listings. In addition I have based some of it on anecdotal information and calculated guesses, such as similar names of children in the same location on cadastral maps of different dates. In the following breakdown by surname I will try to justify any relationships claimed for which I don’t have primary evidence.

MACKIE Surname

Patrick Mackie, “Paddy” to us. In addition to running a large farm in St..Roche, PEI skippered the schooner, Maggie Macbeth that sailed primarily between Tignish Harbor and Chatham or New Castle, New Brunswick, on the Miramichi River. (Incidentally “Mackie” was most often spelled Mackey in those days. Edward MacLysaght in his book, The Surnames of Ireland says that it is not a “Mac” name at all but an “O” name and the O’Mackeys [O’Macdha]) stem from Ballymackey, Tipperary.

I had assumed that, like many others on the western end of the Island (and since Paddy sailed there) the Mackies had immigrated via the Miramichi River area of New Brunswick. As a result much of my early searching for his forebears was fruitlessly pursued in that province.

[I describe the descendants of Paddy Mackie and L’Jane more fully in an article which is included in My Eight Family Stories.]

When Fr. Claude Shea, Pastor of St. Simon and St. Jude parish in Tignish correctly interpreted the surname of Bridget as, “Shreenan” rather than, “Schurman” as I had read it for Patrick’s (12) first wife it opened new doors for me. He informed me that “Shreenan” was a “Monaghan” name and that a large group of Irish from County Monaghan had settled in the Kelly’s Cross-area in the 1840’s so my search took a new direction.

Records in the St Dunstans Basilica at Charlottetown show that Fr. Malachy Reynolds officiated at the marriage of Patrick Mackie and Bridget Shreenan in 1841. Fr Reynolds didn’t list the names of parents of the couple or location of the wedding but I feel certain that this Patrick was the son of another Patrick Mackie listed on the 1841 census of Lot 28, near the Monaghan settlers. He lived in Tryon with a family of six, two of whom were over sixty years old (Pat & his wife Mary Myers?) plus of male under sixteen, two over sixteen and one female over sixteen.

The six had paid their passage from Ireland.

I believe the Patrick I of Lot 28 is the father of the Patrick II who married Bridget Shreenan and then Catherine Whelan and was the father of my grandfather Patrick II because:

1) At this time Fr Reynolds was ministering to Catholics on this part of the Island including the nearby “Monaghan Settlers”.

2) Patrick Mackie and Bridget Shreenan’s son, Thomas was baptized in 1846 in St Peter’s Church at Seven Mile Bay, the parish for Lot 28 Catholics.

3) In 1842 Fr. Reynolds officiated at the marriage of James Mackie and Mary Kehoe. Kehoe was and still is a name common to Lot 28.

4) A list of donors to a St. Peter’s Church (Seven Mile Bay) fundraiser in 1846 - 1851 includes several Kehoes, a James Mackie and a Thomas Mackie and a Mrs. James Mackie of Cape Traverse. (By this date the progenitor, Patrick I and his son, Patrick II had moved to Kildare.)

Tignish records and the 1861 census of Lot 3 support the thesis that the Lot 28 Mackies are the same ones that appear later in Lot 3. The 1861 census does not list any Mackies still living in or near Lot 28 but does list several families in Lot 3 that fit their profile. That census shows Patrick Mackie (He’d be II.) with a wife and three young children and James Mackie with a wife and eight children. It also shows a Michael Cahill with a wife and five children, Patrick Cahill and his wife (both over forty-five which would mean they would have been born prior to 1816? - a record that gives me a problem [see below]) with a married male over sixty in the home. Records at St. Simon and St. Jude Church in Tignish show that in 1849 a Bridget Mackie, daughter of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers had married Michael Cahill and that four months later her sister Catherine had married Michael’s brother Patrick Cahill. These families were all living (according to Lakes Map of 1863) on O’Rourke Rd. in Kildare, Lot 3. Thomas Mackie who would have been the, son of Patrick II and his first wife, Bridget Shreenan was living a few miles away in Skinner’s Pond, in Lot 1 with a wife and two children.

These Lot 3 settlers match the children of Patrick Mackie in the 1841 Lot 28 census, with the addition of one female who did not appear on that census. This may have been Catherine who could have been older and probably living away from home in 1841. This is plausible because Patrick and his wife were over sixty years old in 1841 and probably had several older children who were not living at home at the time of the census. In fact when my great-grandfather, Patrick (12) died after his horse and sleigh broke through ice of the Kildare River in 1870 he was supposed to have been returning home from visiting a sister down there. I suspect the Johanna Mackie and Mary Mackie who appear on the records of St Mary’s Church in Malpeque may be his sisters, but I cannot establish that. The above mentioned problem with Catherine’s age stems from the fact that I had previously assumed she was the (widow of Patrick?) Catherine Cahill, aged 56 (so born about 1825) on the 1881 census, who was living in the home of (her nephew?) John Cahill.

It is interesting that there was another Patrick Mackie (bc 1825 in Ireland) who was a contemporary of my great grandfather and who lived near him on the O’Rourke Rd, Lot 3. This Patrick’s grandson, Tim Mackie (1891-1983) who lived in the homestead told me his grandfather was called, “Little Pat” and my great grandfather, “Big Pat”. My mother once told me that, Tim, who was a good friend of my grandfather’s was smitten by one of his daughters but my grandfather, Paddy put the kibosh on any marriage prospects, for one thing because they were related. There is little chance they were related on the maternal side so Big Pat and Little Pat must have been related as first cousins. Any more distant relationship should not have been a problem for their grandchildren. I hope someday to find out about this connection in Ireland.

There are two places to the search in Ireland; Ballymackey, Tipperary the origin of the Mackies and Newbawn, Wexford. The lead to the Newbawn connection comes as a result of The Repeal Movement activities on PEI. This Movement started the 1840’s when Irish expatriates in many parts of the world held rallies to oppose a new British law that made the Irish Parliament a part of the English one, effectively disenfranchising the numerically smaller Irish contingent At one of those rallies held in 1843 in Bedeque, PEI a James Mackie identified himself as a native of Newbawn, Wexford now living in Tryon, PEI. (Lists of those attending Repeal meetings were published in The Island Magazine.) Since the 1841 census lists only one family of Mackies, Patrick’s in Lot 28 it is safe to assume that James is a son of Patrick (24) and the one who married Mary Kehoe and some time later moved to Kildare near his brother, Patrick and sisters Bridget and Catherine.

See more in; DESCENDANTS OF PATRICK MACKIE & MARY MYERS

MYERS Surname

I know little about Mary Myers except that the 1841 census listing Patrick Mackie’s family includes a female over 60 years old, born in Ireland. I know her name because when her daughters married in 1849 they were listed as daughters of Patrick Mackie and the late Mary Myers of Tignish. This would also imply that she and Patrick moved from Lot 28 to Tignish some time between 1841 and 1849. There were other Myers family living in Lot 28 in 1841 and there are still some there but I think they are English and probably not related. There were also Myers or similarly spelled names near Tignish in 1861 and 1881 but they appear to be Acadians.

WHELAN Surname

Catherine Whelan was born on 12-8-1825 according to the 1901 CE of Lot 2 and married Patrick Mackie at SSJ on 4-12-52. He was the widower of Bridget Shreenan who he had married in 1841. Their children were; (Thomas, Bridget Shreenan’s son), Joseph (b.2-21-53) who probably died young, my grandfather, Patrick (b. 2-11-55), Ann (bp.5-21-57) who married Alexander Martin of Alberton, Catherine (b.2-3-61) who married John Doucette of Harper Road, Mary (b.4-22-63) who married John MacPherson and lived in Lowell Mass., and twins John and Mary (b. in 1865) who I think died as infants. All were baptized at St Simon and St Jude in Tignish. After her husband Patrick died in March 1870 Catherine married Alexander McIntyre in October 1871. According to marriage records Alex was the son of John McIntyre and Mary MacDonald and was a second and third cousin of Catherine’s. When her sister, Mary had married Alex’s brother, William in 1855 he was listed as being from Lot 14, so Catherine must have been related to the McIntyres or MacDonalds of Grand River, Lot 14. After his father’s death her son, Patrick went to live with and farm for Catherine Dalton, the widow of Lawrence Kinch whose daughter, Lisa Jane he later married. In 1881 he moved his family to his mother’s (now widowed a second time) farm in Lot 2.

Catherine’s father James Whelan was listed as over sixty and his wife (Ann Isabella Ahearn) between forty-five and sixty on the 1861 census of Lot 3. Lakes map of 1863 shows a neighbor Thomas Whelan, his wife (Elizabeth McIntyre) and three children. According to the 1881 census Thomas was born about 1823 so could have been James’ his son but he was not included in his Will. Tignish records do not show Thomas’ marriage or the baptism of the three children listed on the 1861 census, so he may have moved from some other part of the Island (Lot 14?.) The Master Name Index (MNI) lists the marriage of Thomas Whelan to Elizabeth McIntyre by Fr. James McDonald on 11-15-1853 and the 1881 census shows, Thomas aged 54 and, Elizabeth aged 54 living on O’Rourke Rd. Fr McDonald ministered to the people living between Lot 14 and 28 about the time of the marriage.

Later information provided by, Dorothy Farish shows Thomas was the son of James Whelan and Annabella(sic) Ahearn and she the daughter of John MacIntyre and Mary MacDonald. They were married at St Patrick’s Grand River and the church write up indicates that they were related. Note that their sponsors were William MacIntyre and Mary Whelan, their siblings who, when they married each other required a dispensation a/c third and fourth degree consanguinity - second cousins. So three Whelan siblings (see Catherine Whelan - above.) married three MacIntyre siblings who were second and third cousins.

I have found records of nine children of James Whelan and his wife Ann Isabel Ahearn; Thomas (bc.1823) Catherine (b.12-8-25), Mary (b.c.1835), Ellen (b.c.1836), Peter (b. 5-10-36), William (bc.1837), James (b 2-26-1840), Elizabeth (bp.6-29-1842) and Annabella (bp.4-7-1844) were baptized in Tignish. James Whelan had the earliest lease I have found (1833) for Lot 3 settlers. There were Whelans earlier on other parts of the Island including a John Whelan and wife both over 60 on the 1798 census of Lot 18 and others in Lot 28 but I have not found any records that would connect them to my forebears.

AHEARN Surnames

I believe that Ann Isabel Ahearn was a daughter of Joseph Herring(sic) who was born about 1780, according to Hill’s List; and Mary MacDonald (b.c1780 Barra, Scotland) who were probably married on the Island. Despite, L’Impartial’s (a newspaper published in Tignish in 1899) claim that Joseph was born in Wexford, Ireland several of their children who were still alive at the time of the, 1891 census list their father as having been born on PEI. The evidence establishing Ann Isabel Ahearn as a daughter of Joseph and Mary is rather circuitous, but I think valid; An article in, ^[1]”L’Impartial”, and reprinted in, “The Abegweit Review,” Spring 1983 describes Jim Kinch as the grandson of Joseph Ahearn of, Wexford, Ireland. He, Jim Kinch was the son of a Lawrence Kinch and a Catherine Ahearn, who I contend through the following rationale was a sister of Ann Isabel.

My mother often told us of Jim Kinch bringing a Christmas present to her grandmother, Catherine (Whelan) Mackie every year, describing her as his cousin. She was a daughter of James Whelan and Ann Isabella Ahearn and as mentioned above her, “cousin Jim” was a son of Lawrence Kinch and Catherine Ahearn. Ann Isabella Ahearn and Catherine Ahearn must have been sisters if their offspring’s were cousins, unless they were related through the paternal side, which they weren’t. But Catherine, according the record of her marriage to^[2] Lawrence Kinch at Miscouche on 7-26-1843 (reported by ^[3]JH Fabien) was the daughter of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald. The record of Ann Isabel’s marriage is not available to confirm this parentage but I think it’s a reasonable to assume it was the same Joseph and Mary. I know Jim Kinch and Ann Isabel weren’t related as cousins through the Kinches because I have a complete genealogical chart for those generations of Kinches. In addition, the fact that Catherine[Whelan] Mackie and her second husband, Alex. McIntyre, like her siblings described above were second cousins gives further indication of such a relationship.

Joseph Ahearn’s name appears in two important references; the 1899 article, “The First Irish Settlers of Tignish” in, L’Impartial cited above, and in ^[4]William Hill’s “census”. The 1899 article states that Joseph, Peter and James Ahearn landed in Charlottetown from Wexford Ireland in 1813 and came to Kildare in 1820. William Hill’s list includes a married man, Joseph Herring (sic), and a married Mary Herring both 46 years old, six unmarried male Herrings and two unmarried female Herrings. I am theorizing that this is Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald and their family, and that Joseph who would have been born in 1780 was born on PEI, (despite the L’Impartial article) and married Mary on the Island. Since Mary MacDonald was from Lot 14 she would have been one of the Scotch who emigrated from the Island of Barra in 1790. (See “Grand River West Settlement And the Mission of St. Patrick”, by Rev.A.E.Burke written about 1881.which can be found in the genealogy file at the PEI Museum and Heritage Foundation and at; <http://www.isn.net/~dhunter/stpatricks.html> The Island Register.) Hill’s “census” of Lot 4 also lists an Alexander MacDonald, 60 yrs old and a Mary MacDonald,58 yrs old (Mary’s parents?). It’s interesting to note that the lumber to replace the original St.Patrick’s Church at Grand River, Lot 14 about 1816 was procured from “Mr. Hill’s saw mill at Cascumpec.”-Burke.

Interesting Projections from Hill’s List:

The following is my re-creation of the family of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald based on the “Herrings” listed by Mr. Hill and tying them in to others by census and church records and reasonable extrapolations etc:

1) Mary bc.1805 (Mary Gavin, married woman aged 21 on Hill’s List)

Miscouche marriage records show a Mary Ahearn daughter of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald married Timothy Gavin on 9-26-1825. If she married at 20 yrs of age she would have been born about 1805. Hill lists a married man, Timothy Gavin aged 21 and a married woman, Mary Gavin aged 21. This is probably the same couple that later lived next to Peter and Patrick Ahearn in Lot 3 (see below). The 1891 CE lists her father as having been born on PEI.

2) Ann Isabel(27) bc.1806 (not on Hill’s List)

The 1881 census of Lot 3 shows Annabella Whelan 75 yrs old (The MNI is wrong when it lists her as 25), born on PEI living in the house of, John Cahill 25 yrs old with, Mary Ann Cahill 18 years old and a 56 year old Catherine who was born in Ireland.

Patrick Cahill’s will written on Jan. 25, 1870 had provided that Mary Ann Cahill, daughter of his brother, Michael [and Bridget Mackie] would have his property on the death or remarriage of his wife Catherine [Mackie]. He died prior to the 1881 census.

In 1881 sons of James Whelan lived in the immediate neighborhood on farms, (one of which would have been that of their parents, the late James Whelan and Ann Isabel Ahearn) with large families of children. I’m guessing that the widowed Ann Isabel, (who, according to oral history told by my mother’s cousin Howard Doucette, was quite a tyrant. He also said she spoke only Gaelic.) moved out of her crowded homestead to the home of the young couple. The 56 yr old Catherine would have been the childless widow of Patrick Cahill and sister of Michael Cahill’s wife, Bridget Mackie. They appear to be living on the farm that was Patrick Cahill’s on the 1863 Lake Map. Ann Isabel does not appear on Hill’s list as she had probably married before 1826. Her husband leased a farm in Kildare in 1833 and had probably settled there well before that.

3) Joseph bc.1811 (Aged 15 on Hill’s list.)

I haven’t found any later records that seem to fit this Joseph Ahearn. It is possible that he is the Joseph Ahearn who with Mary Joyce were the parents of the following girls all baptized at St. Simon & St Jude; Mary-Ann (bp. 7-8-51), Rachel (bp. 10-24-52), Elizabeth (bp. 11-12-54) and Margaret (bp.6-9-56)

.

The following three siblings; Cornelius, Patrick and Peter are all listed as 16 yrs old on Hill’s list. This is inconsistent with later records of people I’m assuming are these siblings. An age of 6 yrs old in 1826 would fit, so I’ll assume Hill was mistaken and have assigned the 1820 birth dates based on these later records. It has been reported that Hill was rather careless with ages on his census, particularly of children.

4)Cornelius bc.1820 (Aged 16 on Hill’s List)

Cornelius Shren(sic) m. Helen Kinch 7-26-1842; according to Fabien’s marriage records at Miscouche Parish. Joseph Ahearn was born to Neill(sic) and Ellen Kinch and baptized in Tignish 3-2-45. The names Cornelius and Mary Ellen are very difficult to deal with because “Cornelius” seems to be interchangeable with “Neil”, and “Mary Ellen” can appear as “Mary”, “Ellen”, “Ella” or “Helen”. Two more children were born of (this?) couple under various combinations of these names.

5)Patrick Ahearn bc.1820 a/c 81 CE &91 CE (Aged 16 on Hill’s List)

Patrick Ahearn, son of Joseph and Mary MacDonald married Mary Gillis on 1-9-44 at St.Patrick’s in Grand River. The 1861 census lists Timothy Gavin,(see Mary Ahearn, above) Patrick Ahearn and Peter Ahearn in order on Lot 3 and the 1863 Lake map shows Peter and Patrick living on the road called Birch Grove in Lot 3. The 1881 census lists Patrick O’Harn(sic), 61 yrs old & Mary O’Harn, 61 yrs old in Birch Grove. The names and ages of six of the seven children still living with them match birth records of those born to Patrick Ahearn and Mary Gillis. The 1891 CE lists Patrick’s father as born on PEI.

The following Peter Ahearn does not belong in this immediate family, but I have left him in this story [with later editing] because I have done a lot of work on him and because I know several of his descendants will be interested in it.

Peter Ahearn bc.1820 a/c 81 CE

Peter Ahearn son of James Ahearn and Margaret Gavin married Sarah McIntyre daughter of Donald and Mary MacDonald It can be found at the Acadian Museum at Miscouche. Peter and Sarah McIntyre gave birth to seven children between 1845 and 1857 when the youngest, Daniel was born. Peter was remarried to Catherine Gillis (Possibly his cousin Patrick’s wife Mary Gillis’ sister.) after Sarah died. Augustine, in 1862 and Sarah Jane, in 1866 were born to Peter and his second wife, Catherine. The 1861 census for the Peter on Birch Grove matches the ages of Peter and Sarah’s children except for one male over 21. The 1881 census of Lot 3 lists Peter O’Harn(sic) 61 yrs old, Catherine 58 yrs old, Bridget 18 yrs old, (this fits the age of a daughter, Bridget born of a Peter Ahearn and Catherine Whelan?) Augustine 20 yrs old, Sarah Jane 15 yrs old, two Ryne (Ryan?) children, John 19 and Maggie Ann 10 yrs old. Peter and Sarah’s last child, Daniel 24 yrs. old was also listed.

The PEI Genealogical Society Vol 15 # 1 includes an interesting note from Mike Meggison. He notes that a Peter Ahearn and Margaret Ryan from PEI were the grandparents of Donald Regan, President Reagan’s Chief of Staff and Treasury Secretary. There were at least four Peter Ahearns baptized at Tignish between 1845 and 1858, any of whom could have been Regan’s grandfather, but it is interesting that one of them was a son of Peter and Sarah. He was born on April 18 1855 which means he was about 26 yrs old in 1881 and, Maggie Ryne(sic) about 16 years younger was living in his father’s house (he was not) at the time. The 1881 census of Lot 4 Shows a Peter Ahearn, 26 and Margaret, 21 years old living in what appears to be Alberton.

More recently acquired information establishes that this Peter Ahearn is indeed a forebear of Donald Regan. According to the above mentioned document by, J.H. Fabien this Peter was married to Sarah McIntyre on Oct 15, 1843. His parents were James Ahearn (probably a brother of Joseph) and Margaret Gavin. The 1891 census lists Peter’s father as born on PEI. I discovered that the young Peter and his wife moved to Hull, Mass. about 1881. They have many descendants living primarily in South Shore towns. I have a extensive family chart for Peter’s descendants, a copy of which I sent to Donald Regan. I was delighted to receive a nice response from Mr. Regan, with an autographed dollar bill signed by him as, “Secretary of the U.S.Treasury” enclosed.

6)Peter bc. (1810 a/c 81 CE & Hill’s List)

The Peter who was a son of Joseph and Mary Ahearn married Anne Foley on Dec 18, 1837 (see JH Fabien) and leased a farm from Samuel Cunard on Lot 2 near the end of the O’Rourke Rd. on what came to be called the Cock Rd. They had twelve children, 9 girls and three boys born between 1839 and 1861. According to the 1861 CE he had used 28 years of a 99 year lease on 98 acre farm on the shore road near round pond in Lot 2. But then in 1861 he leased a smaller farm on the “proposed” Cock Rd from the same Sam Cunard. His name is still listed on that farm on the 1881 Meacham Atlas but the only one of his children still with him on the 1881 CE is his youngest daughter, Rosella. A thirty year old named Moses lives there and two young boys John 18 and Joseph 9 years old. The 1891 CE lists his wife Anna on the farm which is now that of their son, William and his wife, Sarah[Mackie] with a one year old son, Peter.

7)Catherine bc.1817 (Aged 9 on Hill’s List)

Catherine Ahearn, daughter of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald married Lawrence Kinch son of Lawrence Kinch and Julia Foy on, 7-20-1843 according to Fabien’s records at Miscouche. Her stone at Sacred Heart cemetery says she died in 1900 at age 76, meaning she would have been born in 1824 rather than 1817?. Her son James b.1-25-1858 married Ann Ready on 10-9-1883 and lived at Kinches Corner Lot One. This is at the end of the Western Road near Tignish. (There was also a Kinches Corner in Kildare where William Kinch settled.) He is the Jim Kinch I mentioned above, who was a cousin of my mother’s grandmother, Catherine (Whelan)Mackie (7).

8)Ann b.c1819 (Aged 7 on Hill’s List)

Anne Ahearn, daughter of Joseph and Mary MacDonald married George Ramsay the son of Donald Ramsay and Mary Connor on 4-15-1839 according to the same Miscouche records of Fabien mentioned above. She had nine children and lived in Kildare. She must have died before 1881 because her husband, George was living with Lawrence Kinch and Eliz Ahearn in Alma on the 1881 census.

9)James b.c1821 (Aged 5 on Hill’s List)

I can’t find James on either census, but a James Ahearn and Christy or Anita McLean had three children baptized in Tignish; Joseph 9-20-39, Cornelius 2-27-41 and Mary Ann 8-6-1843. The names of the children’s God-parents match family and neighbor names.

10) William bc. 1815 (Aged 4 on Hill’s List, but bc. 1815 a/c to cemetery records.)

William the son of Joseph Ahearn married Mary-Ann Kinch, daughter of Laurent and Judith Foy on 1-1-1838 according to JH Fabien’s records. They had 12 children between 1839 and 1863 all, except the first were baptized at St. Anthony’s. A W. Herron(sic) shows on Lake’s map of Lot 5, near where Laurence Kinch’s original farm had been. The 1881 census of lot 5 list his son William, aged 32 as head of the house living with Mary-Ann now 60 and his wife? Julia 37, three siblings; James 17, Jane 20, Augustine 16 and son? Bradford one year old. The 1891 census lists Julia as his sister and does not show any young children. A stone in Sacred Heart cemetery lists William as d. 5-28-67 Ae 52 and his wife Mary-Ann Kinch d. 11-8-90 Ae 74.

11)Daniel (bc.1828 after Hill’s List)

Daniel married Ann MacDonald in Tignish on 1-17-1852. By matching the 1881 census and the 1880 Meacham’s Atlas it’s evident that he was born ca.1828 and lived in Kildare on the road from Kinches corner to Kildare Capes. The 1891 CE of Lot 3 lists Daniel’s father as born on PEI.

Summary chart of the Ahearns described above:

Other Ahearns or Herons;

The name, Ahearn is spelled in many ways in the records but as mentioned earlier I have generally used only one spelling for Ahearns. This has been done on the basis of evidence, admittedly circumstantial that, though names may be spelled differently it is the same family. The evidence in the following case is flimsier than usual, but it is interesting to speculate:

The 1798 census published in Duncan Campbell’s; History of Prince Edward Island lists a Peter Heron(sic) in Lot 18 with a family of twelve. Six in the family were between 16 and 60 yrs old. If they were all Peter’s family it would mean that he had four children over 16 yrs old. The oldest of these would have been born about 1775, unless there were multiple births and Peter would have to have been born at least 20 yrs earlier in or before 1755. In 1780 a Peter Heron of New London, Mariner acquired a permanent lease from King George III for a house lot and a “ground lot” in nearby Princetown. He sold it the following year but this transaction establishes his presence on the Island very early in its Anglo history. I don’t know how an Irish Catholic, was able to do this, but except for this it seems quite possible that he was the first Ahearn on the Island, and that those Ahearns in Lots 1, 3 and 5 whose father was born on PEI were descendants of this, Peter Heron. I have found no other more reasonable Heron descendants, and, “Peter” is certainly a first name given to many Ahearn children in subsequent generations. I have built the following scenario on that possibility;

Some possible descendants of this Peter Heron settled in Cascumpec, Kildare and in the Tignish area. They were, in addition to, “our” Joseph who married Mary MacDonald:

1) A Peter Ahearn was listed as a neighbor on James P[W]helan’s 1833 lease of a farm in Kildare. He would have to have been old enough to have been the Peter who fathered Margaret in 1813(bp 1814 Rustico) and another member of Peter Heron’s family. He is probably the Peter who married Mary Quinlan and is the father John and Mary Ann who married McInnis siblings and of James who married Margaret Gavin; parents of the “other” Peter mentioned above. Their son, John must have been born in 1824 or earlier as he married a widow, Flora MacDonald on 9-22-1844. James had died before this son’s marriage.

2) Nicholas who married Catherine Fitzgerald. Their daughter Mary was born in 1838, so Nicholas must have been born in 1818 or before and could have been a son or grandson. There is a gravestone in SSJ cem. for a Nicholas Ahearn who died on 4-4-1871 Ae 62, which is probably that of this Nicholas.

4) Ann Ahearn who married Richard Aylward “shortly after his arrival (in 1818) here”, according to the 1899 L’Impartial article. She must have been born before 1800.

5) Charlotte(bc. 1794) who married Patrick Reilly and had at least six children before she died in 1843 Ae. 49. In 1855 widower, Patrick remarried Marie Ahearn, his first wife’s niece, daughter of the above mentioned James. The L’Impartial article, mentioned above lists; Joseph, Peter and James Ahearn(sic) from Wexford together, implying they were related. It also says the children and grandchildren of Nicholas are the only remaining, (in 1899) “representatives of the Ahearn family.” in the Tignish area.

The following chart summarizes some of the possible relationships described above:

See my Peter Heron, Mariner for more on this.

KINCH Surname

There are several different family stories about how the Kinches got to PEI. One recurring one is of five brothers leaving Ireland, one or two going to Bermuda and two going to Canada and finding work on the construction of the Rideau Canal. (Jean Buziak, of Penticton, B.C. tells me the Rideau Canal was built between 1826 and 1832.) One or two of these brothers came to the Island. The name “Kinch”, sounding so German-like has given rise to several stories of a German origin for the family, but I feel certain it is as Irish name. Edward Maclysaght, “the leading authority on Irish names” according to the publishers of his, The Surnames of Ireland claims in that book that Kinch is the Manx form of MacAoughuis (MacGuinness) and is found mainly in Wicklow and Wexford.

Hill’s List of 1825/26, described above under the Ahearn surname is the first evidence that I have found of Kinches on the Island. Lawrence Kinch 40 yrs old, a married man and Judith [Foy?]Kinch 30 yrs old, a married woman are listed as living on Lot 5. William 20, Lawrence 5, Ann 8, and Ellen 6 yrs old are listed as unmarried Kinches. They are obviously a family by the order in which they are listed. Based on the ages listed William was a son or a brother of Lawrence. Judith was probably Lawrence’s second wife, [or was older than 30 in 1826].

The following chart assumes William was a son of Lawrence by his first wife;

Of the family that appeared on the List, Ann married William Ahearn, (at least an “Ann” or “Nancy” Kinch married a William Ahearn at about the right time and place to be them,), Ellen (or Mary Ellen) married Cornelius (Neil) Ahearn, and Lawrence married Catherine Ahearn. These Ahearns also appeared on Hill’s list but in Lot 4, and were apparently siblings (see above under, Ahearn Surnames). Three brothers marrying three sisters seems surprising until you realize that there were only eight Irish families in Lot 4 and five in Lot 5 at the time and some of these might have been closely related. Another daughter, Catherine who must have been born after 1825 married a George Coughlin in 1849. A Michael Kinch who appears on the record as a sponsor at a baptism in 1855, the best man at the marriage of John Kinch and Rachel MacAlduff on 1-19-1859 and of whom there is no other record was probably one of this or the next generation. Many of this branch of Kinches settled to the west of Alberton and later along the Western Road in Alma. Some of their descendants still live there.

William Kinch the 20 yr older who was living with Lawrence’s family I claim as my gr gr grandfather.. He married Margaret O’Connor who appears as a 15 yr old on Hill’s List for Lot 4. They settled in Central Kildare near or at what came to be known as Kinches corner where the O’Rourke Rd crosses the main road to Kildare Capes. Thus was established two branches of Kinches the early generations of whom were separated by the Kildare River and lived in different parishes, St. Anthony’s in Cascumpec and Bloomfield and St Simon and St Jude in Tignish. I think this may have been part of the reason later generations believed two unrelated Kinch families settled in the area.

Children of William and Margaret my great grandfather Lawrence; the Michael mentioned above, John b 1837 who married Rachel MacAlduff (He was a cooper and lived in Northport, the harbor for Alberton), Bridget who married John Foley and settled in Kildare, William who married Elizabeth O’Rourke in 1868 and Mary Nelligan in 1873, Mary A. b.1842 and Catherine b.1845. All except William were baptized in Tignish. William was baptized at St Anthony’s in 1840 so I suppose the family lived in that area until then. The reason the records of the older children’s baptism were in Tignish could have been because St Anthony’s was served by priests from St Simon and St Judes at that time. St Anthony’s records don’t start until 1839.

Chart of first generations of the William Kinch and Margaret O’Connor Family:

William and Margaret’s son, Lawrence was born about 1830 as his gravestone indicates he died in 1868 at the age of 38. In 1860 he leased 100 acres on the shore of the Kildare River where the bridge was later built. Marie Wade a great granddaughter of his told me that he drowned in the river [1860] and his widow, Catherine Dalton exchanged that farm with a Mr Gillian for the one in Central Kildare away from the river.

William and Margaret’s son, Lawrence’s chart follows;

O’CONNOR Surname

;

Possible First Generations of my, [maternal] O’Connor Forebears:

Margaret O’Connor(29) is the only forebear of this branch that I am sure of. The record at St Anthony’s, Bloomfield shows the bp 11-2-1840 (b.9-16) of William Kinch, son of William and Margaret O’Connor. William and Mary are my forebears, #’s 28 and 29. In the following re-creation I am assuming that Margaret O’Connor (28) is the 15 yr older on Hill’s List of Lot 4 and that William Kinch (29)is the 20 yr older on Hill’s List for Lot 5

This re-creation is based in part on the fact that there were two different O’Connor families in Cascumpec in the early 1800’s and that a descendant of one of them, GV “Gerry” O’Connor of Orange, Connecticut has a complete and accurate family chart of the “other O’Connors.” In addition, since Gerry assures me that his forebears arrived after 1825 when Hill’s List was developed I am laying claim to the apparently orphaned, or at least, “Home Alone” O’Connor children on that List. That is, the children shown in the shadowed area on the chart plus the Edward O’Connor who married Margaret O’Connor, one of Gerry’s clan. Incidentally, this Edward’s gravestone indicates he was from County Wexford and Gerry’s forebears hail from Tipperary.

The Mary O’Connor mentioned above, married Patrick Aylward on 11-8-1844 and is probably the one shown on Hill’s list (of Cascumpec 1825/26) as four years old. She was identified as the daughter of the “Late” Michael O’Connor and Catherine O’Hara[I think] on the marriage record. I am assuming that; the Edward O’Connor (who married G.V. O’Connor’s ancestor, Margaret O’Connor), and the other O’Connors on Hill’s List; Margaret 15, Patrick 7, Michael 5 and Catherine 4 years old are all siblings. (At this point I can’t prove this.) If I am right then, Michael O’Connor and Catherine O’Hara were the parents of Margaret and all the other O’Connors on Hill’s list and would be #’s (58) and (59) on my, PEI ANCESTOR chart. Unfortunately Michael and his wife, Catherine O’Hara must have died before Hill made his list in 1825/6 making the family hard to trace.

However, with few clues some projections are possible; Michael O’Connor and Catherine O’Hara? would likely have been born in Wexford in 1788 or before if they were the parents of Edward (b.c1808) and the other O’Connor children on Hill’s List. So that seemed like a good place to look. The Mackies, Ahearns and [my] O’Connors all seem to come from Wexford so I had hoped to find more there. However, I recently visited the Heritage Center in Wexford, Ireland and they tell me my chances of finding any forebears of those who left there in the early 1800’s is pretty slim, as Catholic birth and marriage records for those years are hard to find.

Dalton Surname

According to the 1899 L’Impartial article mentioned above Patrick Dalton, a native of Kerry moved from Lot 7 about 1829 to Nail Pond [Lot 1]. (Ballyheigue, Kerry according to John Cousins in his article; The Irish of Lot 7 in The Abegweit Review Spring 1983). Patrick and Margaret McCarthy were married in Ireland and apparently came to PEI at about the same time as his brother John Dalton and Margaret’s father John McCarthy with his wife and several children. Patrick and Margaret had at least nine children, eight of whom were baptized in Tignish. By 1899, according to L’Impartial all had left the Tignish area except the youngest, Charles so Tignish records do not include much on their descendants. St Simon and St Jude records start about 1831 so they don’t include the baptism of their oldest child, my gr. gr. grandmother Catherine who was born, probably also in Tignish about 1832 according to the 1901 census of Lot 3. Catherine married Lawrence Kinch and settled in Kildare. I have described their descendants under the Kinch surname.

Margaret [Patrick and Margaret’s daughter] b. 1834 married John McCullum who also settled in Kildare. Their daughter, Margaret McCullum was baptized St S. St Jude on 7-20-72. The little additional information I have on the McCullums comes from Marie Wade, mentioned above who spent much of her childhood in Kildare. She remembers an Adie McCullum who married Al Wood and had two children, Edna and Martha.

Son, Patrick [b.1837-d.1919] married Margaret McCullum and settled in Palmer Road. Five of their children were baptized in Tignish and one, Charles born about 1875 is listed on the 1878 and 1890 census of Immaculate Conception parish in Palmer Road. The next son, John was born in 1839 but I have no more information about him.

Daughter Honora, born in 1842 [10-26-42-d.1933] married James Bergen and moved to Boston. I remember, her visiting us in Holbrook when I was small. She was very old and I was afraid of her but my older brother enjoyed her. He used to give her rides through the woods in an old car that had nothing but a battered seat resting on the frame, and she loved it. She had at least two children, James and John and John had at least one daughter named Naomi.

Son, Thomas [b.10-26-45] married Honora O’Brien in Tignish on, 2-28-76 but I do not have any additional information about him and son, Michael [b.3-6-48,d.1-6-81] is buried with his parents in Tignish cemetery.

Charles, the youngest [b.6-9-50,d.12-9-33] child of Patrick and Margaret became famous and wealthy as the developer of the silver fox industry on PEI. He was the first, together with Robert Oulton to successfully breed foxes in captivity. My mother used to say he was considered lazy as a young man because he would rather hunt and fish than work the farm. Men like that were usually very poor providers for their families. He became “Sir Charles” by virtue of being made a Knight Commander of the Order of St Gregory by the Pope and was appointed Governor General of PEI in 1930. However, as Marie Wade, mentioned above tells the story he was still a country boy in his old age. He loved to put on his old clothes and wander on his farm and the nearby shore. Once when some important visitors came to see him and asked for his whereabouts they were told, “He’s was down by the shore.”

After awhile the visitors returned saying,

“There’s no one down there but some poor old beachcomber.”

“That’s Sir Charles,” was the response.

“Sir Charles” married Ann Gavin in Tignish on 6-30-74 and they had 12 children many of whom died young. Some, like many Islanders at the time moved to “the Boston States” and beyond. I recently noted an obituary in the Boston papers for a Mabel (Brant) Dalton, widow of Dr. Howard Dalton who was [b.8-8-76,d.2-13-42] the second son of Charles and Ann Gavin. I have not found any other members of this family.

The Daltons and McCarthys had first settled on Lot 7, some stayed there, and it appears the two families maintained close contacts at least in the early years when St Mark’s was a mission area for St Simon and St Jude. I do not have good records from that area and from St Marks church but there is probably much to be learned about these families’ descendants there.

See Sir Charles Dalton, Foxman, an unpublished paper by Allan Rankin edit by me for more.

McCarthy Surname

According to the 1899 L’Impartial article Margaret McCarthy [bc. 1801] (who married Patrick Dalton) was the only daughter of John McCarthy who came from Kerry Ireland with his wife and children about 1822. She and her siblings were all born in Ireland. They were; Florence who married Frances McCarthy and lived in Lot 2. He died in 1885 at 81 years of age - his wife died in 1882 at 68 years. They had 11 children baptized in Tignish between 1835 and 1856. Two daughters, Ann and Jane married Burke brothers and a third, Ellen married Pat Kirwin of Seven Mile Bay. Many Irish who settled, “Up West” had first lived in the Seven Mile Bay, (Lot 27/28) area. Son, Cornelius married Johanna McCarthy who died in 1897 at 91 years of age. They had at least eight children. The oldest, Margaret married Stephen McElduff in Tignish on 11-22-54 and died 3-3-80 according to a stone at Sacred Heart cemetery in Alberton. John, the only other child I have anything on except baptism records [see chart] married Alice Morrissey. The Lot 1 census of 1881 shows his mother, Johanna [70 years old b. IRL] living with him, his wife and four children. Next comes Eugene, who married Bridget Halloran and settled in Lot 7 according to the 1881 census which listed him as 68 years old born in Ireland. That census lists five children but two older ones baptized in Tignish were not shown. There is a stone in Tignish cemetery for Charles McCarthy who died in 1881 at 66 [bc. 1815]. I assume this is the last son of the immigrant, John. He is listed on the 1881 census of Lot 1 with his wife Bridget[Doyle] [bc. 1823 on PEI] and 4 children. They had 12 children include twin girls and two named Charles, born in 1842 and 1845.

I am sure much more could be done with the McCarthy surname since so many of them stayed in the area for the second and third generation but we have very little family anecdotal information that would pique interest. The only one I remember is Chester McCarthy who was an important figure in Tignish when I was young. He was a lawyer, son of John McCarthy and Alice Morrissey and was active in the fisheries association.

This is the end of my family history story of the early generations as of the Spring of 1996. I hope to add to it as I discover more, or correct any parts I find to be incorrect. I will appreciate any help readers can be in this.

.

PETER HERON/AHEARN, MARINER

First three generations and where they fit in my family history

The 1798 census published in Duncan Campbell’s; History of Prince Edward Island lists a Peter Heron(sic) in Lot 18 with a family of twelve. Six in the family, five males and one female were between sixteen and sixty years old. Five females and one male were under sixteen. If they were all Peter’s family it would mean that he had four sons or other male family members born before 1782 plus he and his wife. In this effort I will attempt to identify who these might be.

In 1780 a Peter Heron of New London, “Mariner” acquired a permanent lease from King George III for a house lot and a "ground lot" in nearby Princetown. He sold it the following year but this transaction establishes his presence on the Island very early in its Anglo history. Later on January 2, 1810 he sold some land in Darnley Basin to Charles Stewart for, “one hundred Pounds Currency being in part of the amount of his... [Acct-Cant?] against me”. I believe that he was the first “Ahearn” on the Island, and that those Ahearns of the next generation who settled in Lots one, three and five and whose father was born on PEI were part of this family. I have found no other more reasonable Heron descendants, and, "Peter" is certainly a first name given to many Ahearn children in subsequent generations. I have built the following scenario on that hypothesis.

The name, Ahearn is spelled in many ways in the records but I have generally used only one spelling for Ahearns. This has been done on the basis of evidence, admittedly circumstantial that, though names may be spelled differently these are all the same family. The evidence in the following case is circumstantial, but it is interesting to speculate.

The descendants of this Peter Heron who I believe settled in Cascumpec, Kildare and in the Tignish area were;

–Joseph who married Mary MacDonald and I claim as my forebears. More about them later.

–A Peter Ahearn (bc. 1775) was listed as a neighbor on James P[W]helan's 1833 lease of a farm in Kildare. He would have to have been old enough to have been the Peter who fathered Margaret in 1813 (bp. 1814 at St Augustine’s, Rustico). Most of the children in this family can be identified as those of Peter and Mary Quinahan. This Peter’s other children could be;

I have moved this James from my previous placement as a son of Peter Heron Ahearn of Darnley because Peter had a son James who stayed in Darnley and is included in his will. This James must be a son of Peter and Mary Quinlan who, like most of the Ahearns/Herons seem to have moved up-west fairly early. He died before 9-22-1844 a/c son John's marriage record describes John as the son of "the Late" James Ahearn.

–Nicholas (bc. 1809) who married Catherine Fitzgerald. Their first [?] daughter Mary was born in 1838, so Nicholas must have been born in 1818 or before and could have been a son or grandson. (There is a gravestone in Saint Simon Saint Jude cemetery in Tignish for a Nicholas Ahearn who died on 4-4-1871 Ae. 62, which is probably that of this Nicholas.)

–John who married Sophia McInnis in 1853,

–Mary-Ann who married Sophia’s brother John in 1853.

–Bridget who was born in 1821 according to Immaculate Conception Parish records was married to Francis McKenna.

–Ann Ahearn (bc. 1795) who married Richard Aylward “shortly after his arrival here”, according to an 1899 L’Impartial article, “The First Irish Settlers of Tignish” [reprinted in, “The Abegweit Review,” Spring 1983 ]. She must have been born before 1795 because their son Michael married Helen Griffin (JH Fabien) on 2-14-1836 so I expect L’Impartial is wrong and she was married before 1818 and not in Tignish.

–Charlotte (bc. 1793) who married Patrick Reilly and had at least six children before she died in 1843 Ae. 49

–James Heron (bc. 1795)whose father, Peter Heron, Sen. died in 1815 after making out his will on March 29, 1814. He left his farm of one hundred acres to his wife Mary with a codicil instructing her to allow his son James one third of all his property. On Nov. 8 1823 Mary made out a will leaving half of the farm or 59 acres to James and half to his sister Helen. He is probably the James Hearn(sic) who is buried in the Pioneer cemetery in Charlottetown with four young women. [Daughters?]

–Helen’s (bc. 1794) husband Thomas Lawless was the executor of her mother’s will in which a calf was left to Mary Lawless. She seems to be the only family member who stayed in the area. Two children married at St Mary’s, James in 1842 and Peter in 1850. I have estimated Helen’s birth date assuming James was her oldest son and was married at twenty five.

Added the following info from Linda Rombough 9/18/98 to my charts. May 1999 added more info from Joseph Summers another direct descendant.

Thomas Lawless- Sea Captain Wife: Ellen - Children:

1) Elilzabeth born 1821, Norbor, P.E.I. Died at Prince Dist. Lot 25,

P.E.I. married John Reeves (this is my, Linda Rombough's family tree line)

2)Mary born 1818 at Malpeque P.E.I. Died: 1903 on lot 17 and is buried

st St. Paul's Cem. Summerside, P.E.I. She married John Schurman Baker On

Sept 26 1839 at St. Eleanor's P.E.I.

3)Michael born about 1823 Prince Norbor Lot 20 P.E.I. Died: 1914

Summerside, P.E.I.. He married Mary Ann Schurman Baker on Nov 14 1853

In Prince County, Norboro PEI

4)Magarit Lawliss Born april 17 1833 Charlottetown PEI Baptisted Nov 20, 1833.

5)Ellen Lawliss Born: Jun 10 1835 Charlottetown PEI Baptised Nov 4 1835

Peter Heron’s Son Joseph’s Family

My great grandfather, Patrick Mackie married Catherine Whelan who was the daughter of James Whelan and Ann Isabel (or Annabella) Ahearn. The following is a result of my efforts to find where the Ahearns fit in my family history;

I believe that my gr. gr. grandmother, Ann Isabel Ahearn was a daughter of Joseph Herring (sic) who was born about 1780, according to Hill's1825/6 List of Inhabitants of Lot 4 , (Which was can be found in the Fall/Winter issue (#28) of The Island Magazine in, “Counting Heads; William Hill’s Mysterious Lists”.). Ann Isabel’s mother was Mary MacDonald (bc.1780 Barra, Scotland) who must have married Joseph on Prince Edward Island. Despite the L'Impartial article’s claim that Joseph was born in Wexford, Ireland, several of his children who were still alive at the time of the 1891 census list their father as having been born on PEI. I do not have Ann Isabel Ahearn’s birth or marriage records but the evidence establishing her as a daughter of Joseph and Mary, while rather circuitous is I think, valid; The L’Impartial article describes Jim Kinch as the grandson of Joseph Ahearn of, Wexford, Ireland. This Jim Kinch was the son of a Lawrence Kinch and a Catherine Ahearn, who I contend through the following rationale was a sister of Ann Isabel.

My mother often told us of Jim Kinch bringing a Christmas present to her grandmother, Catherine (Whelan) Mackie every year, describing her as his cousin. Family history records Catherine as a daughter of James Whelan and Ann Isabella Ahearn. If her, “cousin Jim” was a son of Lawrence Kinch and Catherine Ahearn, Ann Isabella Ahearn and Catherine Ahearn must have been sisters since their offsprings were cousins unless they were related on the paternal side, which they weren't. But Catherine, according the record of her marriage to Lawrence Kinch at Miscouche on 7-26-1843 (reported by JH Fabien in his book which includes an alphabetized list of early marriages etc. at St Jean the Baptist, Miscouche. It can be found at the Acadian Museum.) was the daughter of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald. I know Jim Kinch and Ann Isabel weren’t related as cousins through the Kinches because I have a complete genealogical chart for those generations of Kinches. In addition, after her husband Patrick Mackie died and Catherine married Alexander McIntyre, a dispensation was needed because they were second cousins giving further indication of such a relationship. According to marriage records Alex was the son of John McIntyre and Mary MacDonald. When Catherine’s sister, Mary had married Alex’s brother, William in 1855 he was listed as being from Lot 14. They also needed a dispensation and when their brother Thomas had married Elizabeth McIntyre at St Patrick's, Grand River in 1853 the record indicated they were related. It’s apparent then that Catherine and her siblings must have been related to the McIntyres and MacDonalds of Grand River, Lot 14.

Joseph Ahearn's name appears in two important references; the L’Impartial 1899 article, and on Hill’s List. The L’Impartial article states that Joseph, Peter and James Ahearn landed in Charlottetown from Wexford Ireland in 1813 and came to Kildare in 1820. William Hill’s list includes a married man, Joseph Herring (sic), and a married Mary Herring both forty-six years old, six unmarried male Herrings and two unmarried female Herrings. I am theorizing that this is Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald and their family, and that Joseph who would have been born in 1780 was born on PEI, (despite the L'Impartial article) and married Mary on the Island. Since Mary MacDonald was from Lot 14 she would have been one of the Scotch who emigrated from the Island of Barra in 1790. (See “Grand River West Settlement And the Mission of St. Patrick”, by Rev.A.E.Burke written about 1881.which can be found in the genealogy file at the PEI Museum and Heritage Foundation.) Hill’s List of Lot 4, Cascumpec also has an Alexander MacDonald, sixty years old and a Mary MacDonald, fifty-eight years old. It’s interesting to note that the lumber to replace the original St.Patrick’s Church at Grand River, Lot 14 about 1816 was procured from “Mr. Hill’s saw mill at Cascumpec.”-Burke.

The following is my re-creation of the family of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald based in part on the children listed by Mr. Hill and tying them in to others by marriage records and by reasonable extrapolations.

1) Mary bc.1805 (Mary Gavin, married woman aged 21 on Hill's List)

Miscouche marriage records show a Mary Ahearn daughter of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald married Timothy Gavin on 9-26-1825. If she married at twenty years of age she would have been born about 1805. Hill lists a married man, Timothy Gavin aged 21 and a married woman, Mary Gavin aged 21. This is probably the same couple that later lived near Peter and Patrick Ahearn in Lot 3 (see below). The 1891 CE lists her father as having been born on PEI.

2) Ann Isabel bc.1806 (not on Hill's List)

The 1881 census of Lot 3 shows Annabella Whelan 75 years old (The MNI is wrong when it lists her as 25), born on PEI living in the house of, John Cahill 25 years old with, Mary Ann Cahill 18 years old and a 56 year old named Catherine who was born in Ireland.

Patrick Cahill's will written on Jan. 25, 1870 had provided that Mary Ann Cahill daughter of his brother, Michael [and Bridget Mackie] would have his property on the death or remarriage of his wife Catherine [Mackie]. He died prior to the 1881 census. (Patrick and Catherine were childless.) In 1881 sons of James Whelan and Ann Isabel Ahearn lived on the next farms, (each of which would have been half of the two hundred acres of their parents) with large families of children. I’m guessing that the then widowed Ann Isabel, (who, according to oral history told by her grandson, Howard Doucette, was quite a tyrant who spoke only Gaelic.) moved out of her crowded homestead to the home of the young couple. The 56 year old Catherine would have been the childless widow of Patrick Cahill and sister of Michael Cahill’s wife, Bridget Mackie. They appear to be living on the farm that was Patrick Cahill's on the 1863 Lake Map. Ann Isabel does not appear on Hill’s list as she had probably married before 1826. Her husband leased a farm in Kildare in 1833 and they had probably settled there well before that.

3)Joseph bc.1811 (Aged 15 on Hill’s list.)

I haven’t found any later records that seem to fit this Joseph.Ahearn. It is possible that he is the Joseph Ahearn who with Mary Joyce were the parents of the following girls all baptized at St. Simon & St Jude; Mary-Ann (bp. 7-8-51), Rachel (bp. 10-24-52), Elizabeth (bp. 11-12-54) and Margaret (bp.6-9-56)

The three siblings; Cornelius, Patrick and Peter are all listed as 16 years old on Hill’s list. This is inconsistent with later records of people I’m assuming are these siblings. An age of 6 years old in 1826 would fit better, so I’ll assume Hill made a mistake and have assigned the 1820 birth dates based on these records.

4)Cornelius bc.1820 (Aged 16 on Hill's List)

Cornelius Shren(sic) m. Helen Kinch 7-26-1842; according to Fabien's marriage records at Miscouche Parish. Joseph Ahearn was born to Neill(sic) and Ellen Kinch and baptized in Tignish 3-2-45. The names Cornelius and Mary Ellen are very difficult to deal with because “Cornelius” seems to be interchangeable with “Neil”, and “Mary Ellen” can appear as “Mary”, “Ellen”, “Ella” or “Helen”. Two more children were born of (this?) couple under various combinations of these names.

5)Patrick Ahearn bc.1820 a/c 81 CE &91 CE (Aged 16 on Hill's List)

Patrick Ahearn, son of Joseph and Mary MacDonald married Mary Gillis on 1-9-44 at St.Patrick’s in Grand River. The 1861 census lists Timothy Gavin, (see Mary Ahearn, above) Patrick Ahearn and Peter Ahearn in order on Lot 3 and the 1863 Lake map shows Peter and Patrick living on the road called Birch Grove in Kildare, Lot 3. Then the 1881 census lists Patrick O’Harn(sic), 61 years old & Mary O’Harn, 61 years old in Birch Grove. The names and ages of six of the seven children still living with them match birth records of those born to Patrick Ahearn and Mary Gillis. The 1891 CE lists Patrick’s father as born on PEI.

6)Peter bc. (1810 a/c 81 CE & Hill's List)

The Peter who was a son of Joseph and Mary Ahearn married Anne Foley on December 18, 1837 (see JH Fabien) and leased a farm from Samuel Cunard on Lot 2 near the end of the O'Rourke Rd. on what came to be called the Cock Rd. They had twelve children, 9 girls and three boys born between 1839 and 1861. According to the 1861 CE he had used 28 years of a 99 year lease on 98 acre farm on the shore road near round pond in Lot Two. But then in 1861 he leased a smaller farm on the "proposed" Cock Rd from the same Sam Cunard. His name is still listed on that farm on the 1880 Meacham Atlas but the only one of his children still with him on the 1881 CE is his youngest daughter, Rosella. A thirty year old named Moses also lives there and two young boys John 18 and Joseph 9 years old. The 1891 CE lists his wife Anna on the farm which is now that of their son William and his wife, Sarah[Mackie] with a one year old son, Peter.

10)William bc. 1815 (Aged 4 on Hill's List, but bc. 1815 a/c to cemetery records.)

William the son of Joseph Ahearn married Mary-Ann Kinch, daughter of Laurent and Judith Foy on 1-1-1838 according to JH Fabien's records. They had 12 children between 1839 and 1863 all, except the first were baptized at St. Anthony's. A, W. Herron(sic) is shown on Lake's map of Lot 5, near where Laurence Kinch's original farm had been. The 1881 census of lot 5 list his son William, aged 32 as head of the house living with Mary-Ann now 60 and his wife? Julia 37, three siblings; James 17, Jane 20, Augustine 16 and son? Bradford one year old. The 1891 census lists Julia as his sister and does not show any young children. A stone in Sacred Heart cemetery lists William as d. 5-28-67 Ae. 52 and his wife Mary-Ann Kinch d. 11-8-90 Ae. 74.

7)Catherine bc.1817 (Aged 9 on Hill's List)

Catherine Ahearn, daughter of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald married Lawrence Kinch son of Lawrence Kinch and Julia Foy on, 7-20-1843 according to Fabien's records at Miscouche. Her stone at Sacred Heart cemetery says she died in 1900 at age 76, meaning she would have been born in 1824 rather than 1817?. Her son James b.1-25-1858 married Ann Ready on 10-9-1883. They lived at Kinches Corner Lot One. This is at the end of the Western Road near Tignish. (There was also a Kinches Corner in Kildare where William Kinch settled.) He is the Jim Kinch I mentioned above, who was a cousin of my mother's grandmother, Catherine (Whelan)Mackie (7).

8)Ann bc. 1819 (Aged 7 on Hill's List)

Anne Ahearn, daughter of Joseph and Mary MacDonald married George Ramsay the son of Donald Ramsay and Mary Connor on 4-15-1839 according to the same Miscouche records of Fabien mentioned above. She had nine children and lived in Kildare. She must have died before 1881 because her husband, George was living with Lawrence Kinch and Eliz Ahearn in Alma on the 1881 census.

9)James bc.1821 (Aged 5 on Hill's List)

I can’t find James on either census, but a James Ahearn and Christy or Anita McLean had three children baptized in Tignish; Joseph 9-20-39, Cornelius 2-27-41 and Mary Ann 8-6-1843. The names of the children's God-parents match family and neighbor names.

11)Daniel, bc. 1828 after Hill's List

Daniel the son of Joseph Ahearn and Mary MacDonald married Ann MacDonald in Tignish on 1-17-1852. By matching the 1881 census and the 1880 Meacham’s Atlas it’s evident that he was born ca.1828 and lived on the road from Kinches corner to Kildare Capes. The 1891 CE of Lot 3 lists Daniel's father as born on PEI.

Other Descendants of Peter Heron

A problem working with the Ahearn surname which is common on the Island is the use of the same given name for successive generations. “Peter”, the name of the progenitor of the Ahearns was used for at least six of his early descendants. I spent many hours tracing a Peter Ahearn who settled in Kildare across the road from Patrick Ahearn, my gr.gr. grandmother Ann Isabel’s brother. I had assumed he was another brother but he was not. He was a son of James Ahearn and Margaret Gavin, placing my family connection to this Peter back a whole generation.

This Peter is interesting to me because of all the work I did on him and because I found records of one hundred forty one of his descendants who live or lived in near me in S.E. Massachusetts.

Peter Ahearn son of James Ahearn and Margaret Gavin married Sarah McIntyre daughter of Donald and Mary MacDonald according to JH Fabien. Peter and Sarah McIntyre gave birth to seven children between 1845 and 1857 when the youngest, Daniel was born. Peter was remarried to Catherine Gillis (his cousin Patrick's? sister) after Sarah died. Augustine, in 1862 and Sarah Jane, in 1866 were born to Peter and his second wife, Catherine. The 1861 census for the Peter on Birch Grove matches the ages of Peter and Sarah’s children except for one male over 21. The 1881 census lists Peter O’Harn(sic) 61 years old, Catherine 58 years old, Bridget 18 years old, (this fits the age of a daughter, Bridget born of a Peter Ahearn and Catherine Whelan?) Augustine 20 years old, Sarah Jane 15 years old, two Ryne (Ryan?) children, John 19 and Maggie Ann 10 years old. Peter and Sarah's last child, Daniel 24 years. old was also listed.

The PEI Genealogical Society Vol. 15 # 1 included an interesting item from Mike Meggison. He noted that a Peter Ahearn and Margaret Ryan from PEI were the grandparents of Donald Regan, President Reagan's Chief of Staff and Treasury Secretary.

More recently acquired information establishes that this Peter Ahearn is indeed a forebear of Donald Regan. According to the above mentioned document by, J.H. Fabien this Peter was married to Sarah McIntyre on Oct 15, 1843. His parents were James Ahearn and Margaret Gavin. The 1891 census lists Peter's father as born on PEI. I discovered that the young Peter and his wife moved to Hull, Mass. about 1881. They have many descendants living primarily in Cohasset, Mass and other South Shore towns. I have a extensive family chart for Peter's descendants, a copy of which I sent to Donald Regan. I was delighted to receive a nice response from Mr. Regan, with an autographed dollar bill signed by him as, "Secretary of the U.S.Treasury" enclosed.

I have tried to put together as many reasonable connections in this Heron/Ahearn family as possible and have probably put some individuals in the wrong place. However I feel comfortable that the large picture is substantially correct and that Peter Heron, Mariner of Darnley Basin was the progenitor of this large clan of Ahearns by whatever name. I would love to see someone with better research skills than I continue work on this even if it proves me wrong about the identity of, Peter Heron, Mariner.

Some Descendants of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers

- of Tryon and Kildare PEI;

Overview:

This is a limited history of those descendants of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers that I have been able to identify to date. The six members of the first family that appear on the 1841 census were all born in Ireland after about 1816 when Pat and Mary would have been over thirty five years old. There was one daughter not listed on that census and probably other children born before this but I have not found them yet. Thirty-one or thirty-two children of these five were born on Prince Edward Island (PEI) in the 1840's or later and have been identified through baptismal records for the most part or, in some cases by marriage or census records.

Over eighty names of the great grand children of Pat and Mary are included in family charts interspersed in this history and included on a 10 page family chart that is available for those interested. The name are of offsprings who were all born on PEI about 1870 or later. I do not claim to have met genealogical standards documenting these individuals but think they are for the most part correct. It is possible that some who are included because the 1881 or 1891 census shows them as family members may not actually be children of the listed parents. In addition there are undoubtedly several more members of this generation, particularly grand children of Bridget Mackie and Michael Cahill I have not identified as yet.

The children of these eighty-some members of the fourth generation are harder to trace because most of the eighty had left the Island by the early 1900's. That is why from this period on, the history will concentrate on just a few of the families. That is, the descendants of Patrick Mackie and Lisa-Jane Kinch and, I hope some day one branch of the descendants of Bridget Mackie and Michael Cahill.

Patrick Mackie [1855-1945] was my grandfather. His father [c.1821-1870] and his grandfather [c.1781-<1839] were also named Patrick so it is easy to become confused as you try to follow the story through the generations. They are my direct maternal ancestors though, so the story tends to focus on them and their wives. However I have included a considerable amount of information about the other members of their families, particularly those of the earlier generations.

Some Descendants of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers

(both b.ca.1781)

EARLY HISTORY

The Immigrants

The 1841 Census of Lot 28, Prince Edward Island (PEI) lists a Patrick McKay (sic) as head of a household of six Roman Catholics all of whom paid their passage from Ireland. (The surname was spelled in a variety of ways until the late 1800's when it was quite regularly spelled either "Mackey" or "Mackie." The latter spelling will be used primarily throughout the following.) The household included one male under sixteen, two males and one female between sixteen and forty-five and one male and one female over sixty years old. Patrick had a leasehold of 100 acres of first quality land, 30 acres of which was "arable" [cleared?]. He had two horses, five neat cattle, eighteen sheep, and four hogs; and had raised twelve bushels of wheat, twelve of barley, 100 of oats and 100 of potatoes. According to notes on the margin of the census report the farm was near Cape Traverse and Tryon. The notes reported:

"The market most generally resorted to by this settlement and Carleton Point [is] Miramichi, Richibucto, Pictou, and Charlottetown. The distance to the last place being about thirty miles."

The Second Generation

This reconstruction of the family is based on census records and later church records that, while not always absolutely identifying the family members lead to near positive identification. The two, "over-sixty" must be Patrick[I] Mackie and his wife Mary Myers, both, then must have been born prior to the spring of 1781. As will be seen later they probably lived at least for some time in Newbawn, Wexford County. Most likely there were older family members who had married by 1841 but I have been unable to identify any of them. The two older males still living at home were probably James who was born about 1818 and Patrick[II],^[5] born within a year or two of James. Patrick[II] married Bridget Shreenan on 2-1-1841 (PEI Public Archives [PEIPA] Master Name Index [MNI]). If he were then, in 1841 twenty three years old or older (few men married younger then) he must have been born in 1818 or before. James, according to the Marriage Book married Mary Kehoe on, 2-7-1842. A gravestone in Tignish, St Simon and St Jude parish cemetery lists his death on, 4-9-93, Ae 75 placing his birth at about 1818. The one female over sixteen was probably the Catherine who, on Jan 7,1849 - as the daughter of, "the late Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers of Tignish" - married Patrick Cahill, son of Walter Cahill and Anastasia Cody. Her sister Bridget married Patrick's brother Michael at the same place on May 14,1849. (see St Simon and St Jude Parish records 1831-1854). Why Bridget (or Catherine) was not counted on the 1841 census is probably impossible to determine at this time. The male who was under sixteen years in 1841 old fits the Thomas Mackie who later records show living in the area (he appeared on the church record at St Peter's as a sponsor at the baptisms of Patrick Kehoe in 1845 and Martin Kehoe in 1848). Thomas married Catherine Shea [MNI] on Feb.1,1853.

Because of the good marriage records at Tignish, [St Simon and St Jude] Bridget and Catherine are clearly identified as daughters of Pat and Mary, but this is not true for records for their brothers who were married by missionary priests, probably from Charlottetown. Identifying them requires some assumptions based on the following; Fr. Malachy Reynolds, the priest who married Patrick [II] and James and Fr. J[ames] MacDonald who married Thomas did not identify the parents of the couples or the locations the marriages. However both priests had missions to the Lot 28 area at the time of these marriages. James' and Thomas' wives' surnames, Shea and Kehoe were names of Lot 28 families on the 1841 census and subsequent records, and the Shreenans were members of a large group of settlers from County Monaghan who settled near Lot 28 during the 1840's. Additional evidence to support the belief that these are the children of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers will be become evident subsequently.

Family Chart of the First and Second Generation;

The Exodus "Up West"

From reports included in the 1841 census Patrick seemed to have a productive farm, however he and all of his family members that I have found left the area within a few years and settled on farms on the western end of the Island. Four of his children and probably Patrick[I} and his wife Mary moved to Kildare in Lot 3 and his son Thomas later moved to Horsehead in Lot 1. About this time several other families from the Lot 28 area also moved to settlements near Tignish. I have not found primary evidence of this move but from the following at least one Islander remembers something about it.

In 1989 a Mr Kehoe of Tryon told me a story, that he remembered his father and grandfather telling about a group of relatives leaving the Tryon area and moving to Kildare. The story claims the travelers stopped in Summerside to feed the horses then moved on to Kildare, arriving there the same day. An amazing feat, if true, given the road conditions of the day. The distance is about sixty miles on todays roads. At any rate, it is apparent that, by the late 1840's the Mackies and several other families had moved "up west" from the Lot 18 and 28 area. Each of the children of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers can be identified in the Tignish area in a way that provides compelling circumstantial evidence that they were part of this exodus.

It seems Patrick[II] and his sisters Catherine and Bridget moved first. Records of the girls' marriages in Tignish (see First and Second Generation Chart-above) indicates the two women (and their parents) lived in Tignish in, (and probably before) 1849, the year of their marriages. Patrick [II] had at least one son, Thomas by his first wife Bridget Shreenan. Thomas was born on, 12-19-1846 and baptised on, 3-17-1847 at St. Peter's Church. Later, on, 4-12-1852, Patrick[II], "the widower of Bridget Shreenan" married Catherine Whelan in Tignish. Patrick[II]'s name does not appear on lists (provided by Arnold McGrath of Seven Mile Bay) of donors to the new St Peter's Church in 1851. That list includes a Mrs James Macky(sic), of Cape Travers, who gave to the altar collection and a James Maky(sic) and Thomas Maky(sic), both of whom gave oats toward what appears to be "stove and pipes" collection. The donor lists also includes the names of several Kaho(sic) and Shay(sic) men and women. These are names of families into which James and Thomas married, some additional members of which moved "up west".

Of the twelve children who, by birth and census records can be identified as those of James Mackie and Mary Kehoe, Martin the sixth born was baptised on 8-8-1852 at St .Peter's Church, Seven Mile Bay (Lot 27). Their next child, James was baptised on, 10-8-1854 at St Simon and St Jude Church in Tignish.

His children's birth records do not provide a link for Thomas with the two locations. The first child of record of Thomas Mackie and Catherine Shea was Catherine, baptised on, 3-29-1858 in Tignish. However Thomas did settle in an area, Horse Head of Lot 1 where several evidently transplanted Shea families also lived. And, the following information from a Deed of Partition found in the Land Conveyance Records of PAPEI [1769-1872 Liber 86 Folio629] confirms strong family connections between Tryon etc. and "up west". The document is apparently an agreement between the wife and heirs of Martin Kehoe to give one heir, son Richard Kehoe the rights to a piece of property in Lot 28 belonging to the estate. It lists Martin (deceased) his wife, Mary, their sons, daughters and sons-in-law as follows;

Sons;

Patrick, Michael, William, John and Richard

Daughters and sons-in-law;

Mary and her husband, James McKay(sic),

Johanna and her husband, John Kieffe,

Margaret and her husband, John Shay(sic),

Elizabeth and her husband, Henry Dawson and

Catherine and her husband, Abram Noonan.

Witnesses to their signatures were; Richard Dawson of Nail Pond, Lot 1 and Thomas Dawson of Tryon [Lot 28]. Many of these same family names appear on Lot 1 and Lot 3 censuses and in later vital records in Tignish.

By comparing the 1861 census with the names found on the 1863 Lake map James Mackie can be located on the O'Rourke Rd. in Kildare Lot 3 near his brother Patrick[II] and brothers-in-law Patrick [Catherine's] and Michael [Bridget's] Cahill's families. Thomas was living on a farm on the Horsehead Rd near at least five Shea families (his in-laws?). Subsequent census, marriage and birth records and family names on Meacham's 1880 Atlas strengthen the identification of these as family members and descendants.

Origins

The Mackies came from Ireland and there is evidence that they came from Newbawn, County Wexford. This is based indirectly on a connection described here, in the hope it might point some future dabbler in family history in a profitable direction;

In the early 1840's Irish expatriates in many parts of the world held meetings to support repeal of a British 1801 law that had practically disenfranchised voters in Ireland by dissolving the Irish legislature and absorbing its members in the British Parliament where their vote would have little effect. Supporters of this, "Repeal Movement", as it was called had several meetings on PEI, one of which a James MacKay(sic) attended. He identified himself as from Newbawn, Wexford residing in Tryon [Lot 28] (see The Island Magazine #20 Fall and Winter 1986.) The author, Terrence Punch indicates that the locality listed was the birthplace of the individual. The 1841 census lists only one Mackie family on Lot 28, and our James Mackie is the only one in the area on subsequent records, giving me reason to believe that he is the James MacKay listed among the Repeal Movement supporters. And - that he, (and his parents and siblings?) came from Newbawn, Wexford.

THE THIRD GENERATION The children of:

Pat (Patrick[II]) James, Catherine, Bridget and Thomas.

Pat Mackie Pat [II] (b.c 1816)

As far as I can determine Pat had just one son,Thomas by his first wife, then two more, Joseph (b. 2-2-1853) and Patrick[III] (b.2-11-1855), then Ann (b.5-20-1856) and Catherine (b. 2-3-1861) and Mary (b.4-23-63), and finally twins John and Mary who were born on May 11 1865 and baptised the next day - an indication that they may have died soon after birth. There is some family recollection of a story of Thomas going to Salem Mass. as a young man to go to sea and never being heard from again.

Family Chart of the Patrick [II] and his children;

Patrick[II] and Catherine (she was the daughter of James Whelan and Isabella Ahearn) settled on the O'Rourke Road near his (and her) relatives. On the fourth of March in 1870 Patrick[II] was returning from a visit to his sister (in Malpeque?) according to family oral history, when he died as a result of his horse falling through the ice. The following article appeared in the Summerside Journal on March 10.1870.

"A man named Patrick MacKay(sic) was found died(sic) on the ice on Kildare River on Friday last. His horse and sleigh were found in a hole near where the body lay. He it appears, lost the track, [in those days winter travel was in a bee-line across fields, fences and rivers following a route marked by trees cut and placed there by local farmers] and drove into a hole in the ice. The water was not very deep and part of the sleigh was above the ice. It is said that there was another man in company with MacKay and it is feared he drowned. MacKay lived for many years in Tryon." The next item in the paper was:

"The ice on Charlottetown harbor is gettin[g] bad. On Friday last several horses broke through."

Although there are no reports to that effect the "other man" might have been his son Joseph who would have been eighteen. Joseph does not appear in any subsequent records. Howard Doucette, a grandson used to tell a dramatic story of how Patrick[II] tried three time to pull the horse out of the ice until he was finally struck by the horse's front leg and was knocked unconscious. Since there were no witness this must have been one of those, -"He must have, etc.-----" stories that so often become true with the passage of time.

Catherine (Mackie) O'Connor the daughter of Patrick[III] used tell of the parish priest refusing to bury Patrick[II] in the consecrated ground because they didn't know if he was in the state of grace. None of his or her grown-up relatives would challenge this decision so it was up to young Patrick[III] then fifteen years old to make the case and have his father buried in the cemetery. She showed a touch of resentment toward her long-dead relatives whenever she told this story.

It was very difficult for a widow with young children to get by in those days so after what must have been a difficult year and one-half, on Oct. 17, 1871 Catherine married Alexander McIntyre. In the interim she had lost the farm to a man named Silas Raynor. That too was an unhappy event but the particulars of the story remain a mystery to me. Alexander McIntyre, who had a farm in St Roche, Lot 2 was supposed to have been an old man. It is interesting that their marriage record reveals that Alexander, the son of John McIntyre and Mary MacDonald and Catherine were second and third cousins. This was the first hint that led to the search for the Scotch forebears of Catherine (Ahearn) Whelan - which I discuss in my, PEI Ancestors.

At about this time Patrick[III] went to work running the farm for Catherine (Dalton) Kinch whose husband, Lawrence Kinch had drowned in the Kildare River in 1868. On October 12, 1872 Patrick[III] married the widow's daughter, Elizabeth (Liza-Jane) and continued to run her farm until 1881 when Mrs. Kinch's son, William reached the age of sixteen. Paddy and Lisa-Jane then moved to his mother's farm (Mr. McINtyre having died) in Lot 2.

James Mackie (b.c.1818)

The 1861 census of Lot 3 lists; James, a tailor with eight children; two boys and two girls under 5; one boy and one girl over five and one boy and one girl over sixteen. James and his wife were between twenty-one and forty-five. This approximates the birth records of the children of James Mackie and Mary Kehoe. The following chart shows their family with birth or baptism and marriage records unless otherwise indicated taken from church records at St Simon and St Jude in Tignish. As is usual throughout this paper birth dates giving only the year are based on estimates taken from the 1881 or 1891 census death records which give the age at death:

Family Chart of James Mackie, and his children - of the Third Generation;

Two of his James' sons, Patrick and John married and settled on Lot 1 near where their uncle Thomas (and some of their aunts and uncles?) lived. James' other sons, except son James were still listed in their parents' household on the 1891 census. The Johanna who was born in 1845 and the one born in 1848 apparently died young as another daughter, born in 1866 was also named Johanna. There doesn't appear to be any record of the marriage of Johanna or her sister Elizabeth. Many young people left the Island to find work in "The Boston States" about the time these people reached maturity. It would be interesting to find out if any of this branch of the Mackies is working on family history.

Bridget Mackie (b.c 1824)

The 1861 census lists two boys under five, two over five and one girl under five in the home of Michael Cahill. One child was born during the past year. The birthdates of the children of Michael Cahill and Bridget Mackie match these except for one male child (Patrick or John). Since they gave the name Patrick to a son born later, in 1868 the Patrick born earlier must have died.

Their son Walter married Bridget O'Connor the daughter of Edward O'Connor and Margaret O'Connor. Edward and Margaret O'Connor apparently belonged to two different O'Connor families one from Wexford and one from Tipperary both who lived in the area as early as the 1820's. Margaret was the daughter of Maurice O'Connor and Alice Quinlan who arrived at Cascumpec shortly after 1826. We do not have certain identification of Edward's family but there is an interesting group of O'Connor children ^[6] who may have been his siblings.listed on a "census" of Lot 4 done by Hill in 1825/26 (see, Counting Heads: William Hill's Mysterious List, The Island Magazine # 28) A Mary O'Connor who seems to have been one of them married Patrick Aylward in 1844. The marriage record in Tignish lists her as the daughter of Michael O'Connor and Ann O'Harra(sic?). These then could have been the parents of the other O'Connor children and Edward. (see my O'Connor Chart for more on this.

Family Chart of Bridget Mackie and her children - of the Third Generation

Catherine Mackie (b.c 1826) for Family Chart - See Bridget's - above

Catherine, it appears had no children. Her husband, Patrick Cahill died some- time between 1870 when he execute his will, and 10-11-1875 when his widow completed a Conveyance of Deed for his lease to the farm to John Cahill. Patrick's will had provided that the rights to his farm would go to Mary-Ann Cahill upon his wife's death. Mary-Ann the was daughter of his brother Michael. Later on 10-21-1889 Mary-Ann sold the rights to the lease on which it was indicated that Patrick's widow, Catherine was now deceased. It is not clear what happened to John Cahill's (Mary Ann's brother?) rights to the lease.

Thomas Mackie (b.c.1831)

The 1861 census of Lot 1 lists a Thomas Mackie and two girls under 5 years old. He and his wife were between 21 and 45 years old. Matching his name with that of several others on the censuses with the 1863 Lake Map places him near Horse Head and several Shea families. Meacham's Atlas of 1881 lists Thomas' name on the same farm. However an 1878 census of Immaculate Heart Parish lists "widow Makay(sic)" and three children; Catherine 21, Rebecca 19 and Patrick 17 years old. The 1881 census does not include the widow but adds a 2 year old, Lorence [Lawrence?] to the household which is now headed by (Thomas' son ?) Patrick.

Family Chart of Thomas Mackie and his children - of the Third Generation;

The Fourth Generation; The children of Pat, James, Catherine, Bridget and

Thomas; (Thirty one children)

Patrick[II]'s -and his wives', Bridget Shreenan and Catherine Whelan's (seven) children: Thomas, Joseph, Paddy(Patrick[III]),Ann, Catherine"Kate", Mary and John&Mary.

1 Thomas (son of Bridget)

and

2 Joseph As mentioned above I have not been able to trace these two.

3 Paddy Mackie; son of Patrick[II] an Catherine Whelan

Patrick[III], called "Paddy" and Liza-Jane in 1881 moved from the widow Kinch's farm in Lot 3, Kildare to his mother's farm in Lot 2, St Roche. Their oldest daughter stayed with the widow and apparently spent much of her childhood there. Three children were born in Kildare followed by seven more born in St Roche. Paddy ran a large farm and also captained a coastal schooner, The Maggie MacBeth which carried produce to Chatham, N.B. on the Miramichi River and brought lumber back to the Island. For more on [my grandfather] Paddy, see my (unpublished ) Paddie Mackie: His Life and His Clan.

Family Chart of Patrick[III] - and His Children ;

Paddy Mackie was my grandfather and I knew most of his children, (my aunts and uncles) except Frank and Ann who died before I was born and Bert who died when I was about six. Later I will summarize what I know and have heard about their lives, (see page 14) But first, are the rest of the third generation of Patrick Mackie and Mary Myers' descendants, Paddy's siblings, only three of whom appeared to have survived to maturity:

4) Ann Mackie; daughter of Patrick[II] an Catherine Whelan

Family Chart of Ann Mackie - and her children - the Fourth Generation;

Ann and Catherine were excellent seamstresses, so it is possible that they had apprenticed to their uncle James who was a tailor. Ann worked for some time in Alberton and married Alex Martin of that town. Her neice Mary, Patrick[II]'s oldest daughter lived with Ann and her husband as a young woman. There is little family history about Ann's family but it was thought until recently that she had only two children; a daughter Floss and a daughter Annie. However the 1891 census of Lot 4 lists; Alex Martin 35, a Railway Employee who was a Presbyterian born in PEI whose mother and father were both born in Scotland; his wife Annie 33 born in PEI whose mother was born in PEI and father born in Ireland. They had six children; James 12, Annie 10, Katie 8, William 5, Florence 4 and Mary 2 years old. It appears that this must be Ann Mackie's family. Ann died on Nov 6, 1918 and is buried in Alberton.

5) Catherine; daughter of Patrick[II] and Catherine Whelan

Catherine married John Doucette who had a sawmill on Harper Road near Tignish. Their children were Howard, Melissa, Bertha and Floss. Howard lived in the homestead until he died within the past few years. The 1991 telephone directory lists a Mrs. Howard Doucette on Harper Rd. Melissa married William Ryan and lived in Greenmount. Bertha and Floss went to the "Boston States".

Family Chart of Catherine "Kate" Mackie - her children - the Fourth generation;

6) Mary; daughter of Patrick[II] and Catherine Whelan

Mary She married John McPherson 11/25/1885 in Lowell, Mass, son of Angus McPherson and Ann Shea. He was born Abt. 1867 in PEI, Canada, and died 11/28/1934 in 117 Fulton St, Centralville, Lowell, MA.They had two sons, Francis Served in Battery F 102nd Field Artillery of the 26 Division in WW I. Severely wounded in action. Died later as a result. He was well known baseball player before the war. There is a McPherson Park in Lowell named after him. William and Marion stayed in the Lowell area but Lillian settled in Washington, DC and most of her descendants now live in that area. Daughter Katherine McPherson contracted Scarlet fever at 16 which left her profoundly deaf.

7) John and 8) Mary; children of Patrick[II] and Catherine Whelan

Twins, baptised the day after birth. Apparently they died as infants.

PADDY AND LIZA JANE MACKIE’S FAMILY

More anecdotal story of my grandparents and life in Tignish

I) Mary "Aunt May" Mackie;

May was born in Kildare while her parents lived in the house of her grandmother, Catherine Dalton, (the widow of Lawrence Kinch) known by May's siblings as "Gammie Kinch". When her parents moved to St. Roche May stayed with the widow and spent much of her young years there. Later she lived for some time with her aunt Mary (Mackie) Martin in Alberton. She married Frank White of Alberton and her son Jack and daughter Foster were born there. She separated from Frank who left the area leaving May with the young Foster who was turned over to Paddy and Liza-Jane while May went to Boston for work. Some years later she decided to get Foster and bring her to Boston. Paddy did not think she had the right situation to properly care for a child but May insisted and took her back to the States over his objections.

Later May went to work in a glove factory in Gloversville NY and married Joseph Wilkins there. They had no children. May’s son Jack died as a result of a football injury. She became active in the Christian Science Church were she had a position as "a reader", a sort of counselor who provided advice and conselation to church members. She used to visit her relatives including my family in Holbrook and Randolph, Mass, and we went to Gloversville on occasion. As children we thought she must be very rich because she was very generous, particularly to my sisters. She died about 1976.

Her daughter Foster married Frank Ditmar in Gloversville and had one child, Dianne who married Tom McGowen. They have several children, Erin b. 1970, Katie b. 1972, Colleen b. 1976 and Margaret b. 1977. Tom teaches high school math in N. Andover, Mass. and Dianne teaches elementary classes in Ossipee,NH.

II) Roseanna Mackie;

Roseanna married Joe Buote of St. Roche. Census records for 1901 show a daughter Mary A born Dec 2, 1900, and church records show another Mary A born on August 2 1907. Roseanna also had a son, I think who died young She had two grown daughters, one named Adeline and one named Stella. One of them married Russell Shea and lived at least for some time near her mother in St Roche. After Joe Buote died Roseanna married William Waite, a widower who had a son, Benjamin. Ben was reported to have loved Roseanna's younger sister who had rejected him to Mary Mick Lynch. She had no children by William but lived for many years on his large farm in St Roche with William and with his son Ben and his family after William died. She died in 1970.

III) Joseph Mackie;

Joseph "Joe" married Margaret-Mary Handrahan in Providence RI but later returned to PEI and farmed the farm next to Paddy’s in St Roche. His first four children; Joseph, Carl, Doris, Earl and his last son, Edward was born in Providence, RI. Terrance. His fifth son, Terrence was born in PEI. So sometime between 1918 when Terrence was born and 1924 when Edward was born Joe sold the farm to Paddy and moved his family to "The States". They lived for many years in Providence RI. Son Joseph was killed in an automobile accident in RI while still a young man. Carl, Doris and Earl brought their families up in the Providence area. Terrence, who died on December 28, 1994 and his wife [Muriel Vaughn] lived in Cranston, RI. Their children are; Vaughn Terrance, Daniel S., Brian J., Geraldine [Summers] and M. Patricia [Mackie-Dosreis]. (Patricia is sending me more information about Joe's descendants.) Edward studied law in Baltimore MD and (in 1995) is still practicing law there. He and his wife, Caroline live in Monkton, Md. They have several children and grandchildren. I expect to receive the specifics about them soon.

IV) Anne "Annie" Mackie;

Annie married Michael Lynch in Tignish on Feb 9, 1902. and died there on Dec.5, 1908 shortly after the birth on Nov. 21,1908 of Annie-May, her fourth child. The others were Olive-[Marie], 1902; Robert -Emmet, 1904; and [Mary]-Winifred, 1906. Michael Lynch was remarried to Irene Murphy by whom he had another child, Florence-May in 1914. Annie-May was reared by her grandparents, Paddy and Lisa-Jane. She lived in Natick Mass and died in 1994. Olive and Annie May married Scholl brothers.

V) Catherine "Kate" Mackie;

Kate was my mother so I will be able to write a lot more about her life and family than the others. She loved to tell us about her life on the farm, the exploits of her father and Jim Whelan on the Maggie Macbeth and her school experience. Her two heroes were her father Paddy and her teacher Willie Overbeck. She left for Boston when she was seventeen years old and stayed for a while with her mother's sister "Aunt Kit" who ran a boarding house in Roxbury. She was proud that she never had to work as a maid, but was able to get the better jobs as a waitress in the better restaurants and resort areas. She had only an eighth grade education but was hired to teach school in Michigan. For some reason she returned to Boston as soon as she arrived in Michigan. I suspect she found that rural Michigan at that time was not much improvement over Tignish. It was during this period that she married my father, Thomas A. O'Connor who was a chauffeur working, I think, in Newton. (He was born in Pawtucket RI and his father was born in Worcester, MA) He later got a job driving a truck for Adams Express which was later taken over by the Railway Express Agency were he worked until his retirement. He once told me that he had traveled to Michigan with my mother and that they had gotten married before they left so they could travel together. Shortly after the Michigan experiment they moved to Tignish PEI where he opened a pool hall and where, on Sept. 10,1914 their first child, John-Jeremiah was born. The Pool-hall was so successful he opened one in O’Leary. This was just before WW I. PEI contributed a large number of its young men to the war effort. Unfortunately that included the bulk of the pool hall customers so the pool halls were closed and they returned soon after to the Boston area where they spent much of the remainder of their lives, except for a few further brief experiments with life on PEI.

Their first home in Boston was probably at 15 M St. in South Boston where daughter Catherine was born on July 25, 1917. On Aug. 27, 1918 she died at Boston City Hospital of Tuberculosis Meningitis. After she was buried at Mt Benedict my mother never returned to the house on M Street. Next Mary Isabel was born on Aug 1,1919 at Fort Hill Sq in Roxbury. Meanwhile, Kate was saving dimes and well before Eleanor was born in 1922 they had saved enough money, (200.dollars) for a down payment on a house on Liberty Street in Randolph. Later, I think it was because service on the Randolph spur line of the Old Colony Railroad was poor or, it may have been canceled that they sold that house and bought one at, 261 Union Street, Holbrook near a main line with better service to Boston. I, Thomas P. was born there in 1923, Lawrence-James “Larry" in 1925 and David in 1930. Twenty one grandchildren of Tom and Kate were born to five of their six children.

VI) John Wilfred "Will" Mackie;

Will, who was born in 1888 as the second oldest boy was expected to help his older brother, Joe on the farm. And when Will was a youth Paddy was running the Schooner, Magee Macbeth so he and Joe had more responsibilities than usual. This may help to explain why the boys didn't remember Paddy with the same affection as their sisters did. About 1920 Will and his younger brother, Merl came to Boston to find work. Liza Jane had died in 1921 and Paddy prevailed upon Merl to return home to help on the farm. Will stayed in Boston and in 1924 married Ann "Annie" Arsenault who was living in Providence but had been reared near Will in Greenmount, PEI. They had five children Helen b.,1925, Wilfred b., 1927, James-Allen b. 1929, Marie b. 1935 and Wade b. 1939. In, I think the late twenties they bought a house with a large barn and several acres of land next to us on Union Street in Holbrook, Mass. Will worked for many years for The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad.

VII) Mary Bertha "Bert" Mackie

Bert, who was born in 1891 became a school teacher. She married Steve Gallant of Oleary, PEI(I think) and died at an early age in 1930.

VIII) Genetta "Et" Mackie

Et was born in 1893 and died in Randolph in 1992. She grew up at a time when apparently The Mackies were more prosperous than they had been when my mother, Kate was young. Et remembered she and Bert thinking nothing of going to town and ordering material for a dress and having a seamstress tailor it. Maybe they were more prosperous or maybe it's just the recollections typical of the youngest daughter in a large family. In 1915 she married Sylestine "Tine" Arsenault, an uncle(I think) of Annie, his brother Will's wife. They had eight children Dorothy, Francis "Frank", Irene, Maxwell b.1924, Jean, Barbara, Robert and Bernard "Barney". About 1930 they moved to Boston and sometime later to Randolph, Mass. Tine was a tall easy going man who worked for many years for Monsanto Chemical Co. in Everett.

IX) James Merril "Merl” Mackie;

Merl was born in 1896 and accept for a brief period in Boston he spent most of his younger years on the farm in St Roche, PEI. He served in World War I with the Princess Pats of the Canadian Army spending some time in Ireland. His favorite story about his military life was being amazed at how he would leave his boots outside the door in the hotel in Ireland and find them all shined in the morning. When he returned from Boston he married Mary "May" Harper on 11-24-1923. He and May came to Boston for a Honeymoon and served as Godparents at my Baptism that December. They had children six children all born in St. Roche; Patrick bc.1925, Robert bc 1927, Coleen, Esther (now deceased) Leonard and Roy, and twenty grandchildren many of whom are living in Ontario, some in St Louis MO area and at least two of whom are teaching in Japan. Merl was an excellent farmer and fisherman, utilizing every acre of Paddie's farm and the adjoinning farm that had been his older brother Joe's. He also fished lobster, cod, herring and mackerel. I remember that one year in the thirties he caught $4000.00 worth of lobsters, a phenomenal catch in those days. Sometime in the late forties he sold the farm and bought one in Peterborough, Ontario. In, Peterborough Merl was a pioneer in growing sod for sale to those who wished ready-made lawns or golfing greens. He also farmed and had a horse breeding business. As he got older he sold the farm and retired to a single house in town were he died on April 13, 1980. His wife May is still alive at this writing - Feb. 1997 [died 9/27/1999, in Peterborough, ON]. I have recently been contacted over the Internet by, Francis Glenn Mackie of St Louis MO just about the time his father, Robert,(b.1927) Merl’s second oldest son, who I knew as a boy was dying in Seattle WA. He died on Dec. 15, 1996.

X) Joseph Francis "Frank" Mackie ;

Frank was born in 1899 and I know little about him except that he died of pneumonia in 1921 after having walked about five miles home to St Roche from St. Louis, PEI in a blinding snow storm.
FAMILY OF THOMAS O’CONNOR & CATHERINE MACKIE

Of Holbrook, Mass and other places.

The following is from a piece I wrote for another purpose; to show the relationships our family has had over the years with Prince Edward Island and Canada;

John Jeremiah O’Connor;

John, who we called, "Gene" was named after his paternal grandfather John and his only brother Jeremiah who had no children. He was born in 1914 in Tignish PEI during his parents short sojourn there. He next returned to the Island in 1929 when the entire family went there to bring our uncle back to the US. During the thirties he visited the Island several times and on one occasion attempted to start a fish filleting business even to having an ice house started and filled with ice. With war approaching this project was aborted and in 1942/43 he went to work as a crane operator building the, Argentia Air Base in Newfoundland. He then attempted to join the Canadian Air Force, but was too old for the existing standards so he joined the Army and trained at Camp Utopia in New Brunswick. He was one of very few selected there for officer's training and was sent to the, Officer's Training Centre at Brockville, Ontario, where he qualified as a Second Lieutenant in the Armoured Services on May 15, 1943. He served as a Lieutenant in the Armoured services in Italy and France and left the Canadian Army in Europe to head an United Nation Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) camp near Hanover, Germany. He died on February 23, 1972 at the Veteran's Administration Hospital in Houston, Texas.

Catherine O’Connor

Catherine; was born on July 25, 1917 in Boston and died at the age of one year on August 27, 1918.

Mary Isabella O’Connor;

Mary was born on August 1, 1919 was the member of the family least attracted to PEI. She spent the summer of 1938 at our place in St. Felix, PEI [more about this later] but left there to marry William [Bill] Lawry in Braintree, Massachusetts. Bill worked at Fore River Shipyard before serving with the the US Army occupation troops in German. He later graduated became a teacher of Auto mechanics at Westfield Vocational school and Mary graduated from Westfield State College and American International College Graduate School and became a teacher of English and then a Guidance counselor at Westfield Public Schools. She died on February 16, 1988 in Westfield, Massachusetts.

Eleanor Elizabeth O’Connor:

Eleanor was born in 1922 in Randolph, Massachusetts. Eleanor always enjoyed the Island and returns there often. She stayed at Notre Dame Academy for two years, (1939 and 1940) while attending Prince of Wales College and remains in contact with her friends from those days. After graduating from Prince of Wales she returned to Massachusetts. She retired from, Empoyers Mutual of Wasau Insurance Company after being employed in many roles such as; a Trouble-Shooter visiting Wasau offices in various parts of the US, Insurance Underwriter and finally Office Manager for their New England office in Belmont, Mass. She lives in Sandwich, Massachusetts.

Thomas Philip O’Connor:

I was born in 1923 in Holbrook, Massachusetts. I have always had a close connection with PEI. My first trip to the Island was when I was six years old in 1929 with the entire family except David who was not yet born . That was quite a trip with seven of us, plus Rex, our collie dog riding on the running board and, Sylistine Arsenault, "Tine" our six foot four uncle riding with us on the return trip.—And with only gravel roads beyond Portand, Maine.

The family and I made several subsequent early trips to The Island and finally in the Spring of 1938 we moved to and establish a farm at St Felix, Lot 2. My father returned to Holbrook and his job and my mother and I and brothers David and Larry stayed on the farm. I enrolled in Dalton School in Tignish in the Spring and Fall but transferred to the St Felix School when the bad weather came. My mother and David returned to Holbrook later that Fall until the following Spring and a housekeeper was hired to cook for Larry and me. My father had planned to retire early but when that couldn't be worked out, and with Canada at War it was decided that after spending another Summer on the farm we should all return at, least temporarily to the States.

I served three years in the US Army, first in basic training in the Armored Forces then in an engineering program at Muskingum College in Ohio and finally with the 102nd Division Infantry in Europe. In fact for a short time our Regiment, the 405th was attached to the Canadian Second Army in Holland and we got a rum ration. At about that time my brother John was with the Canadian Assault troops at Anzio and Larry was on an LST that had 85% casualties in the attack on Iwo Jima — a very difficult time for my parents, particularly my mother who was beside herself with worry and David and my sisters who were home with them. — But that's another story.

After the War I was accepted at SDU in December of 1946 on the basis of my course work at Muskingum and graduated in 1950 as a member of a very distinguished class, that included, Wendell MacIntyre among its notable graduates. I continue to return to The Island at least once a year and look forward to trying the new bridge this year.[1997]

After St Dunstan's I attended Boston College Graduate school for my Master's Degree, got married (to Margaret Schultz whose mother, Cecilia Farrell comes from St Mary's Road, PEI) and went on to becoming a teacher of Chemistry and Physics and Science Department Head at Bridgewater-Raynham Regional High School. [Fr. Cass and Fr. MacDonald my chemistry and physics teachers at SDU would have been surprised.] Margaret and I have three daughters; Patricia-Jean, Mary-Elizabeth and Margaret-Mary. Another daughter, Mary Margaret died at birth.

In 1964 I was selected to join the, Oak Ridge Institute of Nuclear Studies for a year under a contract with the Atomic Energy Commission. Part of this role was to give lectures and demonstrations of nuclear energy at Massachusetts High Schools. At the end of that year I was joined the Mass. Dept. of Education, first as State Supervisor of Science until 1971 when I became Asst. Director of the Bureau of Teacher Preparation and Certification. The Bureau was responsible for reviewing for approval, teacher preparation programs in Massachusetts colleges and universities and for issuing teaching certificates to teachers and administrators who qualified. In 1980 I became Director of the Bureau until I retired in 1988. Since then I spend a good deal of my time pursuing my avocation, genealogy and family history, a hobby that started in 1970 when Mike [SDU class of 1950] and Dolly Hennessey showed/gave me a copy of Meacham's Atlas.

James Lawrence O’Connor;

"Larry", who was born in 1925 in Holbrook, Mass. is particularly fond of The Island and visits there often. He, sometimes with me drives down to Tignish, walks the beach of our property at what we call, “Upper Kildare Cape" and returns to Mass. (The farm we had lived on before the war had been sold and the property in St Felix, then called O'Leary's or Donahue’s shore was bought. In the 1980s it was subdivided part of it sold and the remaining lots distributed one to each of our parent's 21 grandchildren.) Larry married Eleanor Kennedy of Holbrook, Mass. in 1947. Their children are; Kevin, Karen, Larry Jr, Jimmy and David. He graduated from Burdet College and was employed in Boston by the, Milwaukee Railroad. and later by the Pacific Fruit Express. He switched from rails to highways for a position contacting traffic managers throughout New England for Yellow Freight, a national trucking company finally becoming Terminal Manager for their Boston facility. He is retired now but spends a large part of every day helping his son, Larry Jr. at his business, O'Connor Home Improvement Company in Falmouth, Mass.

David Patrick O’Connor;

David was born in 1930 in Holbrook, Mass. visited the Island many times and spent one year at St Dunstan's Grade 10. As his children grew he, as did Larry built summer homes on Cape Cod which diverted his attention from the Island. David married Libby Lennon Hart of Randolph and had four boys and two girls; Paul, Bobby, Catherine, John, Tommy and Eileen. He worked for a while as a carpenter until he graduated from Fitchburg State College and became a teacher of Industrial Arts in Stoughton, Mass. He retired in 1992 and died in 1995.

Comments

It seems the almost compulsive attraction of the Island for my generation seems to have faded with the next. Many of my parent's twenty-one grandchildren love the Island. However, even though they each have a building lot in, "Upper Kildare" (and have been paying an unreasonable tax bill for it) none seem to have a strong enough interest or opportunity to build or to spend much time there.

For any readers who might be interested in more about our forebears on PEI and their descendants I have a large amount of family history in my files which includes over 2000 births and 500 marriages. Some of it date as early as the late 1700's with extrapolations to the mid 1700's. Much of this information may be found on the Dave Hunter’s PEI Web site The Island Register <http://www.isn.net/~dhunter/index.html>. I will be happy to share this information with others and add to it any appropriate contributions that I received.

TERRENCE FARRELL AND ELLEN CONDON

Traces my wife’s mother, Ceclia (Farrell) Schultz’ forebears

The following is a summary of my efforts to date [written about 1990] at tracing the early Farrell ancestors of my wife, Margaret(Schultz). The late Archie Lanigan who was a teacher on St Mary's Road wrote a genealogy of the Lanigans in 1978. This is the source of much of my information. (Most Lannigans now spell their name with two "n's" but in deference to Archie I'll use his version on this report.)

Terrence Farrell and his wife Ellen Condon arrived at Cascumpec, PEI from Kings County Ireland about 1821. At that time they had one daughter, Anne about five years old and probably a second daughter, Ellen. Archie says they "removed to Morell" and apparently Terrence died about then because records show an Ellen Condon married a Thomas Hackett at St Peter,s(near Morell) in 1834.(I don't know why but this marriage is listed in the records of St Paul's Anglican Church.)

[Later in a search of Provincial records I found that they had married again in a Catholic ceremony.

PEI Surrogate marriages list;

# 134 married by John Jardin, JP by license on 11/7/1834, sponsors Micael Scully and Richard Cullen.

# 195 married by John MacDonald, Catholic Priest by Banns on 1/22/1836, sponsors Mathew Rivel and Mary McIntyre.

At one time the priests were required to send their marriage registers to the surrogates office periodically to be listed there.]

Before he died Terrence had fathered three more children on the Island; William about 1823, Terrence about 1825 and John about 1831. So in 1834 in 1834 Ellen must have had at least five children, three fairly young to care for.

Thomas Hackett and Ellen next show up near Chatham New Brunswick where Ellen (or Mary Ellen)Hackett was born in 1836, Edward in 1842 and Augustine in 1845. Ellen's older daughter Anne Farrell married John Lanigan there at St Patrick's, Nelson/Miramichi on Jan.21,1836. John and Anne had eleven children, one whom, William had fifteen including my friend Archie. Another of the eleven, Michael was the father of a Nicholas Lanigan who I assume was the Nick who married Mary Farrell, the daughter of James Farrell and Mary O'Connor. John Lanigan had come to Chatham from Ireland (Kilkenny Tipperary as Archie put it) in 1820 via Newfoundland according to Archie.

I'd love to know why but John Lanigan and Anne, Ellen Farrell who married Nicholas Murphy, and William Farrell who married Catherine Murphy show up next in the the Sturgeon/Cambridge area. A John Condon lived there but I have not found any connection. The Lot 63 (Cambridge) census for 1841 does not show any Farrells (William would have been about 18 then) but it does show John Lanigan with a wife(Anne Farrell?) and two small sons next to Nicholas Murphy and his wife(Ellen Farrell?). William Farrell appears on the 1861 census in the same area with 10 in the family all born on PEI. Among the 10 was James who was to marry Mary O'Connor, daughter of Henry O'Connor and Sarah Kearney and later establish a farm on St Mary's Road. The attached chart lists the children of James and Mary.

Some of the Farrells however remained in the Miramichi area with their mother and step-father.Later Thomas Hackett and Ellen Condon with Terrence and John Farrell and (Mary)Ellen Hackett, who had been born in NB moved to Sea Cow Pond near Tignish. Ellen Condon gave birth to two more Hackett children there; Edward b.1842 and Augustine b.1845. It is interesting that although the families lived on opposite ends of the Island one of William Farrell's sons, Philip b.1857 apparently spent much of his life the Tignish area near his grandmother but also is identified with the Sturgeon area. Philip Farrell was part of the ill-fated group that nearly all died after being caught by the ice flow crossing Northumberland Straights on the mail trip on Jan 27,1885. He survived but I think his arm was permanently damaged by the experience and he was given a Government job in Ottawa. (I'm not sure there is any connection between the event and the job.) Terrence Gavin, a Farrell descendant living in Tignish gave me a long poem written by Philip Farrell describing the ordeal on the ice floes. [These open boats had runners on them and

when they came to an ice flow the crew would drag the boat up onto and across the ice to open water.]

Terrence Farrell married Honora Carroll in Tignish in 1854 and later (1874) Anne Gavin. John married Flora White in 1853. Meacham's 1881 Atlas shows them both living near the North Cape not far from Thomas Hackett. They both had sons named Terrence, one of whom(John's) was the Terrence Farrell of "Gracie Parker" fame. For those who don't know; there is a famous poem about this ship which was lost with all hands including Captain Terrence Farrell and his brother Bill.

In case anyone would like to pursue this branch any further I'll add a a story with a personal connection. My mother, Catherine Mackie was an Islander and our family used to visit her homestead near Tignish. Her brother Merrill used to tell me of going out west for the harvest and how he always worked for a wheat farmer named Terrence Farrell who had migrated from Tignish. For some reason years ago I wrote down the name of the town, Biggar, Saskatchewan on an old atlas. I recently ran across that named and called information for the number of Terrence Farrell, figuring he would have named one his sons, Terrence. He did, although the son goes by the name "Vincent". I got a lot of material from him but have not done much with it lately. If anyone is interested (I know Gregg Farrell RR #4 Montague PEI COA IRO is) his address is:Vincent Farrell Box 912, Biggar, Saskatchewan SOK OMO.(Vincent is now deceased)

I have also been in contact with another descendant of this branch of the Farrells:William(Bill) Farrell of, 1315 Elgin Circle Oakville, Ont.L6H 2J9 <Dwnhilbill@aol.com>and his nephew of #210 1260 Marlborough Court, Oakville, Ont.L6H 3H5. They have collected an enormous amount of information on the Farrells.

[March 28, 2000 Comments; I have collected a lot of info on these families since 1990 but have not updated this piece lately. Many sources have sent me information about the line and in 1999 The Farrells and Lannigans held a reunion at Montague at which over 200 people attended. Needless to say more info was obtained in connection with that reunion. Tom O’Connor]

Tom O'Connor, tpoc@aol.com, 781-843-6653 395 Liberty St,.Braintree, MA02184

P.E.I. COLLECTION

LIBRARY OF U.P.E.I.

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

OF

SIR CHARLES DALTON

-FOXMAN-

by

Robert Allan Rankin

University Of Prince Edward Island

1974

PRESENTED TO PROF. DAVID WEALE AS

THE UNIVERSITY OF PRINCE EDWARD

ISLAND.

[Library Notes] P.E.I.

F 5374.5

.D3

R 3

[Library Stamp?]082555

[Mr. Rankin went on to complete an M.A. in Canadian History, with a speciality in Loyalist Studies, at the University of New Brunswick. Following this, he went to work for the P.E.I. Museum and Heritage Foundation, and was the founder and first editor of The Island Magazine and has written extensively.]

My thanks to Mr. Allan Rankin for allowing me to use and edit his article, if credited.

Tom O’Connor

The following is slightly edited and amended by Thomas P O’Connor ;

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

OF

SIR CHARLES DALTON

-FOXMAN

-presented to Prof. DAVID WEALE of by student, Robert Allan Rankin in 1974 a requirement for History 492 at,THE UNIVERSITY OF PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND. Two pictures of the subject, Charles Dalton and a few other items enclosed in square brackets, [**] have been added, tpoc

[This picture isfrom the files of Prince Edward Island Public Archives and Records Office, (PEIPARO) Charlottetown, P.E.I., Canada]

I

_______________

EARLY YEARS

A birch beam holds up the southwest corner of an old weathered barn on the Norway Road, near Tignish Prince Edward Island. Scratched in pencil upon its smooth face are the discouraged words of young Charles Dalton, a poor hunter-fishermen who had been trying to breed foxes in captivity. The year was 1875:

"Reds produced Cross Red-Blacks . . Nothing

else but Patches. Killed Crosses . .”

C.D.

Dalton's experiments were motivated by a keen love of the outdoors, a perservering curiousity, and the desire to increase in numbers an animal otherwise doomed to extinction. Born at Norway on June 9^th, 1850, the son of Irish immigrants, Dalton inherited the energy and endurance of the pioneer settler. Like his father before him, he possessed an abiding faith in the future of the land, lived a simple life, and was happy. His education was obtained in the little school at Christopher's Cross and in the surrounding forest. Later in his life, Dalton would fondly speak of those early years:

"As a boy I had an inherent desire to partake of Nature's blessings, which developed more as I advanced in years. I lived adjacent to a body of water called Nail Pond - one of Nature's greatest game sanctuaries where various kinds of wild birds such as geese, brant, and ducks abounded. Otter (now extinct) muskrat and mink were to be found also along this stream and foxes roamed the woods at will....At every opportuniy I indulged my passion for the chase and soon became an expert shot and trapper. The fox was my great objective, and the very name of "black fox” had a romantic attraction for me beyond any other aluremements of sport.....”

The furs which Dalton did manage to procure, did not bring in much money, hardly enough to feed a growing family. His neighbors ridiculed him for chasing after worthless animals, instead of setting to work sensibly to farm the family homestead. In fact, Charles Dalton was not looked upon with any great respect or admiration until he became wealthy. But the young man remained completely preoccupied with hunting and shooting. An old friend tells one story of how Dalton, in a moment of preoccupation, went home from a friend's wake, only to leave his wife standing on the steps of the Church. It was this strange manner of mind which led many people in the district to look upon him as a "good for nothing." Hard- working farmers would say on his passing; "There goes that foolish Dalton into the woods again with his gun.

One fascinating aspect of Dalton's character was the almost spiritual communion he enjoyed with Nature. He refused to rush at anything, a trait which perplexed his friends. They could not understand how he could "hunt" successfully with such'ease and ability. Notes Fred Dawson of Christopher's Cross, “it was as if he had everything figured out.” Dalton's reverence for the natural world probably stemmed from the fact that he spent most of his waking hours discovering its untold mysteries. He was, if you like, a "Worshipper of Nature". When asked why he did not attend Church regularly, Dalton pointed to a spot in the nearby forest and replied; “See that tallest tree over there. Well, that’s my Church.” He always attended his traps before he attended his Mass. Nevertheless, there is good reason to believe that Dalton was on good terms with the Parish Priest - if only because of his wife's community spirit and the generous financial contributions of later years,

Charles Dalton is rightfully to be credited with having first successfully bred silver-black foxes, the strain which eventually formed the base of the fur-farming industry in Prince Edward Island. But the origins of experimental fox breeding involve other personalities also. The first foxes kept in captivity were dug out of the ground in 1870 at a place called Fox Hill, near North Cape [P.E.I.]. A Caraquet, New Brunswick fisherman had been called from his vessel to fight a brush fire, when he stumbled accross a litter of fox pups hidden beneath an old stump. Dalton later reminisced about this first capture:

"(James Thompson's) foxes were purchased by Mr. Benjamin Haywood of Tignish for five pounds for one (the Island pound was then worth $3.25), and a cow for the other. Mr. Haywood kept them for two years in his barn. They produced a litter of pups, two of which were raised to maturity. Haywood failed to have them produce another litter and finally killed them for their pelts. I bought the two pelts from Mr. Haywood and sold them to Donald Cronan, Halifax, N.S. for $150.00. I then seriously thought the matter over and came to the conclusion that if one litter bred in captivity why, with proper care could they not be bred annually.

Haywood sold his foxes to Dalton for 9 shillings [according to the Morrissey Diary]; therefore, the Norway hunter made an attractive profit on this, his first fox deal. The remaining story of the origins of the fox industry is quite confusing, for it entails dozens of unsuccessful breeding attempts. But through gained experience and luck, the pioneer Dalton finally acquired outstanding breeding pairs. The best account of this acquisition of strain is contained in the diary of Dalton's close friend and associate, Clarence Morrissey of Tignish:

"About 10 years [after Haywood's foxes were sold] Dalton got a pair from Anticosti Island [part of Quebec; a large island in the St Lawrence River.] that was advertised for Sale by a man named Pope. heard would sell for 100.00 and of'fer was accepted and got foxes - female and male from same litter. Bred same and issue was 4 Cross foxes. Next year got a pair from John Martin from Bangor Lot 40 P.E.I. Killed the Anticosti foxes and got for fox pelts 26 - f lumpsum sale. Litter of Crosses realized 38 shillings. The litter from the 40 Lot foxes gave a litter of 4 Pups. Beauty Silver Pups. Bought 2 pairs from Louis Holland, Bedique[sic][Bedeque, P.E.I.]. The Lot 40 foxes and the Bedique foxes are the true origins of the present Industry ....”

It is also known that Dalton purchased a jet black fox from a man at Lot 6 for fifty dollars. He had high hopes for the subsequent mating, but the issue was five red pups. "It was my intention", Dalton noted, "to have a pair of the red pups for experimenting but all of them escaped one night. Looking back on these beginnings, Dalton like Morrissey regarded the Lot 40 foxes as the real turning point in the acquisition of breeding stock; "I had been a number of years constantly thinking and endeavoring to successfully farm silver - or black foxes as they were then known- in captivity. But I was not totally discouraged. The pair I got from Lot 40 in 1885, was the foundation of the domestic silver fox.

Fox breeding was an undeveloped science, and its subtleties revealed themselves only to resourcefulness. and perserverence. Dalton learned early to kill the Cross pups which did not approach certain standards. This practise, wise salutary, became a normal technique used by breeders to direct natural selection. Yet the fox business was for Dalton, still unpredictable. The Lot 40 and Bedique Silvers produced litters for two years. Then, however, the foxes once again stopped breeding. "That 'convinced me’, remarked Dalton later, "that if I were to make a success out of silver fox farming I must ranch them as nearly as possible under natural conditions.” The 1880's were difficult years for the Dalton family. The Depression was-at work on the Island, as it was in all the provinces of the new Dominion. And in June of 1887, Dalton sold the Norway homestead and purchsed a house in Tignish, hoping to supplement the sale of the odd pelt with income from operating a drug-store/ confectionary. "Dalton's Drugs" sold the drug most prescribed - hard liquor. One did not have to be a trained pharmacist to retail "a little bottle to help with,the ailment", however, Dalton became extremely interested in Chemistry, and he invested what little spare money he possessed in order to advance his knowledge of the subject. Needless to say, this knowledge must have proved invaluable to him in future years as a pioneer fox breeder. The drug-store, like most everything else in those days, finally went on the rocks! Its proprietor was so desperate at one point that he was refused credit for a five-pound barrel of flour at Myrick's General Store in Tignish. A lad who worked in the store subsequently took his own salary to cover the purchase, a gesture handsomely repaid by the then poor foxman, when the Dalton strain was world-famous. An old account book from the original Myrick's Store, shows that as late as 1889, Dalton's financial status was grim indeed, as evidenced by the following entry:

"Took large iron safe from Chas. Dalton on

account. Out of drugstore. 20.00

Already owed 18.00

Balance on acct. 2.00

Charles Dalton wrote in his retirement:

"In 1890, I entered into an arrangement with Mr. Robert Oulton, who came to Prince Edward Island from Little Shemogue, New Brunswick, and settled on Cherry Island. in Cascumpec Bay, near Alberton. This proved an ideal location for a fox ranch. I took him in as a partner. We had hunted and fished together, and he was altogether a man of my own heart."

Dalton's first real success in breeding silver foxes as a business dates back to this partnership with Oulton. The latter's patience and clever ideas about ranching the animals, combined with Dalton's experience and management, -resulted in the Cherry Island ranch becoming a prototype in the developing Industry. The 'Island' location isolated the foxes from curious neighbors and unwanted guests, and the......[Allan. I Cherry Island, Alberton Harbour, P.E.I. must have missed your page six.]

In 1897, Dalton built a large ranch near his home in Tignish, but still retained a half-interest in the Cherry Island enterprise. The Dalton-Oulton partnership lasted until 1911, when Robert Oulton moved back to New Brunswick, leaving his son, Russell, in charge of the ranch "The two foxmen had enjoyed an excellent relationship, with "never a harsh word spoken between them.” Dalton went to see Oulton just before he died. As Dalton was leaving his sick friend, Oulton embraced him and said; "Charlie, I'm not going to live long, but when I die I went to go where you go.” Dalton considered that the finest tribute to be paid a friend.

Oulton and Dalton had entered into a partnership basically for financial reasons. Experimentation required some capital, and the two men found themselves forced by necessity to take into their privy business, inquisitive friends with dollars in their pockets. They included Captain Gordon of Alberton, Robert Tuplin of the Black Banks, B.I. and Silas Rayner of Summerside. These men constituted what was known as the "Big Six Combine", Together they swore not to sell breeding stock to outsiders, and the Combine was a closed corporation. Dalton's established contacts with London fur buyers enabled him to control the marketing of the district's pelts.

It was only inevitable that sooner or later this compact would break down. Curiousity spread among neighbors. What had brought wealth to these men who had been poor all their lives? The member of the combine who kept his financial situation least confidential was Robert Tuplin. Tuplin was to become a fox pioneer himself, but overnight wealth produced a frenzy within his family. He stored his money in a big oak barrel in the attic, preferring not to trust bankers, and in one year alone, purchased eight Buick automobiles for his children. Robert Tuplin's nephew, Frank Tuplin from Summerside, talked his uncle into selling him a pair of Number 1 breeders in the Spring of 1909. The younger Tuplin made the purchase with $1,000.00 he had borrowed from a local photographer After a winter of successful mating, he began selling live foxes to anyone interested, at a price of $10,000.00 a pair. The "Combine" was broken and, from that point on, the Silver Fox Industry mushroomed. Prices rose steadily until the outbreak of War in 1914, reaching a peak value of $35,000.00 for a pair of breeders.

Charles Dalton's material riches after 1900 were in sharp contrast to his personal tragedy. The family, now twelve in number, was struck by an epidemic of tuberculosis in 1906. Seventeen-year-old Florence and ten-year-old Irene fell victim to the deadly disease, while sixteen-year-old Patrick was left disabled by it. During these years of both comfort and anguish, the Daltons lived in Tignish and Charles continued to hunt, fish and breed foxes.

There appears to be a conflict of opinion as to whether or not Charlie Dalton was a "miser". People certainly could have gotten that impression by the way he dressed. It was not uncommon for Dalton to show up at a wake dressed in "rags'. "He had a lot of money", remembers a friend, "but he didn't value it very much He-was not a braggart, nor did he boast about his wealth." On the other hand, many Tignishers and especially residents of Nail Pond, thought him to be mean and a hoarder of money. But the philanthropy of later years must support the former belief that Dalton was not a miserly person. There is no actual known record of exactly how much money Charles Dalton made breeding foxes, though he retired a self-confessed 'millionaire' in 1914. Nevertheless, the account sheet presented below, of Furs on consignment for Dalton in 1910, by C.M. Lampson and Co. London, Gives some idea of the exorbitant profits he made.

Dalton sold his Tignish Ranch in 1912 to a Charlottetown-based company: The Black Beauty Foxes were transported by rail from Tignish to the site of the new ranch at Southport, near the capital. History has named the train the "Million Dollar Black Fox Special”. The purchasing company capitalized at $650,000 and the train itself was said to have brought the figure to the million dollar mark. Dalton's estimate, however is some-what more modest. "I was paid", said the foxman, $400,000 in cash and given $100,000 in shares of the company. "In any event, it was an extraordinarily valuable cargo. The baggage master of the Million Dollar Train, A.B.(Andy) Bagnalll recalled in the Guardian many years ago:

"All night the priceless animals had been guarded by two men armed with revolvers. They caught the previous day, placed in boxes, or crates, and taken to the freight shed. The train left Tignish at nine in the morning of November 8^th. On Board were Charles Dalton, a Dr. Lundie and W.B. Prowse who was the secretary-treasurer of the company making the purdhase.Three armed men rode shotgun along the route.”

The Southport Ranch was modern in every way boasting such inovations as electric lights and a pressure water system to prevent fire. It was even connected with the city of Charlottetown by telephone. Dividends of 40% were paid the shareholders of the company in its first year of operation, representing a production of 44 pups, averaging at $12,000.00 pair. Disaster struck the next year. Although crop-wise, the biggest the Industry had ever experienced, the declaration of War in August had a crippling effect upon sales. For the Southport Ranch,, however, it was production which hampered profits. As Dalton explained; "the move to Southport, a strange caretaker and other factors [not described] made the breeding season of 1914 a most disappointing one.

Charlie Dalton sold his entire fox holdings in November of 1914, as if anticipating the collapse of the Industry. He stated in a speech later that he "foresaw what was coming." In fact, Dalton's awareness of scientific discovery might very well have included developments in the art of dying. It would not be long before the black fur could be produced from the red, at a cost far below breeding. Dalton was also conscious of "the vagaries of style and fashions", a factor which greatly influenced the decline of the Fur Industry on the Island and elsewhere.

II

_____________________________

POLITICS AND PHILANTHROPY

At the age of sixty-four years, when most men looked forward to a quiet retirement, Charlie Dalton had already started on another career, as a legislator and promoter of viable enterprises. First elected to the provincial House Assembly in 1912 as the representative from First Prince, he served in the Government of Conservative Premier J.A. Mathieson. The Minister without portfolio was re-elected in 1914 but went down to defeat at the hands of the Liberals two years later, and subsequently retired from politics. Dalton the politician was rather unassuming and away from the limelight. His advice , however. was continually sought by those in government who recognized wisdom and intelligence. Dalton's great gift to the people of Prince Edward Island was the establishment of the Sanitarium at North Wiltshire, for the care and treatment of sufferers of tuberculosis - the same desease that had robbed him of two daughters. The magnificient hospital containing the most up-to-date medical equipment, cost Dalton some $70,000.00. What a pity that it was in operation for only a mere six months. The story of the Wiltshire Sanitarium is an embarassing story of Island politics,"Upon the completion of the building, the Government took it over as a home for convalescent soldiers during the war. It was enlarged to serve this need. When the war had ended the Sanitarium was to have been turned ovver to the-Province. But the Government of the day liberal Premier Bell refused to accept responsibility for the operation of the facility and it-reverted back to its benefactor. Later the Wiltshire Sanitarium was scrapped and the generous offering of a native Islander became history. The denouement came with the construction of another Sanitarium within the limits of the city in 1933. Unlike its predecessor, the Charlottetown sanitarium was poorly-staffed and lacked adequate equipment.

Wartime Prince Edward Island brought out the patriotism in Charlie Dalton. In 1915, he donated to the Red Cross a fully-equipped Ambulance. Once more, he offered to drive it himself to the front, a sincere request by a man old in years but a specimen of health. Dalton's request was turnned down unfortunately because of his age, and the courageous gentlem was deeply hurt. Nevertheless, he did assist the War effort as best he could by urging young men to enlist and by speaking at "help the troops" gatherings throughout the Province. The founder of the Silver Fox Industry-was supremely honored by the Vatican in 1917, when Pope Pius XXIII knighted him 'Command St. Gregory the Great'. Dalton travelled to Rome to accept the title and while in Europe toured the Holy Lands.

Dalton's second major donation was the construction of Dalton Hall at Saint Dunstan's University [Now The University of PEI.] in Charlottetown in 1919. Though not a university graduate himself, Sir Charles placed a high value on education achieved formally. His two sons, Howard (M.D.) and Gerald (B.A., BSc.), were both graduates of S.D.U. Gerald continued his studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and was to become a distinguished aeronautical engineer in the field-of ‘hydrofoil’ design.

Immediately following the cessation of European hostilities the Daltons moved to Brookline, Massachusetts, where Sir Charles had purchased a large estate. There is good reason to believe that Dalton was unhappy away from the Island he loved. For during the few years spent at Brookline, he made more than frequent migrations, back to his favorite hunting spots. It was on one of these trips back home around which a legend has been created. The summer was 1922 and Dalton, then 72 years of age, had entered a shooting contest with Tignish ace-shooter George Profit, at Hughes’ Field on the outskirts of the village. At this time, clay pigeons were just becoming popular and Dalton had never shot them before. When it was the old man's time to shoot he quickly raised his rifle to his shoulder and, to the astonishment of those present shattered five birds as fast as they could be launched! It was an incredible bit of shooting. Sir Charles simply smiled at his competitor, who then refused to shoot, and walked away chuckling to himself. On July 12^th, 1929, Dalton was formally honored by the Canadian National Silver Fox Breeders Association , at a banquet in Summerside. The foxman was presented with a model of a silver fox and a plaque whose inscription read; "In grateful recognition of valued services to Canada in organizing and developirg the Silver Fox Industry.” Principal speaker at the event was a native Islander, the Hon. Dr. Cyrus MacMillan, later to be named Federal Minister of Fisheries, Dr. MacMillan said of Dalton:

......he was the product of pioneer..... ancestor, without riches and without accumulation of the worldly goods. They belonged, however, to God's toiling aristocracy, men and women to whom life was no day dream, but real and hard, disciplinary, and full of meaning. That tradition was the strongest inheritance he received.''

Life did not cease to have meaning for Dalton in his old age. On the contrary, the sportsman spent every available minute basquing in Nature's pleasures. His 'Meeca’ was a tract of marsh land separating Nail Pond from the ocean. About one mile in length and merely 200 yards wide, the land became for Dalton a personal sanctuary, just as it did for the wild geese and other animals which inhabited its bleakness. On it the foxman "experimented" with growing 'wild rice' - first time such a crop was tried on the Island. The geese flocked to Dalton's feeding grounds and the sanctuary flourished with life. Sir Charles was now in his late seventies, but looking and acting as if he were invincible!

People of the district can recall the old man going down to the marsh with his horse and wagon to plant the slender stalks of rice in the shallow water which kept the sanctuary semi-submerged. It was an icy job in the Fall of the year, one which demanded stamina of body and a love for the 'wilderness' of things. On returning from one of these excursions to the marsh Dalton stopped at the house of a neighbor to warm himself. The neighbor asked if he was chilled. The white-haired man went to the doorway and looking towards his wagon said; "My blood is still moving, my soul is not yet weary, but I guess I froze the dog." Episodes similar to this took place until his accidental death in 1933. Another neighbor, Mr. Gerald Handrahan, remembers Dalton walking back to the woods with his gun in the middle of a snowstorm. "He would", contends Mr. Handrahan, "remain in the woods all day, whatever the weather, then re-appear once again in the evening. He rarely came out empty- handed.”

[An anecdote from Tom O’Connor’s files:

Marie Wade Wilkie, a grand niece, (b. Oct 10, 1905 in Kildare, PEI) now (Jan 2000)in a nursing home in Braintree Massachusetts used to tell the story showing he was still a country-boy in his old age. He loved to put on his old clothes and wander on his farm, the woods and the nearby shore. Once when some distinguished visitors came to the farm to see Sir Charles and asked for his whereabouts they were told, ‘He's was down by the shore.’

After awhile the visitors returned saying, ‘There's no one down there but some poor old beachcomber.’

‘That's Sir Charles,’ was the response.” ]

Sir Charles Dalton was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Prince Edward Island on November 29^th 1930. It was but the official recognition of a simple man whose perserverence, intelligence and kindness had been blessed by luck, and the Will of God. Observed the Guardian: "No representative of His Majesty the King could be more deserving the honor and esteem.....of the position, or more conscientious in the discharge of its responsible duties .....” Dalton assumed the Governorship at the ripe age of eighty years, but without any signs of failing, either phyically or mentally. He attended Governmental functions with regularity and delighted at stumping some expert mathermetician with a problem he had created. When not engaging in these activities, Dalton either took to the outdoors or settled into an evening's study of an English Classical Novel. It was during Dalton's stay at Government House that he bestowed upon his own Parish of Tignish, the Dalton Normal School. At time of its construction in 1930, the school was of monumental importance to the community. Sir Charlie was fully aware of that significance, and the Dalton School stands today [1974] as a tribute to him.[Now in 2000, sadly replaced by a new Museum and Community House which fortunately includes a tribute to Sir Charles (and Chester Morrissey).

This picture is from a snapshot taken of a portrait that hangs in the Museum. tpoc]

Sir Charles Dalton [1850 - 1933]

The sudden death of Gerald Dalton in a boating accident at Key West, Florida in 1932, disheartened the old foxman. His son had been more to him than flesh and blood. He had been his best friend. Sir Charles invested heavily in Gerald's research when the youth showed ability to "pioneer" his own field. They had taken trips together, often, and usually out of common interests. The son's tragic death left the father spiritless and lost. Sir Charles Dalton very seldom left his residence during-those last few months in office. Then, while walking along an icy pathway in Victoria Park one afternoon he slipped and fell. Dalton never recovered from the accident. He developed pneumonia and, after a few days suffering, died on Saturday December 9^th, 1933. How ironic that it had been the first and last time Dalton was ever confined to a sick bed.

No doubt the best epitaph to the death of Sir Charles Dalton was penned by the editor of the Charlottetown Guardian:

"The late Lieutenant-Governor was what has so often been described as a self-made man, and his kindness of heart was proverbial.....He was one of Nature's gentlemen, and never would willingly hurt the feelings of anyone or Permit an unkindness tobe done in his presence.

Dalton was accorded a full State Funeral in the capital on December 11 ^th The service, conducted by Rt. Rev. Monsignor MacLellan, contained this appropriate eulogy:

"Life to Sir Charles..... was no mystery ..... He realized, furthermore, that we are only the stewards of the goods of this world that come into our possession, and that we shall have to render an account of our stewardship to God who gave them to us. These were the high motives that governed his life and guided his every effort.....”

A simple ceremony in the bosom of the country he cherished put Charlie Dalton to rest. And he was buried in the old [St. Simon and St Jude] Parish Graveyard at Tignish, across the road from the rickety fox pens that etched for him a legendary place in Island History.

III

_______________________

THE LEGEND

Sir Charles Dalton looms large in any social and economic history of Prince Edward Island. His rise from humble birth to riches practically overnight is, in itself, sufficient to have made the man a legend in his own time. But the 'isolation' of his experimental breeding and the sense of 'creation' which surrounded it, attaches to Dalton the pretense of 'romance' and 'mystery'. The Fox Industry was independent of and did not-effect any other Industry in the Province.

The legend of this fox pioneer is, however, more than a of economic phenomenom. it is the portrait of an unusual individual and his environment! What is so unusual is that the individual lived in complete harmony with his environment, and moulded a 'freedom' through integration with it. This spiritual attachment with Nature gave Dalton the patience and understanding to unlock one of Her secrets - natural selection as applied to the domestic breeding of Silver Foxes. It is this scientific discovery which is a historical fact, and forms the basis of any Dalton Legend.

It is also not uninteresting that the legend of Charlie Dalton differs in its interpretation from one place to the other. Present day residents of Tignish village speak of him firstly as a benefactor, of the "great things he did for the community,” pointing naturally to the still [1974 ]used Dalton School [Since repaced by a new school.]. The people of nearby Nail Pond, however, claim there is no "magic” about Charlie Dalton. They think it not uncommon for a man to be termed a "Worshipper of Nature". Any man who takes his living off the land or from the sea, they say is of that kind. And so,the legend makes its way into the towns.

Summerside and Charlottetown of the early 1930's were both growing quite rapidly, obtaining a character entirely different from that of the outlying Countryside. In fact, the "hicks" and the '-town-boys" could always be told apart. Hence, the people of these Island centres, in their relative urbanity, saw Dalton as a "pioneer" of almost mystical qualities. They allowed their legend of the man to grow into anything which offered an explanation to "Nature" and the "life forces" they had never experienced, or had forgotten.

Is there then a correct and incorrect legend of Dalton the Foxman? Of course there is not. Still we must respect a certain continuity as dictated by the "extraordinary" personality of the man. Many attributes are beyond suspicion or disagreement. No one disputes the fact that Dalton was an expert hunter and rifle shot. Fewer dispute his uncanny way with animals, his ignorance and lack of concern for 'time', his unhurried disposition, his congenial manner. And the material gifts he bestowed upon the people of Prince Edward Island seem to speak well for his kindness.

Sir Charles Dalton represents that ‘perservering enterprise’ and 'understanding of Island life’ which today appears impossible to combine. Perhaps that is why we remember him!

[Sequel by Tom O’Connor

The silver fox business did suffer a serious blow with the beginning of the war in 1914 but it did not die. In fact up until World War II wire fox pens were familiar sites in the P.E.I. countryside. In May of 1926 a publication of the; American Fox and Farmer includeds an article entitled; A Correct Account of the Beginning of the Fox Industry by, C.F. [Chester] Morrissey in which he writes,

“....When the war was over, and conditions became normal, the fox business again took its place with other sound business enterprises and today ranks as one of the leading branches of the world’s greatest industries. The amount realized in the present year, 1925, on P.E.Island for live foxes was $1,500,000 and fox pelts were $1,250,00 making a total of $2,700,000.......Dalton again bought the Tignish ranch from the Company where he now breeds the finest quality of Silver Black foxes......”

An announcement which appeared in the Montreal Daily Star, 8 Dec.1933;

"CHARLOTTETOWN, PEI. Still unconcious but slightly stronger said a physician's report on the condition of Hon. Charles Dalton Lieutenant-Governor of Prince Edward Island.

Mr Dalton in his 83rd year, is said by Doctors to have little chance of recovery from an attack of pleural pneumonia which developed during his confinement to hospital with a fractured hip-bone. For more than a month since he slipped on an icy pavement, the Lieutenant Governor has been in the institution where only a few days ago his condition was reported as satisfactory. Meanwhile, however, bronchial pneumonia set in and subsequently developed into the more serious stage". His obituary likely appeared in the Montreal paper and may give some information about his parents and whereabouts of his living relatives.

Another publication, a Forty-five page booklet by The Itasca Siver Fox Co. of Vinton, Iowa, USA a Member of the American National Fox Breeders Association includes a letter written in 1926 by Sir Charles to Hamilton Tobin Esq. Headed by; A LETTER FROM SIR.CHARLES DALTON is on the next page. Both these publications can be found in the Alberton Museum, Alberton, PE

Thomas P. O’Connor 395 Liberty St Braintree, MA 02184

tpoc@aol.com
Hamilton Tobin, Esq. Tignish, 24 Nov., 1926.

Hawkeye Itasca Silver Fox Co., Vinton, Iowa, U. S. A.

Dedr.Mr. Tobini

I am today shipping you by express, twenty-two pure sil-

ver foxes of my own strain, all Canadian National registered,

of course. As you have always insisted on my shipping you

only genuine old Island blood foxes, referred to as the Pure

Dalton Strain, I have carefully inspected the ranch record in

each instance, with this point in mind. My name is back of

the pedigree of every fox sent you. No foreign or imported

blood has ever 'been bred into any of these animals.

As you know from conversations we have had on the sub-

ject, my,first partner in the business was the late B. T. Oulton,

and my next was James Rayner. For this reason our foxes

have sometimes been referred to as Dalton-Oulton and later as

Dalton-Rayner strain, although all from my original stock.

However, this does not mean that outside blood has been crossed

in. Sorting out the choice 'animals'for breeding was the point

of success in keeping up the good strain. This is the method I

have followed in all cases.

In this shipment are a number of unusually fine specimens.

I have placed them in pairs that I thought most suitabla for

breeding. Knowing that you are a good judge of foxes, I wish

you would examine each one in this shipment and write me

your opinion. As usual I have personally inspected the for

for qualithy; and have had them all examined by a veterinarian,

and all are well furred, of clear colour, and in good health.

I here make a promise, that after one year, if any of your

customers are not satisfied with any one or more of the foxes bought

from you, and if shipped to me in good condition, Iwill replace

it with a good fox of the same sex.

In crate 3, you will find a male that I think is a perfect

beauty, that sired a fine litter for me last spring, The younger

animals in the shipment aro all choice selections. In crate 7 the

pair is one year old and had'a litter of four, 2 males and 2 fe-

males. In crate 2 is my best pair of breeders. They are three

years old and last spring raised a litter of five, 4 males and 1

fmale; in 1925 they raised a litter of 'six, I male and 5 females;

and in 1924 their litter was four, I male and 3 females.

Since you are my only American representative, I hope you

will see fit to keep the strain pure, at least in these proven

breeders from my old original Tignish ranch, as they are my

very best breeding stock. It might be well to ask your custom

ers to do likewise, as I have found that nothing excels the pure

Island blood. Am reserving the same quality shipped you, for

breeders on my ranch next season, but cannot supply you with

many more pairs this fall, as I must retain enough to keep my

ranch Well stocked at mating time.

I will be very anxious to hear from you. Meantime I remain

yours truly, Chas. Dalton.]

TRAVELS OF THE LANGNERS as told by Alex

Plus A brief summary of Poland’s history during this time; from Encarta 99

- Background -

My daughter, Margaret Mary [Mardy] had met Thomas Langner while she was studying for her Master’s Degree in Physics/ Material Science and he was studying for his Master’s in Computer Science at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass. On 5/28/1994 they were married in Wuerzburg Germany. Thomas had grown up under communist rule in East Germany and was able to get out with his parents just before The Wall came down. On a recent trip with Thomas’ father, Dr. Alex Langner to My nephew Terry’s home in Holyoke, Mass I asked if I could tape his fascinating story of his life in East Germany. The following is an edited version of that story;

Travels of the Langners

Part I: The Early Years

I, Alexander Langner was born August 12 , 1933 in a little village called, Deutsch-Lauden, (Ludow Polsk) Kreis Strehlen, Niederschlesien, Germany, (now Poland). My wife Inge Brosch was born only a few miles far away in Strehlen.

My father, Artur, Julius Langner (Sept, 15,.1900-Dec. 1980) was a baker and also a shopkeeper in that village. Inges father Gustav Brosch (1897-1954) and her mother Anna (1902-1993) lived after their expulsion in 1945, first in Haßlau, a little village in Saxonia and, after fathers death on Dec. 24, 1954 Inge's mother went to live in Würzburg with her daughter Elli's and her husband, Franz Molinari.

When I was six years old (1939) my father and mother, (Helene Krause) and five children moved to the village of Nimkau (Miekinia) near Neumarkt (Sroda Slaska) where I, Alex attended high school from 1943 - 45. My father had purchased a larger house in Nimkau where he could run his shop and bakery while renting his place in Deutsch Lauden to another family.

Part II From: Nimkau to Nossen to Weistritz and back to Nimkau.

On January 26, 1945 as the Russian Army approached Nimkau the order came to leave our village within two hours. We were allowed to bring one suitcase per person. My father, even though he was not a soldier had to stay behind to help with the defense of the town of Breslau, the capital of Niederschlesien, against the Russians for several days. He was later taken prisoner by the Russians until the war ended on May 8,.1945. My family together with my seventy years old grandmother and us five children [the youngest was two] left, walking along a railway bed for several days in the bitter cold January weather. Many other families who were farmers had horses or tractors for transportation but our family had to walk as we were shopkeepers and therefore didn't have such means of transportation. When my grandmother became ill she road on a farmers wagon for awhile but finally because of her illness after three days walking we all had to leave the tracks and our luggage and go into a small town and wait for a freight train. Meanwhile we had lost our luggage.

After several days on the train we arrived at Nossen, a little town near Meissen about 22 km from Dresden. The distance from Nimkau to Nossen is about 350 - 400 km, "As the crow flies." My father’s half brother lived there and the family stayed with him for two or three months. Relations were not good with the half brother so my mother decided to take the family to her a town in East Germany where her brother lived. This was catastrophic. We had to travel through Dresden down to Prague, Czechoslovakia then northeast to Weistritz in Germany where my mother's brother lived and taught school. This was in part of Silesia which was surrounded on three sides by mountains and the Czechoslovakian border. It was about March. We stayed there in Alt-Weistritz, a little village on a small creek near a small town Habelschwerdt in this "Glatzer Kessel" (Klodzko) named region.

At this time the area was under German control but finally April or May 1945 the Russians came over the hills and took the village. After a while we, the Langners; children, mother, her sister and her husband all decided to go back to their hometowns near Breslau. The uncle prepared a little carrier for our luggage. Our grandmother stayed with her son and his family in Alt-Weistritz. He left his homeland later with this family and went to north western Germany. Our and our uncles familys left for the trip by walking to the train, a freight train. It was about 120 km. to Nimkau. The train only went to the town Nimpsch and we had to walk the rest about 50 km to Schmolz the home town of my uncle Rudolf Stephan where my mother’s sister lived. My uncle, his wife Liesel and their daughters Helga, Ruth and Edith stayed there. We, the Langners walked about 30 km more to Nimkau,.our home village.

Life was very difficult for us from the time we left our hometown and it was no better in my uncles town where we lived in the schoolhouse. I remember of one scary

incident; The children from the school had found some sabres in a little brook behind the school house. German soldiers take them on their flight back from the Russians and had hidden them in the brook. The kids took the weapons out and hid them in the school out-house [toilet]. The Russians found them which gave the children a bad scare, but luckily nothing more happened.

Part III Back in Nimkau with the Russian Army and Displaced Poles

When we got to Nimkau we found the village which had had about 1300 inhabitants was almost deserted except for Russian troops in barracks and about a dozen other Germans. A few more [about 40) Germans returned later. Then Polish people started arriving from Eastern Poland.[Parts of Eastern Poland had been taken by the Russians and part of Eastern Germany was given to Poland.] mostly also with nothing or probably one cow. They moved into our homes and the houses of the German farmers which were now vacant and kept moving into better ones. They called me and my four brothers and sister and our german friends, "Dirty Germans" and they would beat up the German kids who could not defend themselves as they were the minority. We couldn't live in our own large house as the Russians were using it as hospital. We had to move five or six times when some Poles wanted to move in and drove us out of the flat into which we had moved. The Poles would come into our flat and take whatever they wanted from us. Later when the Russian patients were moved out of our large house we were able to move back into our own home for awhile. But everything was gone, the Russians had packed all our furniture and shipped it back to Russia. Even the feather beds had been emptied out in the garden. The rooms were empty and the bathtub was full of human waste as the Russians had apparently thought it was the toilet.

[The British Goverment had aided Poland as there were International Harvester and and Massey Ferguson farm equipment in the fields. They had provided food and seeds for the farmers because at this time Poland was ruled by the National Polish London Government in Exile. This was between the time we had left Nimkau the first time in January 1945 and the Summer of 1946 the time of our final expulsion by the British and Polish governments.]

See; A brief historical summary of Poland’s history during this time. Excerpted from Encarta 99 at the end of Alex’ story

Finding food and other necessities was a continuing problem. The Germans had planted fields of grain before they left and I would sneak into the fields near the woods at night after dark and pick some corn. Then after the Russians soldiers and Polish farmers had finished harvesting I and others would go into the field to find kernels of grain that had fallen to the ground. We would collect nearly 100 kg. and would bring it home where we had a little coffee mill which we used to grind the grain into a rough meal or gruel from which we would make soup. We had no salt but would sometimes find and use saltlicks which would have been placed in the fields for the animals. We also made the gruel into flat cakes which we baked as quasi bread.Sometimes we worked for the Polish farmers for which they would be given 2 kg. for a days work. We heard that at a place nearly 20 km away there were some wastes left over from a sugar making process from sugar-beets. We got and boiled them further to make a little syrup or molasses. Once we heard about a place also nearly 20 km away, where we found another kind of grain, millet in piston form used as birds food, which was good for children food too. We also found some wax for production of shoe-polish. With help of a aluminium tube and a cotton thread we had produced candles, because we had also no electricity. There were no money, no shops, no administration, no bread, no flour, no meat or sausages, no milk and butter, no cheese, jam, potatoes, no vegetables and fruits.

We had fairly good relations with the Russian soldiers particularly who were good to the children. We children would help the Russian soldiers in their cook house by peeling potatoes etc. and would get some left-over food and some more to bring home for our mother and the youngsters (the age of the five children was between 3 and 12 years). The soldiers didn't have much more food than we did. One of their officers said that he had been in the battle of Stalingrad which was so terrible that both the Russian and German soldiers would cannibalize their fellow soldiers who had died. He asked us to guess his age and we guessed he was about 45/46. He said the war had aged him and that he was only twenty five years old. Surprisingly he was very friendly to the German kids.

At this time the Polish government was Democratic/ Socialist similar to that of England but then I believe 1948 it became Communist. Suddenly one day without warning we were told we had to leave our home [This must have been in June 1946 when the Polish were transferring Germans out of what was now Poland westward across the Oder/ Neisse, the new border between Poland and Germany. this was done the basis of a joint order or common command of the British and Polish governments issued in English and German.] I looked out the window just after the order to move came and saw my father walking down the street. He had been made a prisoner of the Russians in Breslau and was sent to Russia for a time until, but since had lost one eye, had difficulties with his back and had been seeing the doctor often he was among the first to be released. My father had been looking for us at his half brother's house in Nossen and had then tried to cross the border several times along the Oder Neisse line most near the divided town Görlitz before he finally found us at Nimkau. Luckily he was there just in time to help us leave.

There was a lady in the village who was alone and who had a brother in the US. Because she knew that my father was such a good baker she wanted him and us to go to the US with her using her brother's help. However my fathers half brother thought he had found a little shop in Nossen for my father he , so he decided we would go there. That turned out to be a bad decision.

When we were leaving Nimkau even though there was a railway station in our village we had to walk 20 km with our luggage, only one piece for each person, to the railway station near our district town Neumarkt (Sroda Slansk). There we slept in a sheepen and the next day the Poles made us walk through a small corridor for perfect control where they took the most we had including all valuable things and all our remaining money and savings accounts. That means they also took the money my parents had in the bank. My father worked 20 years, had the biggest store in the village in our own large house with several appartments, which were rented to other familys. He also owned two other rental houses in Deutsch-Lauden and had nearly 300,000 german Marks in the bank. This all, including furnitures, clothes and all other things a family has and needs was lost forever without any compensation from the German and Polish government.

Part IV Life in East Germany

Now in Nossen, Saxonia we had nothing. Because the hoped-for shop did not work out. Therefore we tried several times without but finally with success to leave on the animal train from Nimkau toWest Germany which we remember as a sad failure. Now in Nossen my father worked at his half-brother’s shop as business manager for about 180 marks per month;-about the price of a loaf of bread on the black market."

I graduated from high school there 1952 and wanted to go to an university but since my father had owned a shop in Schlesien before our expulsion from our homeland in 1945 he was considered Bourgeoise even though we were the poorest of them all. Only the peasants were eligible for college. Finally because the East German communist government at this time started a large program supporting chemistry , they needed a lot of chemists and therefore I was able to get into the Chemical Institute of the University in Leipzig. I was then nineteen having lost a year of school in 1945. I studied Chemistry with no assistance from my family, receiving only 85 marks per month as a stipend. My room was 35 marks so I had little left for food etc. I lived on bread, a little margarine, jam and sometimes a little liver sausage. It was very very difficult.

I had married Inge Brosch in Wuerzburg, Germany on Jan.20, 1959 and Mario and Thomas were born. Mario in Jan. 1,.1960 and Thomas in Sept. 15, 1966. When Mario was a baby I was still attending the University so Inge had to work so we were forced to placed the baby in a kindergarten where he stayed all week long. Thomas was more fortunate than Mario because by the time he was born we were able to keep him home. I finished the University as "Diplom - Chemiker" in March 1960 but I couldn't get my Doctorate degree because I was not, as you had to be, a member of the Communist party as a prequisite. First I went to work in the Chemical Industry for a few months (3/60 - 6/60) but I had to travel each day very far by train which was very stressful so I changed jobs to work for the Institute of Energy under the Ministry of Coal and Energy from July 1960 till our escape to West Germany on Nov. 2,.1989. There I did applied research on power plant chemistry. I worked in that field for 30 successful years. I was more successful than the most of my colleagues in the West as can be demonstrated by my awards of more than thirty patents for new processes in the field. Beside my job I carried out Doctoral work and examen as extern member in the University of Architecture and Building Erection in Weimar in the Institute for Building Trade Material Chemistry in November 1965.

When Mario matured he had a house in Potsdam and asked at the beginning of 1989 for a Visa to West Berlin (he said the reason is that he wanted to marry a girl there what was wrong) and got it in July 1989 leaving immediately from Potsdam to West Berlin, but before leaving he had to sell his house in Potsdam to the communist government for "peanuts", only 30000 East Marks at this time nearly 3000 West Marks. Now it would be worth nearly 1 Million West German Marks for the house which Inge and I had paid for.

Part V To The West - We Start Over Again

When we wanted to visit Inge's mother for her 85^th. birthday on Nov. 4,.1989 in Würzburg we asked for a visa for one or two weeks together with Thomas. Since Inge’s mother was over 80 years old we thought there might be about an 10% chance of success. Surprisingly we received a visa for me, Inge and Thomas. There had been some demonstrations at, “The Wall” at this time which probably had some effect toward easing the restrictions. Now we had to decide what to do whether to go with a view to staying or to plan to return. Two years before my brother Siegfried had left legally only for a visit and when did not return and it was very hard on his family. The government took half his money and half his house because he was considered to be an, "Enemy of the Government". So before we left our home I told my sister, Ingrit Lehmann, (She lived with her family near Leipzig.) that, if we did not return she could take all that she wanted from our flat.

So after 30 years of work we were left with nothing;- No bed, no food, no furniture.We had wanted to take our old car a Russian Lada but that was not allowed so we went by train. It was a very difficult trip. There were two Austrian ladies in their compartment and the guards made them all go out including Inge. They took everything out of our suitcases and wanted to know why we were taking so much clothes especially underwear. We were surprised when the Austrian ladies told the guards that the Langners must be planning to not return to East Germany. After that I was very nervous and prespired during the whole trip but was relieved when we crossed into West Germany.

The East German government allowed us to change 15 W German marks for 15 E German marks for each of us for this journey. So we started life in West Germany with 45 West German marks and nothing else.

When we got to Wurzburg Nov. 2,.1989 we called Franz and he came and picked us up at the railway station. We moved at first into the upper floor of Franz and Ellie Molinari’s (Inge's sister) house which was empty. Three days later Thomas came home rather late and we asked him where he had been. He told us he was at the University and that he had been accepted to study Computer Science because one of the students, now six weeks after beginning of the study year had quit making a space available. We were surprised, and could hardly believe it. We had just arrived on Friday and on Monday Thomas would start his studies at a new institution.

Inge got a job in a hospital in January 1990 and I got a job in a small company in Hamburg in February, about 540 km from Würzburg. I worked there till September, driving each Monday at 4:00 AM to Hamburg by car and returning Friday in the late afternoon. On October first, 1990 I started my job in the research center of Siemens Power Generating Group in Erlangen, 100 km from Würzburg. Therefore we changed our flat to Erlangen, where I worked in the research of steam chemistry. I also worked in the Commissioning of the chemical equipments in newly erected coal, gas and oil fired power stations in Germany (München and Dresden, 8 months each) and Netherland (3 months), Great Britain (3 months), Iran (33 months) and Pakistan (8 months). I retired from this employment on November 18, 1999.

A brief historical summary of Poland’s history during this time. Excerpted from Encarta 99

When the Soviet Army first reached Polish territory, it established a committee of national liberation in Lublin. This committee later became a provisional government based in Warsaw. Polish frontiers underwent a major shift after the Allied conference in Potsdam, Germany, in 1945. The Soviet Union retained control of the territories that it had obtained in 1939, while Poland gained large areas of former German territory in the west, including the industrial region of Upper Silesia, the ports of Gdansk and Szczecin, and a long Baltic coastline. Poles from the Soviet-occupied areas were resettled on lands in the west that had expelled Germans. Communist control was intensified with the removal of more liberal political leaders such as Wladyslaw Gomulka in 1949. In 1956, however, a major political upheaval led to the return of Gomulka as first secretary of Poland's Communist party with the support of Nikita Khrushchev, the new Soviet leader. (See also Gomulka.) In 1970 the authoritarian Gomulka government fell after the eruption of bloody riots and strikes in several cities because of rises in food prices. Edward Gierek was appointed party leader. Further price increases in 1976 and 1980 created more unrest. In Gdansk a committee led by Lech Walesa, an electrical worker, demanded the right to form independent trade unions (see Walesa, Lech). A national confederation of trade unions called Solidarity was formed. Gierek resigned, and Stanislaw Kania succeeded him as first secretary of the party. Kania resigned in 1981 and was replaced by Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski, who banned Solidarity. Only unions pledging allegiance to the Communist party were permitted. In 1985 Jaruzelski resigned as prime minister and was replaced by Zbigniew Messner. In September 1988 Messner and his cabinet resigned amid growing furor over the economy. Mieczyslaw Rakowski became prime minister. On April 5, 1989, Solidarity was legally restored. In July parliamentary elections, Solidarity won the majority of seats in the new Senate and all of the seats allocated to opposition parties in the Sejm, or lower house. Jaruzelski became president. Rakowski resigned in August. Communist attempts to form a government failed. Tadeusz Mazowiecki of Solidarity then became Poland's first non-Communist prime minister in more than 40 years. The second half of 1989 was dominated by a growing economic crisis brought on by the government's introduction of market pricing for agricultural products and skyrocketing inflation. In 1990 the Communist party disbanded and reorganized as the Social Democratic party, an opposition party to Solidarity. The country's first fully democratic elections since World War II were held on May 27, when the local councils were chosen. On December 9 Walesa won the presidential election. The October 1993 election restored many former Communists to power. Waldemar Pawlak became prime minister.*

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^[1]L'Impartial A Tignish newspaper published in the 1890’s

^[2]I assume many records found at St Jean Baptiste, like those in other earlier churches are made of events taking place in local community missionary chapels rather than at the church of record.

^[3]An alphabetized listing of early marriage: “Repertoire Alphabetique Avec Fililations des Baptismes [M---s] et Sepulchres de la paroise St Jean Baptiste De Miscouche” 1817 -1941 made by, J. Henri Fabien Genealogist 56 First Ave Ottawa. Pub # 14, 1964.

^[4]Hill’s "List of Inhabitants in Cacumpec" which was published in the Fall/Winter issue (#28) of The Island Magazine.

^[5] the[I], [II] and [III] are added to avoid confusing the first Patrick with his son or his grandson. I am also calling them Patrick-Pat-Paddy in that order.

^[6]Margaret 15, Patrick 10, Michael 6, Catherine 5 and Mary 5 years old.