U.S. Consular Registration Records, 1907-1925

The Ancestry databases U.S., Consular Registration Certificates, 1907 - 1918 and U.S., Consular Registration Applications, 1916-1925 contain records pertaining to "naturalized or native born American citizens who intended to stay in a foreign country for a protracted length of time."[1] Records from these databases have a lot of information about the individual who was requesting to stay outside the United States. 

There are almost 800 entries across the two databases for people who were born in Ireland, became a citizen of the United States when they moved there, and then were required to file registration with a U.S. consulate when they resided outside the United States. In almost all examples for Irish born people, their county or area of birth was recorded. The majority of these people moved back to Ireland for various lengths of time but some also moved to Great Britain.

Denis Barry was born in Sunday's Well, County Cork on 15 May 1860.[2] At some point in his life he moved to the U.S., naturalized, and lived in Washington D.C. He arrived back in Ireland in 1900 to reside at 17 Friars Avenue, Cork City. His reason for returning to Ireland was 'health failing and it is my intentions [sic] to return to the United States, if health improves." His Certificate of Registration of an American Citizen is dated 18 September 1907. A search of the 1901 Census of Ireland shows Denis Barry residing with his two unmarried sisters at the address he provided.[3]

Page from Consular Registration Certificate of Denis Barry, 1907

If you find a person of interest in these databases, be sure to look at the pages either side of the relevant image as there will usually be more than one page in a person's application. Typically, a witness who believed the applicant's statements to be correct is also listed on the document. In the case of Denis Barry, William Ellis of 11 Douglas St, Cork, verified the information provided by Barry. Other records from applicants provide the name of a spouse, any children and all their birth places, if the applicant was married and had children. 

These databases are an interesting example that shows a small subset of Irish people who returned to Ireland from the United States, either temporarily or permanently. Access them at:

U.S., Consular Registration Certificates, 1907-1918
U.S., Consular Registration Applications, 1916-1925

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[1] Ancestry.com, U.S., Consular Registration Certificates, 1907 - 1918. 2013. http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=2995: accessed 7 February 2016.

[2] United States, Department of State, Bureau of Citizenship, Certificate of Registration of an American Citizen, Number 48774, Denis Barry, dated 1 September 1907; digital image, U.S., Consular Registration Certificates, 1907 - 1918, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com), accessed 6 February 2016.

[3] The National Archives of Ireland, 1901 Census of Ireland, County Cork, DED Cork Urban No. 4, Townland/Street Friars Avenue or Granbraker Road, house 4, Form A , Denis Barry; digital image, The National Archives of Ireland, http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/reels/nai000518111: accessed 7 February 2016.

Emigrant City - New NYPL Project

Crowd-sourced, online transcription and indexing projects have become popular in genealogy over the last few years. Both Ancestry.com, through their World Archives Project, and Familysearch Indexing ask people to volunteer their time to transcribe and index genealogy records. The New York Public Library recently launched a transcription project called Emigrant City. Developed in collaboration by two departments of the public library (NYPL Labs and the Irma and Paul Milstein Division of United States History, Local History and Genealogy), "Emigrant City invites you to help transcribe recently digitized mortgage and bond record books from the Library’s collection of Emigrant Savings Bank records."[1]

The Emigrant Industrial Savings Bank, based in New York City, was founded by the Irish Emigrant Society and opened its doors in 1850. It was originally located on Chambers St., beside the current Municipal Archives, a location ideally suited to attracting a large number of Irish depositors who lived in Lower Manhattan. In all over 170,000 accounts were opened between 1850 and 1883 with the vast majority in the names of Irish men and women.[2] The 6,400 mortgage and bond books that are to be transcribed date from between 1851 and 1921[3].

Inevitably, there will be a healthy number of bank customers in the books who were Irish-born or the American-born children of Irish immigrant parents. In fact, the second person who received a loan from the bank was New York-born Mary O'Connor. She received a $2,000 loan on 22 January 1855.[4]

This is a project to keep an eye on, especially if you have New York City Irish ancestry. You can read more about the Emigrant City project on the dedicated NYPL website.

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[1] Armstong, William. Emigrant City: An Introduction. 4 November 2015. New York Public Library. http://www.nypl.org/blog/2015/11/04/emigrant-city: accessed 7 November 2015.

[2] Salvato, Richard. A User’s Guide to the Emigrant Savings Bank Records. New York, NY: New York Public Library Manuscripts and Archives Division. 1997. Available at http://www.nypl.org/sites/default/files/emigrant.pdf: accessed 17 December 2012

[3] Sutton, Philip. Emigrant City: Two Stories. 4 November 2015. New York Public Library. http://www.nypl.org/blog/2015/11/04/emigrant-city-two-stories: accessed 7 November 2015.

[4] Sutton, Philip. Emigrant City: Two Stories. 4 November 2015

Mortuary Records Of The Catholic Order of Foresters Talk

I got to attend my first Back To Our Past conference in Dublin a few weeks ago and there was one talk in particular that I had earmarked to attend: Finding Your American Cousins - A New Source for Massachusetts Mortuary Records, 1880 - 1943. This talk was about a topic I have blogged about before, the mortuary records of the Catholic Order of Foresters (COF) (access here and here). 

To quickly recap, the COF was a fraternal life insurance organization founded in Boston in 1879 by a group of Irish immigrants. Over the ensuing decades, the organization spread throughout the state and by the end of the 19th century there were ninety-five branches throughout Massachusetts.[1]

Mary Choppa, of the Massachusetts based Irish Ancestral Research Association, and Joanne Riley, an archivist at the Healey Library, University of Massachusetts Boston, crossed the Atlantic to give the talk. They started by outlining what the Catholic Order of Foresters was, what information was contained in the mortuary records, and how they came into the possession of TIARA and then the Healey library.

The genealogical strength of the mortuary records lie in the considerable level of detail that a person had to provide to get an insurance policy and the efforts and correspondence that were undertaken to ensure all relevant parties received a payout when the policy holder passed away. I hope to have an example of such a mortuary record on this blog in the next couple of weeks but for now I'll summarize the main points that were discussed.

• Women were admitted to the Order, starting in 1894
• The branches that were set up all over Massachusetts were called courts and there are surviving records of the activities of each court
• There are 79,000 records available and they cover the years 1879 up to the late 1960s/early 1970s.
• Each record contains between 8 and 29 pages
• Information in the records include details such as name, address, information about parents and siblings including when and how parents died, name and address of one friend, details about beneficiaries including maiden and married name of females, names of family members even if they were not beneficiaries
• The beneficiaries were sometimes family members who lived in Ireland. The records for such a person include correspondence between the family members in Ireland and the COF.
• They are currently open for people to access up to 1943. A 72 year rule of access applies and as each year passes, one more new year of records will be accessible to the public
• A different death certificate was supplied than the state/city issued civil death certificate, which can potentially have different information
• The court that a person was a member of can indicate where the person resided in the state

The speakers noted that practically every Irish American family in Massachusetts today has at least one ancestor who can be found in these records. Currently, you can search an index of names through 1935 and apply to the Healey library for a copy of the documents. Records for the years 1936 to 1943 are also available and contact should be made with the Healey Library to search those years. An added bonus was disclosed at that talk in that the records up to 1935 will be making their way onto Familysearch.org in the future.  They will be indexed and all images will be digitized. No date was provided so keep an eye on the regular Familysearch.org new record announcements.

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[1] TIARA. Tiara Foresters Project. 2011. http://tiara.ie/forest.php: accessed 16 December 2013.

Catholic Cemetery, Norfolk, Virginia

The land for St Mary's Catholic Cemetery in Norfolk, Virginia was purchased in 1854. Since that date, it has served as the resting place for Catholics from the Norfolk, Chesapeake and Virginia Beach areas of the state. This is an area of the United States that did not see a lot of immigration of Catholic from Ireland. As a result, the few Catholic parishes and cemeteries that they helped to create are important resources for genealogical research.

The About section of the cemeteries' website has a link to a database of interments that is hosted on the US Gen Web Archive. The database is considerable, with burials from the 1850s to the 21st century included. What makes this such a useful resource is that the information provided for each person was drawn from a number of different sources including original cemetery records, parish records, local death records, headstone inscriptions, obituaries and other records.

Names, dates of burial, dates of death, estimated years of birth, actual dates of birth and a link to an image of the headstone are provided for those in the database. Significantly, place of origin in Ireland is also included for some of the deceased.

For example, John M. O' Connor died on 16 October 1908. He was born about 1866 in Galway. Even though he is buried in Norfolk, Virginia, he died in Baltimore, Maryland.[1] Patrick McCarrick was born in Ballina, County Mayo on 16 June 1821 and died 3 February 1888. He was a captain in the Confederate Navy.[2]

Note: It is important to remember that the information in this database is a secondary source and was derived from primary source documentation. It is possible that mistakes occurred in the creation of this database so the primary source should be obtained wherever possible in your research.

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[1] Alesia Raper, Tim Bonney, Robert B. Hitchings, Bill Inge, Colin Boklage, Marian Rudd, Emilie Hauser, Connie Kean & Candice Cheshire. St Mary's Cemetery Interment Database - O. Date Unknown. http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/norfolkcity/cemeteries/stmarys/sm-o.html : 10 October 2015

[2] Alesia Raper, Tim Bonney, Robert B. Hitchings, Bill Inge, Colin Boklage, Marian Rudd, Emilie Hauser, Connie Kean & Candice Cheshire. St Mary's Cemetery Interment Database - McC - McK. Date Unknown. http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/norfolkcity/cemeteries/stmarys/sm-mcc-mck.html : 10 October 2015

Emigration And The Single Woman

@RTÉArchives is a very interesting twitter account to follow to learn about Ireland over the last 50 years. Last week, they tweeted about a 1995 Radharc documentary called Emigration and the Single Woman. This clip discussed the Mission of Our Lady of the Rosary for the Protection of the Irish Immigrant Girls that existed in New York City in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The records of this organizations are digitized and available for free online. They were quietly released in March 2014, of which you can read more about in my post from when they went online. Researching in them is a must if you have female immigrants from Ireland who came to New York during that time period.

Emigration and the Single Woman, from Radharc via RTÉ Archives.

Click here or here to read Townland of Origin posts about how other Radharc documentaries can help with genealogy. 

Archives Of Irish America

The Archives of Irish America is a repository of primary research materials at New York University that aims to transform our understanding of the Irish migration experience and the distillation of American Irish ethnicity over the past century.[1] Sometimes, it is not obviously apparent how a university archive collection can help with genealogy, but searching through the catalog can reveal some hidden gems.

The oral history collection contains a large number of interviews with Irish-born immigrants and those who are descendants of Irish immigrants from previous generations. Some of the interviewees from Ireland were born in the 1930s and could possibly give an insightful understanding about coming to America and assimilating in the first half of the 20th century. Places of origin in Ireland and the names of parents and grandparents could also possibly be provided.

The Archives also houses the Gaelic Society of New York Collection and the John T. Ridge Collection, among many others. Both of these collections have documents and information from the 19th and 20th centuries. Many Irish immigrants joined fraternal, cultural, social, and political organizations in the U.S. These collections cans shed light on their involvement in such organizations and possibly provide pertinent genealogical information.

For a full list of the collections, click this link and select Archives of Irish America (AIA) Collection at the top of the page.

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[1] New York University. Archives of Irish America. Year Unknown. www.nyu.edu/library/bobst/research/aia: accessed 7 May 2015.

Catholic Order Of Foresters Indexing Project

In January 2014, I wrote about The Irish Ancestral Research Association and highlighted the databases on their site. One database contains information about the records for the Massachusetts Catholic Order of Foresters. This was a fraternal life insurance organization founded in Boston in 1879 by a group of Irish immigrants. Over the ensuing decades, the organization spread throughout the state and by the end of the 19th century there were ninety-five branches throughout Massachusetts.[1]

An archivist from the Joseph P. Healey Library, University of Massachusetts-Boston got in touch to let me know about the efforts that have led to the creation of an online index for this set of records on the library website. This index facility includes more search parameters and also contains the most recent versions of the indexing efforts, a project that is still ongoing. Records for the Foresters, which are housed at the library, are available through 1942, with the index currently covering the years up to 1935.

Read more about the Catholic Order of Foresters, access the indexing project database, and learn where to write to for copies of the records by clicking here.

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[1] TIARA. Tiara Foresters Project. 2011. http://tiara.ie/forest.php: accessed 16 December 2013.

St. Joseph's New Cemetery, Cincinnati

St. Joseph's New Cemetery in Cincinnati, Ohio opened in 1854 and was purchased due to the original St. Joseph's Cemetery—located closer to the center of downtown—filling up. That first cemetery housed the remains of the growing German and Irish Catholic population of the city and was open from 1842 to 1853. [1]

The website for the new cemetery has an extensive database of over 120,000 interments, covering the time period from the 1850s to 2008. There is also a helpful browse option, useful for names that have been erroneously transcribed or spelled in an unconventional manner. Information returned from the database includes name of deceased, date of interment, and where known, age, date of death, spouse's name, and parents' names.

The cemetery is located at 4500 Foley Road, to the west of downtown Cincinnati. 

Click here to access the database.

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[1] Blevins, Michael J. St. Joseph Cemetery Association. 18 November 2008.  http://www.stjoenew.com/history.html: accessed 13 January 2015. 

St. Peter's Catholic Cemetery, Baltimore, MD

St. Peter's Catholic Cemetery in Baltimore, Maryland is located on Moreland Ave., to the north-west of the downtown area. It opened in 1851 and was associated with St. Peter the Apostle parish which was founded on the corners of Hollins and North Poppleton Sts. in 1842. This parish, known as the "mother Church of west Baltimore", was built to provide a place of worship for the growing Irish population who moved to the west side of the city to work on the B&O Railroad.[1]

Three different online indexes of burials for the cemetery, in .pdf file format, are available to view for the years 1851 to about 1970. Each of these indexing efforts come from different sources and cover a majority of, though not all, entries. It is recommended to read the 'Preface' for each set of files to understand from what source they were transcribed and what years they cover. You can access all three sets by clicking here and a cemetery map by clicking here.

Note: St. Peter the Apostle parish is now closed. In 2004 it merged with St. Jerome and St. Martin to form Transfiguration Catholic Community. Phone: 410-685-5044 or visit the parish website for more information, such as the location of parish registers.

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[1] Spalding, Thomas W. The Premier See: A History of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, 1789-1989. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. 1989.

Chicago Area Naturalizations 1871-1929

Chicago is one of the big four Irish-American cities, along with New York, Boston, and Philadelphia. The city is located in Cook County and the Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court oversees administration for that court system. In the 19th and 20th centuries, hundreds and thousands of people went through the naturalization process at their various courts.

Their website has an index of naturalization records from the late 1800s and early 1900s, as "the Clerk of the Circuit Court of Cook County Archives is home to more than 500,000 naturalization petitions covering the years 1871[1] to 1929. More than 400,000 of these records are Declarations of Intention, 1906-1929, which were usually the first papers to be filed by those who wished to become U.S. citizens."[2]

This index is currently a work in progress but it is already showing tremendous promise for those looking for the Irish place of origin for their Chicago-area ancestors of this era. Currently, there are almost 7,500 index entries that list the county of origin for applicants. These numbers come from just six Irish counties: Clare, Cork, Galway, Kerry, Limerick, and Mayo. What is even better is that many of the index entries give details about what part of the county the applicant was born in. Overall, the index provides valuable information: name, birth date, birth town (this is where Irish place and county are to be found), birth country, and occupation.

It is useful to remember that someone did not have to live in Cook County, IL to declare their intent to naturalize. An immigrant could do so at any court. Therefore, don't discount those ancestors who lived in counties and areas around Cook County/Chicago.

You can access the database by clicking here.

If you find a relevant entry in the index you can apply for the declaration of intention via the application form at this link.

Number of records per county (as of July 2014)

Clare - 979

Cork - 753

Galway - 841

Kerry - 1261

Limerick - 986

Mayo - 2657

Total - 7477

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[1] All records before 1871 were destroyed in the fire of that year.

[2] Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court. About the Collection. 2014. http://www.cookcountyclerkofcourt.org/nr/about.aspx: accessed 29 July 2014.

Early San Francisco Newspaper Index

Recently, I came across a very interesting Irish genealogy resource for San Francisco. The Early San Francisco Newspaper Index was created by Thomas and Regina Wrin, descendants of Michael J. Wrin, a prominent businessman who was very active in the forming of Irish societies in early San Francisco.

This "database is an index of over 560,000 listings from San Francisco newspapers, 1849-1927, featuring the activities of Irish San Franciscans in over 2,300 Societies. This is equivalent to 112,000 pages of printed data. Each listing includes: individual's name, publication name, publication date, society involved, a brief summary of the individual's activity which generated a mention in that publication."[1]

Also known as "The Wrindex", this database is currently not available online but there are a number of ways that you can access the information.  Firstly, there is a free name search service available through the Wrindex website. Secondly, you can purchase copies of the index on CD from the same website. Thirdly, the CD's are also available at the United Irish Cultural Center in San Francisco (an organization I have previously profiled on this blog).

It is important to point out that this source is a index. It does not contain original records, or copies of them. Instead, it will allow you to take a very beneficial shortcut in your research and go directly to newspaper articles that contain information about those of interest to your research.

Access The Wrindex website here.

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[1] The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Family History Library Catalog. 2002.  https://familysearch.org/eng/library/fhlcatalog/supermainframeset.asp?display=titledetails&titleno=1189047&disp=The+early+San+Francisco+newspaper+index : accessed 28 June 2014

Irish Research In Hartford, Connecticut

I've written before on this blog about how academic research can be very beneficial to genealogists, but can sometimes not be thought of as a potential source of relevant information or records. Therefore, I'd like to take another opportunity to highlight a useful and interesting piece of academic work.

Getting Their Share: Irish and Italian Immigrants in Hartford, Connecticut, 1850-1940 is the PhD thesis of Bruce Alan Clouette. It was submitted in 1992 at the University of Connecticut. A recent publication considers it to be the most definitive work on Irish immigration to Hartford, CT in the mid 19th century.[1]

Works of this magnitude can be particularly useful when they are about just one city, as opposed to the many academic tomes which have focused on the immigration of Irish people to the whole of the U.S. Individually named immigrants, migration patterns from Ireland, settlement patterns in the city, Catholic Church history and many other useful types of genealogical information can be found in the more locally focused publications.

You can read the abstract here.

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[1] Xiangming Chen and Nick Bacon. Confronting Urban Legacy : Rediscovering Hartford and New England's Forgotten Cities. Lanham: Lexington Books. 2013. p. 44.

San Francisco Police Recruit Books

Archive.org is a website full of wonderful scanned genealogy resources. Buried down in all their millions of scanned images is the three volume Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco. These volumes cover an almost 100 year period, from 1853 to 1947.

The three volumes are ledgers that start with an index of names containing the page number for the full entry. After the index, there is a chronological listing of new police recruits. If recorded, there is a fantastic amount of information included for each new recruit: name, date of birth, city or county of birth, state or country of birth, previous occupation, married or single, no. in family, date appointed, age when appointed, date removed, remarks, and length of service.

Two Irish immigrants in Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco, part one

Two Irish immigrants in Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco, part two*

Like many other American cities, San Francisco experienced a significant amount of immigration from Ireland in the 19th century. These immigrants were attracted to secure public sector employment and the police department saw large numbers of Irish recruits. Two samples from volume one show the prevalence of Irish immigrants:

Pages:                                                    1 to 15, covering the 1860s

Total # of new recruits:                  150

Total of which are Irish:                  45 (30% of recruits)

Total with county of origin:           27 (60% of Irish recruits)

Pages:                                                     49 to 66, covering the years 1884-1886

Total # of new recruits:                  180

Total of which are Irish:                   51 (28% of recruits)

Total with county of origin:            34 (67% of Irish recruits)

Any record set that has county of origin information for more that 50% of Irish entries is a very valuable genealogical resource. The rate of Irish-born recruits does fall off in the second and third volumes. However, they are replaced by first generation Irish-Americans, the sons of the first wave of Irish immigrants.

Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco, 1853-1904

Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco, 1904-1931

Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco, 1931-1947

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* Chronological Record of Police Appointments City and County of San Francisco, Volume 1, 1853-1904, page 6, entries section, available online at https://archive.org/stream/chronologicalrec1185sanf#page/n125/mode/1up : accessed 2 July 2014.

Diocese of Wilmington Cemetery Database

The Diocese of Wilmington was established in 1868 and today covers the state of Delaware and nine Maryland counties on the Delmarva Peninsula.[1] The three largest cemeteries in the diocese are Cathedral cemetery (Wilmington, DE, opened 1876), All Saints (Wilmington, DE, opened 1958), and Gate of Heaven (Dagsboro, DE, opened 2002). 

A searchable database is available on the diocesan website for these three cemeteries. Details in the database include name, date of death, and plot location. Existing headstone/grave markers in Cathedral cemetery have been photographed and are also available to view. The diocesan website also lists location and contact information for 18 current and 4 closed parish cemeteries.

Search the database by clicking here.

Cemetery Maps

All Saints map

Cathedral cemetery map

Gate of Heaven map

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[1] Catholic Diocese of Wilmington. A Brief History of the Diocese of Wilmington. Year Unknown. Available online at http://www.cdow.org/about-the-diocese/history: accessed 13 May 2014 

Omaha Catholic Cemeteries

The Archdiocese of Omaha was originally founded as the Vicariate Apostolic of the Nebraska Territory in 1859.[1] Since then, it has decreased in size and increased in importance, becoming an archdiocese in 1945. Currently, the archdiocese consists of 23 counties in north-eastern Nebraska.

Since the late 19^th century, the archdiocese has had five cemeteries under is auspices: Saint Mary Magdalene (opened in 1868, traditionally German), Holy Sepulchre (1873), Saint Mary (1883), Calvary (1952), and Resurrection (founding year unknown, but after 1952).

Burials at these cemeteries are available to search via the Catholic Cemeteries of the Archdiocese of Omaha website. Where known, you will be provided with name, date of death and plot location. Click here to search the database.

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[1] Archdiocese of Omaha. Prelate History. Available online at http://www.archomaha.org/about/history/prelate-history : accessed 6 May 2014.

Lowell, MA Burials 1895-2011

St. Patrick's Cemetery in Lowell, Massachusetts, was founded in 1832 in response to the need for a consecrated burial ground for the growing Catholic Irish community. The website of the cemetery has a genealogy section where you can search for information about burials that occurred from 1895 to 2011. All burials for those years are listed alphabetically in PDF documents. Provided information includes name, age at death, date interred, the location of the grave, and the name of the funeral director who arranged the burial, if know. This final piece of information could potentially lead to funeral home records.

More information about records before 1895 can be found in the comprehensive history of the cemetery. The website also has detailed maps of individual lots to help you locate a specific grave.

Contact details are also available on the website, should you need to get full interment records.

Kentucky Irish American

A very important resource for Irish genealogical research in the state of Kentucky is the Kentucky Irish American newspaper. Statewide newspapers aimed at the Irish community, and that were published for decades, are not that common. This publication hit the newsstands on a weekly basis from the 1890s to 1968.

Based in Louisville, it catered to the needs of the concentrated Irish community. In the early decades there was regular reporting on fraternal organizations, such as the Ancient Order of Hibernians, with members and officers named on a weekly basis. Other features included society news, focusing on the burgeoning middle-class Irish, and deaths that occurred. Some obituaries, such as the one below, for Mary Boyle Featherstone, give a county of birth.[1]

Obituary of Mary Boyle Featherstone from the Kentucky Irish American

Microfilm editions for all years are available at the University of Louisville. Some years (1900, 1901, 1909, 1910) are available on the subscription website Fold3. Copies from 1898-1921 can be accessed for a fee on Newspapers.com, and for free on The Chronicling America website.

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[1] Author Unknown. Mourn Her Death. 11 March 1905. Kentucky Irish American. p. 1. Available online at 

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86069180/1905-03-11/ed-1/seq-1/#fullscreen=true: accessed 17 March 2014.

Watsonhouse.org Is Now Live

For the last couple of years I have patiently waited for the ledger books of the Irish Mission for Immigrant Girls in New York City to come online. Well, all of a sudden, there they are! Some of them, anyway. Seemingly, there are more to come.

The website, Watson House, has very quietly gone live. You can now search their records from 1897-1940. The information contained therein is phenomenal: the names of Irish immigrant women, their age, what county in Ireland they came from, their US destination address, and other interesting information.

For 35,000 women! Enjoy.

Claire Santry's Irish Genealogy News has a very comprehensive article about this record set.

Chicago Irish Families, 1875-1925

Local genealogists can often go to great lengths to collect information that is of benefit to a much wider number of researchers. One such person is Tom Cook, a native of Chicago. Over many years he collected a large amount of records of interest to those with Irish ancestry in the Chicago area.

Chicago Irish Families, 1875-1925 is now one of the thousands of Ancestry.com databases. The blurb reads, "this database is a collection of records regarding many of the Irish families who made their home in this city between 1875 and 1925....information provided includes births, marriages, and deaths, often including names of relatives. Taken from a wide variety of sources, including local histories, parish records, local newspapers, and cemetery inscriptions, this can be an extremely helpful database for those researching Irish-American ancestors."[1] The database was expanded in 2012, as reported by Irish Genealogy News.

It seems to have had a previous life as an unpublished manuscript, Chicago's Irish Families 1831-1900, before going live on Ancestry in 2000. Examples of entries can be seen in these extracts of Callahan names (along with some others). Further information that will aid researchers using this database can be found at this link.

Efforts to find out the whereabouts of this manuscript were unsuccessful. Also, it does not seem to be clear as to why records from 1831-1875 were not included on the Ancestry version.  Does anyone out there have more information on this interesting resource?

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[1] Ancestry.com. 2012. About Chicago Irish Families, 1875-1925. Available online at http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=3524: accessed 25 January 2014

The Irish And The Métis In Saskatchewan, Canada

When you do genealogical research you really should not be surprised at the unusual record collections that Irish people can be found in. One such example is the North-West Territories Métis Scrip Applications found at Library and Archives Canada.

Firstly, some background: Throughout the late 19^th century, settling the west was paramount for the newly confederated Canada. Clearing the title [rights to land ownership] of the region’s Indigenous peoples was integral to this process. As a means of extinguishing the Aboriginal title of the Métis, the scrip policy was implemented in the North-West, part of which is now Saskatchewan.

The Métis were dealt with on an individual basis. Scrip commissioners travelled to Métis communities and held sittings at various locations where Métis gathered to fill out applications for their entitlement. The basic premise to scrip was to extinguish the Aboriginal title of the Métis by awarding a certificate redeemable for land or money – the choice was the applicant’s – of either 160 or 240 acres or dollars, depending on their age and status.[1]

Some of these applications, for the years 1886-1906, are available to view online and were collected by an organization with a very un-PC title, North-West Half-Breeds Claims Commissions. This name resulted from the applicants having one parent who was Métis and another who was non-Métis, usually French-Canadian, but sometimes Irish.[2] However, many of the applicants in the collection are listed as having two Métis parents. A change to the eligibility rules on 1885 could have something to do with this.[3]

One such example is for Jennis Brunet and has the following information:

Brunet, Jennie - Concerning her claim as a child - Address, Fort Saskatchewan - Born, Edmonton, 1863 - Father, John Foley, (Irish) - Mother, Jennie, (Métis) - Married, April, 1879 at Fort Saskatchewan to Philias Brunet - Children living, two, Mary Charlotte born 1879 and Sarah Jeanne born 1882 - Children deceased, two, Mary Rose and another not christened - Scrip for 240 acres - Claim 51.[4]

Document from application of Jennie Brunet naming John Foley as her father

Some of the files can be a treasure trove of information. An application by Samuel Cunningham, for his deceased brother John, has the following:

Cunningham, Samuel; for his deceased brother, John Cunningham; claim no. 318; address: St. Albert; born: 1815 at Manitoba; father: Patrick Cunningham (Irish); mother: Nancy (Métis); married: 1848 at Lac Ste. Anne to Rosalie L'Hirondelle; heirs: Rosalie L'Hirondelle (widow), $16.00; Samuel Cunningham; John; James; Albert; Edward $16.00; Daniel; Alfred; Henry; Nancy, wife of George Gamon, $16.00[5]

Document from Samuel & John Cunningham application.

Unfortunately, navigating the Library and Archives Canada website can be quite complex. Start here if you think you have some Irish ancestors who were in Saskatchewan in the later 19th century. Then click "Show Arrangement Structure", followed by the links for "Pages 1.11", "Pages 1.12" etc.. This will open links for each individual application. A Ctrl+F search is the best way to proceed from there, using the word 'Irish" or the name of your ancestor.

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[1] Camile, Augustus. Our Legacy. 2008. Saskatchewan Council for Archives and Archivists. Available online at http://scaa.sk.ca/ourlegacy/exhibit_scrip: accessed 8 January 2014

[2] Library and Archives Canada. North-West Half-Breeds Commission. 2013. Available online at http://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/aboriginal-heritage/metis/metis-scrip-records/Pages/north-west-commissions.aspx: accessed 8 January 2014

[3] Library and Archives Canada. 2013.

[4] "North-West Territories Métis Scrip Applications." From Library and Archives Canada. Application Brunet, Jennie; Available online at http://collectionscanada.gc.ca/pam_archives/index.php?fuseaction=genitem.displayItem&lang=eng&rec_nbr=1497383 : accessed 8 January 2014. original data from: Microfilm reel C-14961, Volume 1342

[5] "North-West Territories Métis Scrip Applications." From Library and Archives Canada. Application Cunningham, Samuel for his deceased brother, John Cunningham; Available online at http://collectionscanada.gc.ca/pam_archives/index.php?fuseaction=genitem.displayItem&lang=eng&rec_nbr=1508494: accessed 8 January 2014. original data from: Microfilm reel C-14961, Volume 1342