Eugene (Owen) (O')Donovan : Short Biography

Eugene (Owen) O’Donovan, 1827-1906,

Eugene (Owen) O’Donovan (he used either version of the name Eoghan on different occasions) was born in 1827 in the town of Cloyne, County Cork. He was the second son of Patrick Donovan and Mary Kenely in a family of thirteen children. His father Patrick, also born in Cloyne in 1804, was the eldest child of Timothy Donovan and Margaret Fitzgerald, both of  Cloyne Parish. The (O’)Donovan men were all carpenters/joiners. Clearly the trade had been passed down from generation to generation. Eugene followed his older brother Timothy in emigrating to America in late February 1854, arriving at the port of Philadelphia. His wife to be, Jane Dineen of Midleton, County Cork, was already there, having arrived in Philadelphia three years earlier. In fact, Eugene had been the best man for the wedding of his brother Timothy and Hannah Dineen, Jane’s older sister. Timothy and Hannah had emigrated to the United States sometime in the course of mid to late 1849. Brother Patrick joined the British navy in 1853 and served as a carpenter in Stoke Damerel until his death in 1882. Eugene and Jane remained in Philadelphia for three years before deciding to move to Connecticut. It is likely that they traveled by ship from Philadelphia to New London and then by boat up the Thames river to Norwich in 1857 or 1858. There they reunited with Timothy. Younger brother James, who had immigrated around 1850, arrived in Norwich in 1862, while Timothy moved to Hartford, followed by Eugene in 1863 to ply their trade as joiners and  house carpenters. Eugene went on to become the foreman for a yankee scion, Erastus Phelps, who settled in Connecticut and founded a construction business. Meanwhile, a third Donovan brother, William, arrived from Ireland in 1863, settling in New Haven, Connecticut. James remained in Norwich while the youngest brother, Anthony, left Ireland in 1866, emigrating to Hartford and bringing with him his wife and two children as well as his parents, Patrick and Mary. Anthony plied his carpentry skills, opened and ran a pub, then founded his own construction business and served two terms as a councillor on the Hartford City Council. Eugene and his wife Jane had eight children, seven girls and one boy. Only two of the daughters married and had children. Daughter Mary Jane married Francis Furey, whose parents and older brother hailed from County Westmeath. The couple had seven children, three boys and four girls. Francis found work as the sexton of Saint Patrick’s Church in Hartford where he served until his death in 1926. Grandparents Timothy Donovan and Margaret Fitzgerald’s children and grandchildren had all left Cloyne and Ireland to settle in America.