Searching for Phelans

Jim:

Welcome to Ireland Reaching Out!

I searched the subscription site Roots ireland and could not find a baptismal record for Mary or any children of Nicholas Phelan and Joanna Ryan. The Urlingford RC records go back to 1805 (I presumed your family was RC). I did some further searching of civil records which can be found at the free site www.irishgenealogy.ie  I located a 1923 death record for a Johanna Phelan with the informant son John. She lived in Ballynascarry Gore townland which is in Tubbridbritain civil parish. I then went back to look for Nicholas' death record and located a record in 1909, same townland and informant son John.

I then searched the 1901 and 1911 censuses and found the family in Ballynsacarry. See links below. I think these records are for your family.

Not sure why Mary's baptismal record did not show up. Civil registration of births started in 1864.

Let me know what questions you have.

Roger McDonnell

https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/images/deaths_retu…

https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/images/deaths_retu…

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Kilkenny/Tubbrid_Brita…

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1911/Kilkenny/Tubbridbritta…

Dear Roger,

Thank you so much for your quick and informative response. One thing you corrected was an error I had made in the death of Nicholas Phelan. I am sure you have found the Phelans I was looking for – Ballynascarry and Tubbrid seem to be just adjacent to Urlington. As for Mary Phelan and her sister Ellen, both of whom came to America, I am reasonably sure they were daughters of Nicholas and Joanna– both Mary and Ellen list Nicholas and Joanna Phelan as their parents on their American records of marriage. I’ll keep searching for Mary, using the links you provided. You were correct about Mary being Catholic. In fact, she is the reason I am Catholic. Although her husband was Protestant, the children were raised Catholic, and all subsequent Goodwins have remained Catholic (despite the decidedly English name!). Mary Phelan is the most fascinating person in my family tree. Clearly a strong woman, she went through five pregnancies in the first ten years of her marriage, and then raised the four children who urvived infancy more or less on her own. It appears that her husband either left or was kicked out of the house shortly after the last child was born, around 1885. He subsequently died young of cirrhosis of the liver (which makes me suspect that Mary kicked him out of the house). She apparently made something of a living as a dressmaker working from home and, in later years, her children supported her. She died in 1929 and is buried in Fall River’s St. Patrick’s cemetery. It remains a mystery to me why Mary and her sister, but not the rest of the family, came to the U.S., although I have read (Out of Ireland, by Miller & Wagner) that female emigration in the post famine years was very common and might have occurred in even larger numbers than male emigration. Anyway, thanks again for your help.

Jim Goodwin

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