Surprise! We have a new column to debut in this issue: Irish by Ancestry How-To With Mel Howes.
Would you benefit from a knowledgeable second set of eyes on your findings? Do you have an Irish genealogy puzzle you just can’t crack? Send your request with the subject line HOW-TO WITH MEL to stories@byancestry.com.
Howes is a longtime member of our Irish by Ancestry Facebook group and has been a helpful resource for RELATED features in the past. She is chairperson of the Irish Family History Society and a genealogist working in Dublin.
Our first request for Mel comes from member Barbara Long, who is seeking more information on her maternal lines, O’Shea and Mason.
Question:
My 2x maternal great grandparents are Johanna O’Shea and Michael Mason. They were from the Cappoquin area of Co. Waterford.
I have found the following records:
- Headstones for Johanna and Michael in St. Mary’s Catholic Cemetery, Monmouth, Illinois.
- Johanna and Michael’s church marriage record.
- Johanna’s church baptism record.
- A possible church baptism record for Michael Mason’s church baptism record.
- Johanna’s sister, Mary Shea’s church baptism record.
- The passenger list of the ship when Johanna and Michael traveled to the United States.
- Their daughter, Mary Mason’s, baptism and will.
I would like to find Johanna’s and Michael’s parents, siblings, and where Michael was born.
Answer:
Hi Barbara,
It’s great that you have already found so much information! Reviewing all the images you sent me, I’ve done some research and I have some ideas to share with you.
Johanna
One of the most useful clues is in detail of the marriage record for Johanna and Michael that you found. They were married in the parish of Modeligo, near Cappoquin in west County Waterford, but there is a note written in the record that specifies a place called Affane. As marriages often took place in the bride’s home parish, it’s very likely that Affane in Modeligo parish was where Johanna was from.
This also matches the information on possible Johanna’s baptism that you found, recorded in 1820, also in Affane in Modeligo parish. This record tells us her parents were Thomas Shea and Bridget Mulcahy, but unfortunately, the Modeligo parish marriage register only commenced in 1820, so there is no marriage record available for the couple. I checked neighbouring parishes in west Waterford for any possible matches but did not find any. However, I did find one extra related piece of information—there was another couple living in Affane and baptising their children (Margaret, Brigid and Mary) between 1816 and 1820. They were named Bartholomew Shea and Johanna Mulcahy. Given the surnames, it is possible that two brothers married two sisters! At the moment, that’s only a theory. The surviving parish marriage records don’t go back far enough to prove it. But it is exactly the sort of tantalising possibility that makes family history so much fun.
I searched extensively for any siblings to Johanna and was only able to identify the one you have already found, Mary baptised in 1822.
One final clue on Johanna’s family appears on the passenger list for Johanna and Michael’s journey to America. Immediately below them are two women named Mary Shea and Catherine Shea. Could they have been relatives? It certainly seems possible.
But again, we can’t simply declare them to be Johanna’s sisters. They might have been cousins, or more distant relatives, or perhaps unrelated people who happened to share the same surname.
The exciting thing is that this clue can potentially be followed forward rather than backward. By researching what happened to Mary and Catherine after they arrived in America, we may eventually find a record that identifies their relationship to Johanna.
Sometimes the best way to solve an Irish genealogy puzzle is not to keep going backward, but to follow a relative forwards through the records.
Johanna’s story is beginning to take shape, but what about her husband?
Michael
The family headstone gives Michael a birth date in 1815. You found a potential baptism for him in Cappoquin parish on 24 October 1815, with parents named Michael Mason and Mary Carthy.
I found a marriage record from nearby Tallow parish for a Michael Mason and Mary McCharty, dated 10 February 1812. The witnesses included William Mason, another potentially useful clue. It’s not certain this is the same couple, but they are a strong possibility. Tallow is close to Cappoquin and Modeligo, so the geography makes this worth investigating.
I couldn’t find any siblings to Michael in either Cappoquin, Modeligo or Tallow parishes.
What next?
There are several promising avenues you could still explore:
- Land records such as the Tithe Applotment Books (1820s to 1830s) and Griffith’s Valuation (1840s to 1860s) may help establish where Thomas and Bartholomew Shea lived in Affane, where any Carthy’s or McCarthy’s lived in Tallow and where Michael Mason (senior) lived in Cappoquin.
- Graveyards around Affane, Tallow and Cappoquin may reveal other members of the Shea and Mason families.
- The American records for Mary and Catherine Shea may help establish whether they really were related to Johanna.
- And then there are the Lismore Castle estate records, which cover a remarkable period from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. Because Affane, Tallow and Cappoquin were within the Lismore Castle estate, records such as tenant lists, leases and rent rolls may contain the names of these families.
Who knows? A name on a rent roll or a gravestone could eventually provide the missing link.
The joy of not knowing everything
Perhaps the most interesting thing about this research is that we don’t have all the answers – yet.
We have a strong lead for Johanna’s parents. We have identified a probable sister. We have possible extended family connections. We have a promising baptism for Michael and a possible marriage for his parents.
But there are still gaps. And that’s actually part of the appeal.
Family history isn’t always about producing a perfectly documented family tree stretching back hundreds of years. Sometimes it’s about getting close enough to the people who came before us to begin to imagine their lives.
Johanna Shea was a young woman from Affane who married Michael Mason, started a family in Ireland and then crossed the Atlantic to begin another chapter in America following a time of great hardship in Ireland.
We don’t yet know exactly where they lived as children or even the names of all their siblings, but we have narrowed down their origins to Affane and to Tallow and Cappoquin.
And perhaps that is the real magic of genealogy: a vague family memory slowly becomes a real landscape — and eventually, perhaps, a place where you can stand and say, this is where they came from.
All the best,
Mel
Mel Howes, Dolmen Genealogy
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