One of my most recent immigrant ancestors, Patrick Quinn, came here in the 1840s for that very reason - a fresh start. Specific details about Patrick's life are few (despite him being only my third-great-grandfather), and the details we do have are often contradictory and confusing. And to make things worse, there is a DNA mystery associated with Patrick's line - but more on this later.
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| A traditional depiction of the Quinn family crest. |
"Patrick came from Upper All Station in Ireland about age 11 or 12. The story is that Patrick got mad at the family and decided to leave home. He went and talked to the captain of a ship and worked his way to the United States. He later married and had a child. A split between him and his wife sent Patrick back to Ireland when he was about 20. A few years later he came back to the United States with his 2 brothers James & Michael or John & Michael. The 2 brothers went to New York while Patrick went to Virginia. Somewhere along the way Patrick married Agnes Icenhower."I have worked diligently to confirm as much of this information as possible over the years, but I often end up finding more questions than answers. Let's go through this paragraph one statement at a time:
"Patrick came from Upper All Station in Ireland about age 11 or 12." There is no place in Ireland called Upper All Station. Gregory Quinn, a first cousin of my mother's who has also researched the matter, believes that "Upper All Station" might have been the product of someone mishearing the name Altishane, which is a small town in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. I believe that this explanation is quite probable. As for the age, I find it hard to believe that such a young child would be able to arrange a trans-Atlantic voyage on his own.
"The story is that Patrick got mad at the family and decided to leave home. He went and talked to the captain of a ship and worked his way to the United States." This part of the story might well be true, but I believe that he had to have been older than 11 or 12 at the time.
"He later married and had a child. A split between him and his wife sent Patrick back to Ireland when he was about 20." I can find no concrete evidence that Patrick was ever married before he married Agnes Icenhower on 11 September 1845.
"A few years later he came back to the United States with his 2 brothers James & Michael or John & Michael. The 2 brothers went to New York while Patrick went to Virginia." I did find two passenger records for Patrick Quinn prior to 11 September 1845 (when he was definitely in Rockbridge Co., VA); however, I don't think that these records pertain to the same person. The first record has a Patrick Quinn, age 25, arriving in New York in April of 1834, and the second has a Patrick Quinn, age 26, arriving in Philadelphia in May of 1845. I believe that our Patrick is the one who arrived at age 26 in Philadelphia. The 1850 census lists Patrick and Agnes as residents of Rockbridge Co., VA and lists Patrick's age as 32. This would be consistent with him being 26 in 1845 (depending on what month he was born in). There was an Edward Quinn, age 22, that arrived on the same ship as Patrick in 1845, but no Johns, James, or Michaels.
"Somewhere along the way Patrick married Agnes Icenhower." As mentioned above, they married on 11 September 1845.
By 1870 Patrick and his family were living in Simmon's Creek, Belle, WV, where many of his descendants still live to this day. Both the 1870 and 1880 census list him as farmer. Patrick and Agnes only had two children: James Henry Quinn (my 2nd-great-grandfather) in 1849, and George Quinn in 1860. Patrick passed away on 10 August 1883, and in all likelihood is buried in the Simmons Creek Community Cemetery, near his home.
Although I have not been able to find a birth record that I can confirm as belonging to our Patrick (do you have any idea how many Patrick Quinns were born in Ireland in 1818!?), I do have one theory regarding the names of his parents. Irish people of this time period tended to follow very specific naming patterns when naming their children. The first born son was named after the father's father, and the second born son was named after the mother's father. Patrick and Agnes only had two children: James and George. We know for a certainty that Agnes' father's name was George, and their second son was named after him; therefore, I believe it is safe to assume that Patrick's father's name was James Quinn. Unfortunately, the number of Patrick Quinns born to James Quinns in Ireland in 1818 is still quite daunting.
Earlier in the post I mentioned that there was a DNA mystery surrounding Patrick - one that will be extremely difficult to ever get to the bottom of. When my mother and I first had our DNA tested about two years ago, we had a huge number of matches show up that all descend from a family named Lafferty. The closest of these matches show up as third cousin matches to my mother on Ancestry, meaning that they would have the same great-great-grandparents. When I took the amount of centimorgans shared between Mom and these matches and fed it into the Shared cM Project Tool, the result came up that the highest Lafferty match (at 121 cMs) was probably a half-2nd-cousin (meaning they likely shared one great-grandparent). Several other Lafferty matches also fell into this category. This is problematic because the trees of the Lafferty matches and our own family tree do not intersect anywhere. We have no known ancestors named Lafferty, and they have none named Quinn.
It is obvious that there has been some kind of non-paternal event here. The question is: are they Laffertys who are actually Quinns, or are we Quinns who are actually Laffertys? If George Quinn (second son of Patrick and Agnes) had any descendants that could take a DNA test we might have been able to figure it out; but as far as my research has been able to tell me, he did not have any children. It did occur to me that the "first wife" mentioned in the handed-down account of Patrick's life might be the tie-in to the Lafferty line, but there is no way to confirm this.
The name Quinn is such an important part of who we are - it is even my middle name. We have always been proud of our Irish ancestry. The thought that we might not actually be Quinns at all is somewhat of a sad one. But hopefully one day we will be able to figure out for sure where the non-paternal event took place, and how we fit in with the Laffertys. Until then, it remains a mystery.
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My descent from Patrick is as follows:
3rd great-grandfather
James Henry Quinn 1849-
Son of Patrick Quinn
James Abram "Garfield" Quinn 1882-1953
Son of James Henry Quinn
Arthur Ray "Jack" Quinn 1939-1986
Son of James Abram "Garfield" Quinn
Lora Marlene Quinn 1961-
Daughter of Arthur Ray "Jack" Quinn
Allison Quinn Kessinger
You are the daughter of Lora Marlene Quinn
Oh I feel your pain! People with the same names...it's like each generation only had 4 or 5 approved names to choose from! I wish you good luck, it is an interesting story!
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