Discovering More Relatives in Catholic Cemeteries

Holy Name Cemetery is the final resting place for many of my family. The cemetery, also known as the Hudson County Catholic Cemetery, is in Jersey City, New Jersey.

From the New Jersey Records Preservation Group,

"The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Newark has made a small (but extremely significant!) improvement to their searchable database of burials (www.rcancem.org/find-a-loved-one-search). The database includes burials in some Catholic cemeteries within the Archdiocese of Newark (including Holy Name in Jersey City, Holy Cross in North Arlington, Holy Sepulchre in East Orange, and several other Catholic cemeteries in Essex, Bergen, Morris, and Union counties).

Until recently, a search for an individual in the database brought up the name of the deceased, the burial date, and the plot number. However, there was no way to search by plot number or to see who else was buried in the plot with that individual. The recent addition, a small magnifying glass to the right of an entry, generates a listing of individuals buried in the same plot with the person whose entry is listed. This is an extremely valuable tool for genealogists, who may find parents, children, siblings, and other extended family members buried in the same plot. There are still burials being added to the database, so it is an ongoing project.

This change was implemented following input and a suggestion from the New Jersey Records Preservation Group (www.NJRPG.org), who urged the Archdiocese to come up with a solution to help researchers determine who else is buried in plots with their loved ones."

Below are plot listings of people with no gravestones. Being able to view all the people in the plot is leading to new discoveries.

Edward Preston (1885-1903) and Michael Preston (1882-1918) were grandsons of Michael Preston (1813-1904).

Edward drowned after diving from the pier off 49th Street in Bayonne.

Michael was killed by a train (or murdered) in 1918.

Who is Edna Staley, died 1977? I have no idea.

She may be the Edna Mary Staley who appears in the Social Security Applications and Claims Index, born in 1921 in Schenectady, New York to Harry Staley and Edna Gallagher. I see no obvious connection to these Prestons.

Margaret Donovan (1855-1906), wife of John Coughlin (1854-1906), was a paternal aunt of little William.

William Donovan (1896-1900) was the son of Lawrence (or Laurence) Donovan (1862-1944) and Mary OReilly (1870-1944). Lawrence and Mary are buried in Block V, Section AA (see below).

I had no idea who else was buried with Margaret and William. Now I have two additional names, Eliza OLeary and Patrick Thompson, but I do not know how they relate. I will copy their death certificates on my next trip to the New Jersey State Archives.

As discussed above, Laurence Donovan and Mary OReilly, died 1944, were the parents of William, who died in 1900 and was buried with Laurence's sister Margaret in a separate plot.

William Donovan (1831-1897) and Ann Daly (1838-1893) were the parents of Laurence. They were from Skull East in Cork, Ireland.

Annie Esker, died 1895, was a surprise. Using the indexes of New Jersey marriages and deaths, she may be Mary E Esker, a baby who died in Bayonne a day before burial at Holy Name. Her parents could be William Esker and Margaret Dailey, who married at Saint Mary's Catholic Church in Bayonne in 1894. They could have some relationship to Ann Daly, which would be great, because I have nothing on Ann's ancestors.

Again, I need copy the records for these people to figure out the connections.

Irish Records!

For the first time I viewed Irish records for family in the United States!

My Irish studies get stuck once we reach the generation that left Ireland and settled in the United States.  Rarely does a record reveal anything more specific than "Ireland" as the place of birth.  The lack of a specific area in Ireland to look for records, combined with the prevalence of certain common Irish surnames, results in short Irish family trees.

Death certificate for Daniel Donovan, died from railroad injuries in Bayonne, New Jersey on March 5, 1890.
Note that the birthplace for him and his parents is simply "Ireland."

To help my DNA studies, my maternal grandmother's first cousins tested their (autosomal) DNA at 23andMe.  (Their mother and my grandmother's father were siblings.)  All of their ancestral lines trace back to Ireland.

Both cousins showed a close match via comparisons at GedMatch, where people can upload their DNA results from the three major testing companies, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA, and AncestryDNA.

This DNA cousin and I compared family trees.  The connection- the common ancestor- should not be very far back.  The DNA cousin had the surnames Donovan and Coughlan in her family tree.  My cousins' grandparents were John Coughlin (1854-1906) and Margaret Donovan (1855-1906), both born in Ireland, died in Bayonne, Hudson County, New Jersey.

Margaret Coughlin died in Bayonne in 1906.
Her parents were listed as William Donovan and Ann.
Burial at Holy Name Cemetery in Jersey City.

Usually, I would be stuck at the "from Ireland" part.  But the DNA cousin had a specific location in Ireland for her Donovan and Coughlans:  Skull (or Schull) in County Cork.

I had to find family for the Coughlins and Donovans in Bayonne.  A link came with Margaret:  she was buried at Holy Name Cemetery in Jersey City in the same plot as a child, William Donovan, who died in 1900.  [You can search burials for Holy Name Cemetery at the website of the Archdiocese of Newark.]  I did not find a gravestone for their plot.  (I searched before the snow.)

Here is little William Donovan in the 1900 federal census in Bayonne with his parents, Lawrence and Mary.

William Donovan, age 2, living with his parents and brother in Bayonne in June of 1900.
William died five months later.

This is William's death certificate.  The date of death coincides with the William buried with Margaret Coughlin in Holy Name Cemetery, and the address is the same as the census, so we know that we have the correct William.

Death Certificate for William Donovan, died November 27, 1900 in Bayonne at age 4 years.
His parents are listed as Lary and Mary.

Little William's parents were Lawrence Donovan and Mary O'Reilly.  They were married in Bayonne in 1896.  On the marriage certificate filed with the state, Lawrence's parents were listed as William Donovan and Ann Daly.  (Mary's parents were Francis O'Reilly and  Rebecca Nolan.)

Lawrence's residence in Jersey City was a "temporary stopping place."

If you can find a marriage record for an individual, you have a better chance of seeing full names of both parents, as the person was alive when this record was created.  In comparison, the information in a death record is entirely dependent upon the recollection or knowledge of someone who may have little information about the deceased's family.

So I now had Lawrence Donovan, son of William Donovan and Ann Daly, of Ireland.  Perhaps Margaret Donovan, wife of William Coughlin, was Lawrence's sister.

The DNA cousin sent me copies and links of church records from Schull East in County Cork.  A couple by the names of William Donovan and Anne Daly had several children baptized between 1855 and 1875, including a son, Lawrence, in 1862 and a daughter, Margaret, in 1855.

Lawrence of William Donovan and Anne Daly
Baptized December 28, 1865

Margaret of William Donovan and Anne Daly
Baptized January 3, 1855

Going through the church records in Schull East, I found baptismal records for eight children of William Donovan and Ann Daly:
Margaret, 1855
Thomas, 1856
Mary, 1860
Lawrence, 1862
Ann, 1865
William, 1867
Ellen, 1869
Timothy, 1875

The baptismal record for the last child that I found in Ireland, Timothy, was in a different format and provided a specific place name, Cappanolly.  To find this place today, search for Cappaghnacallee.  (Thank you TCO and TS.)

This family in the 1885 New Jersey State census- index at FamilySearch.org:

William Donovan and Mary Daly from Schull immigrated with their children to the United States.  Ann died in 1893 and William died in 1897 in Bayonne.

William Donovan's parents were listed as William and Mary.  If we search for this couple in Schull, we find William Donovan in the tithe applotment book for Cappanacollie in the year 1827!