Your Irish Civil War Ancestry

Zella

1st Lieutenant
Joined
May 23, 2018
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In honor of St. Patrick's Day . . .

Do you have Irish ancestors who served during in the war?

If so, tell us about them! :smile:

I personally don't have any Irish relatives, though that's not for lack of my family trying to claim we do. :D I was always told my family has Irish ancestry, but after doing some research on it, I realized they were just assuming our rather large preponderance of Scotch-Irish ancestors were Irish because they hung out in Ireland for about 100 years. I finally told the relatives the Irish would probably not want to be claimed by us, so we needed to stop telling people that. . . .

Images: Two of the more famous Irish-born generals of the war, Michael Corcoran and Patrick Cleburne.

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I realized they were just assuming our rather large preponderance of Scotch-Irish ancestors were Irish because they hung out in Ireland for about 100 years.
Since the Irish came from what is now Scotland, I don't see that as a big deal, Zella. After three generations, the Ulster Scots were Irish, just as the relatives of the !Irish who emigrated to America one hundred are Americans now. Today, however, we are all Irish!
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Since the Irish came from what is now Scotland, I don't see that as a big deal, Zella.

It’s more likely the Highland Scots came from Ireland; it was Irish invaders who founded the Scottish kingdom of Dal Riata. Note too the term Scot comes from what the Romans called the Irish.

The Celtic Irish most likely migrated from the Continent, perhaps from Spain.
 
I feel like since they were quite culturally distinct during the period my ancestors were there, it's really not accurate to refer to them as Irish. In fact, I don't know that they would have called themselves Irish, if that makes sense?
 
I’ve read that before the mass immigration of Irish Catholics in the mid 19th Century Americans of Anglo Irish and Scots Irish descent commonly referred to themselves as Irish. And that the term Scotch Irish then became popular because the Protestant Irish in America wanted to distinguish themselves from the Catholics they despised.

Many Protestants in Ireland identified as Irish and were Irish nationalists. I think this was more common among C of I people of Anglo descent than Presbyterians of Scottish descent.
 
That's interesting. Maybe they wouldn't have minded being called Irish at first then and just changed their minds later. :laugh:
 
As for my Irish Civil War relatives:

Patrick Kennedy (my great x3 grandfather), the oldest child of Michael and Anna (Quinn) Kennedy, was born on February 27, 1831 in Ireland and immigrated with his parents and several younger siblings to Boston in 1848. Continuing on, the family settled on a farm outside of Ogdensburg, NY where Patrick began his family when he married Catherine Dewan on October 21, 1851. From 1852 to 1856, they had four children, all of whom would survive into the 19-teens. After his father's death in a silo accident in 1858 (which also killed his younger brother, John who was 9), Patrick took over the farm. Staying home in the opening years of the war, Patrick finally enlisted in November 1863 in order to get the enlistment bounty. He joined Company G, 14th New York Heavy Artillery (which recruited heavily from upstate New York and included many veterans from 2-year regiments who had gone home in the spring and summer of 1863) but was given a medical discharge on December 17, 1863. He immediately turned around and enlisted on January 4, 1863 in the 6th New York Heavy Artillery, receiving another bounty. The 6th NYHA served throughout the Overland Campaign and saw heavy service in the Valley Campaign of 1864, suffering 567 casualties from May 1864 until Appomattox. Patrick was discharged on July 19, 1865 at Petersburg, VA and began his trip home. Unfortunately, although he was never wounded, he was deeply scarred by the war. Prior to the war, Patrick seems to have been a relatively typical hardworking farmer but crawled into a bottle when he returned. From 1865-68, he was arrested several times for public drunkenness, publicly abusing his wife, and fighting. Catherine divorced him in 1868 and Patrick married Clara Sampier (who was 23 at the time) in 1871. They would have 6 children born from 1872 to 1880 (my great x2 grandfather was their first-born). Patrick had neglected the family farm after he returned from the war and was practically indigent except for the generosity of his youngest brother, Michael Jr. (born 1854), who had taken over the farm from Patrick. He abandoned the pregnant Clara late in 1879 who had to move into the poorhouse with all of her children (George Kennedy was born in the poorhouse in 1880) and was found dead on the side of a road near Ogdensburg, likely from an alcohol related incident or disease. Understandably, his oldest son Charles would never allow alcohol in his house or around him his entire life.

Ryan
 
Andrew Kennedy was born in Ireland in 1842 (he was the only child to survive from Patrick in 1831 until his birth). His life was similar to Patrick's until 1861 when Andrew and his close friend James Sampier (Clara's older brother) enlisted in the first wave of patriotism. They joined Company G, 16th New York on May 7, 1861 in DePeyster, NY. Andrew was one of the tallest men in the regiment, standing 6'4". The regiment was present at Bull Run but was not engaged. They served on the Peninsula and in the Seven Days, where Andrew was slightly wounded at Gaines Mill (James Sampier had been shot in the hip during the Peninsula but returned to the regiment in August). The regiment assaulted Crampton's Gap and Marye's Heights during the Chancellorsville Campaign before mustering out on May 22, 1863 when their two-year term was up (the regiment suffered 480 casualties during their career). Apparently, Andrew wasn't tired of the army but was tired of walking, he and James went their separate ways with Andrew enlisting in the 13th New York Cavalry's Company G as a sergeant (James Sampier joined the 14th New York Heavy Artillery as a first sergeant and was killed at Petersburg during the first assaults against the city). The 13th New York Cavalry and other cavalry units were consolidated in April 1865 and Andrew was reduced to corporal before mustering out on September 21, 1865. He spent a couple years living on the family farm but couldn't settle down. He was known to be uncomfortable around crowds and decided to go West in 1868. He settled as a miner outside of Helena, MT and spent the next 25+ years relatively isolated. In 1906, he moved into the veteran's home in Helena and decided to begin his journey back home. In 1909, he was in the veteran's home in Milwaukee and the veteran's home in Steuben, NY in 1910. His sister Catherine (born 1851) took him into her home in 1913 where he peacefully died on January 28, 1914 and was laid to rest with Catherine and her husband when they died. Evidently, he had some success as a miner since several of his nephews sued Catherine after Andrew's death in order to gain control of his estate.

Ryan
 
Joseph Kennedy was born in 1847 and was the last Kennedy born in Ireland. He lived on the family farm until December 1861 when he went into Ogdensburg, NY and enlisted at the age of 14 in Company F, 93rd New York. He lied about his age as New York records state that he was 18 years old at the time of his enlistment. The 93rd New York joined the Army of the Potomac and so impressed General McClellan with their drilling that they were made the headquarters guard. They served in this capacity until April 1864 when they were transferred to the Second Corps because the front-line units needed every soldier they could get and the 93rd numbered more than 500 men. They suffered more than 300 losses between the Wilderness and Spotsylvania, including Joseph, who was shot in the attack on the Salient on May 12. He was evacuated to a hospital in Washington but took a turn for the worse when infection set into his wound. He died of his injury on July 7 and was buried in Plot 5472 in Arlington Cemetery under the name "Joseph Kennada".

Ryan
 
Moses Murphy (my great x4 grandfather) was born in 1830 in Ireland and immigrated on his own in 1848, settling on a farm in DeKalb, NY. He married Margaret Brown around 1855 and they had 4 children between 1856 and 1862. Moses decided to enlist in August 1862 and joined Company D, 106th New York which was sent to West Virginia. Companies D and F were captured at the Battle of Fairmont on April 29, 1863 and immediately paroled. The regiment joined the Army of the Potomac on July 10, 1863 and reinforced the Third Corps. In March 1864, the regiment was transferred to the Sixth Corps and served with that body for the rest of the war, suffering 539 casualties from October 1863 until Appomattox. Moses was wounded at the Battle of Spotsylvania on May 12 and spent a few weeks at home to recover before returning to the regiment in time to participate in the Valley Campaign. Interestingly, his son William Henry was born 9 months after his trip home so apparently he had not been too seriously injured. The regiment mustered out on June 22, 1865 and Moses went home. He was active in veteran's affairs after the war, being a founding member of the George Rich GAR Post in DeKalb and was elected color-bearer. In addition, he was involved in erecting a plaque near the Catholic church in Richville, NY in memory of the local soldiers who died during the war (George Rich was the first soldier of the 106th New York to die). He lived a peaceful life, fathering 3 more children and died in 1901.

Ryan
 
Most of my Scot-Irish :sneaky: ancestors were here long before the war. One of my lines, descends from Leap Castle in Ireland :cool:

On my mother's side, the Doyle family came over in the mid 1700s but none of them served in the Civil War. It came at an odd time between generations where the adults were a little too old and the children were a little too young to enlist.

Ryan
 
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