How a Widow’s Listing Found the Right John Kenny
A record-by-record account of the search for my great-great-grandfather in nineteenth-century Brooklyn: the question, the order in which the household came together, what each record states, how the records were weighed against one another, the conflicts between them, where DNA fits, and what remains open.
The Research Question
Which of the many men named John Kenny in Brooklyn between 1870 and 1890 was the John Kenny named as the father of Mary Anne (Mary Agnes) Kenny, born 8 February 1882, and who were his parents?
The starting point was a family document: a Certificate of Baptism issued by St. Patrick’s Church, Kent and Willoughby Avenues, on 7 May 1924, copying the register entry of 12 February 1882. It names the child Mary Anne Kenny, her parents John Kenny and Margaret McKenny, and her sponsors James Kenny and Mary A. Dunne. It passed from my grandmother, Lillian Josephine Robertson, to my mother.
Mary Agnes Robertson’s New Jersey death certificate of 26 January 1924 names the same parents. Neither document gives John’s age, address or trade, and the 1879 Brooklyn directory alone lists thirteen men as Kenny, John on a single page.
How the Research Unfolded
Each stage narrowed the field. The name could not find him; his mother’s widowhood and his trade could.
The daughters’ records
The family certificate and Mary Agnes’s 1924 death certificate gave the parents’ names. Margaret Kenny’s own death certificate of 24 May 1884, at 39 Nostrand Avenue, was delivered to John Kenny; so was the certificate of their six-month-old daughter Margaret, who died at 39 Sandford Street on 12 July 1884. None of these records gave John’s age, trade or parents.
Name searches that could not succeed
Census and directory searches for John Kenny returned dozens of candidates of the right age and birthplace. With no marriage record found for John and Margaret, nothing yet distinguished one John Kenny from another.
The widow and the mat maker
The 1879 directory lists “Kenny Elizabeth, wid. Richard, h r 75 Walworth” and, on the same page, “Kenny John, matmkr. h r 75 Walworth.” Two of the page’s Kennys gave the same rear house. The 1880 census then placed a John Kenny who “works mat factory” in one household with Margt, his wife; Eliza, his mother, widowed and Irish-born; and Eliza, a daughter of ten months, matching Elizabeth “Lillian,” born July 1879.
Back through the censuses
With Eliza and the “widow of Richard” to search for, the household was followed back: the 1875 state census (Eliza, widowed; James, hatter; John, mat weaver), the 1870 census (Elizabeth; James, works in hat factory; John, Mat Maker), the 1860 census (Eliza, grocery; James 14; John 12), the 1855 state census (Eliza, widowed, grocery; James 9; John 7) and the 1850 census, where Richard Kenney, 40, stands at the head of the family with Elizabeth, James and John. Directories of 1862 and 1870 place the widow in the rear house on Walworth Street near Park Avenue, and the 1872 directory puts James, hatter, and John in the rear house at 79 Walworth.
The McKenny side
Margaret was followed through her parents’ household: George and Ann McKenna with Margaret, 9, and baby Mary in 1860; George, Margaret and Mary in 1870; the widowed Ann McKinney with Margaret, 23, and Mary, 14, on Graham Street in 1875; and Ann and Mary alone in 1880, after Margaret’s marriage. George McKenney’s death certificate of 31 December 1870 and Mary F. MacKinney’s of 1935, naming her parents as George MacKinney and Ann Lynch, close the family. In 1920 Mary kept a boarding house with her niece Lillian Kenny in the household.
Deaths and burials
James Kenny’s certificate (smallpox, 79 Walworth Street, 25 November 1875), the Town of Flatbush register entry for Eliza Kenney (Kings County Hospital, 2 December 1887, aged 79) and John Kenney’s certificate (St. Catherine’s Hospital, 30 November 1888, aged 36) completed the household. All three were buried at Holy Cross. Between the deaths, the 1885 directory placed Elizabeth, widow of Richard, at 39 Nostrand Avenue, where Margaret had died. The marriage of Richard Kenny and Eliz. Kenny at St. Paul’s on 23 June 1843, found in a printed compilation of the parish registers, fits a family whose sons were born from about 1846.
The Proof: One Household, Followed for Thirty-Eight Years
No single record names John Kenny’s parents. The conclusion rests on a chain in which the same household is recorded again and again, and in which the directories, the censuses and the certificates were made independently of one another.
Brooklyn, Ward 5
14 October 1850
Brooklyn, Ward 7
28 June 1855
Brooklyn, Ward 9
14 August 1860
Brooklyn, Ward 21
20 June 1870
1872, pp. 396–397
Brooklyn, Ward 21
4 June 1875
1879, p. 536
Brooklyn, E.D. 214
8 June 1880
St. Patrick’s, Brooklyn
12 February 1882
Brooklyn
24 May 1884
1885, p. 688
1887, p. 603
Brooklyn
30 November 1888
North Caldwell, N.J.
26 January 1924
“Widow of Richard” turned a common name into a particular woman with a dead husband to search for, and the shared rear house on Walworth Street tied one John Kenny to her. The trade then carried him from one record to the next. It was the 1880 census, stating in words that Eliza was John’s mother and Margt his wife, that proved the link the directory suggested.
Why the standard searches could not succeed
John Kenny was one of thirteen men of that name on a single directory page, and the family documents gave no age, address or trade for him.
No record of John and Margaret’s marriage has been found, so no record names his parents in his own lifetime.
Brooklyn’s death certificates of the 1880s record the parents’ birthplaces, not their names.
The person who connected the records was his mother, entered as Elizabeth, Eliza and Elia, and in the directory by her husband’s name.
Conclusions and their standing
Stated directly in an original record
Established by correlating independent records
Supported, not yet established
An open lead
| Conclusion | Standing |
|---|---|
| John Kenny, mat maker, was the husband of Margaret McKenny and the father of Elizabeth “Lillian” and Mary Anne (Mary Agnes) Kenny | Proven |
| John Kenny was the son of Richard and Eliza Kenny | Proven |
| John was born in Brooklyn about 1848; his brother James about 1846 | Proven |
| Richard Kenny died between October 1850 and June 1855 | Proven |
| Margaret was the daughter of George McKenney and Ann (Lynch), and the sister of Mary F. MacKinney | Proven |
| Eliza Kenney died at the Kings County Hospital, Flatbush, on 2 December 1887 | Confirmed |
| Richard Kenny and Eliz. Kenny married at St. Paul’s, Brooklyn, on 23 June 1843 | Suggestive |
| Lillian Marie Kenny, Navy yeoman of 1918, is John’s daughter Elizabeth “Lillian” | Exploring |
| Thomas Kenny of 525 Park Avenue was Richard’s brother | Exploring |
| Ann Kenny Corcoran was a sister of Richard and Thomas | Exploring |
Reading the Ages Side by Side
Identity across thirty-eight years was tested by setting every stated age beside the others. Read from the images, the household agrees within the ordinary drift of census ages.
| Year | Record | Eliza | James | John |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1850 | U.S. census | 40 | 4 | 3 |
| 1855 | N.Y. census | 49, widowed | 9 | 7 |
| 1860 | U.S. census | 47 | 14 | 12 |
| 1870 | U.S. census | 56 | 22 | 20 |
| 1875 | N.Y. census | 60, widowed | 27 | 25 |
| 1875 | James’s death | 29 | ||
| 1880 | U.S. census | 60, widowed | head | |
| 1887 | Eliza’s death | 79 | ||
| 1888 | John’s death | 36 |
James was born about 1846 and John about 1848, both in Brooklyn. Eliza was born in Ireland between about 1808 and 1815, and by her own count in 1855 had been in the city twenty years.
How the Records Were Weighed
Every record answers a question for somebody. What it can be trusted for depends on who supplied each line, and how long after the event.
| Record | Who supplied the information | Trusted for | Used with care for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parish certificate St. Patrick’s, 1924 | A parish priest, copying the 1882 register forty-two years later | Parents, birth and baptism dates, sponsors | Spelling of names, which a copyist can alter; it is a copy, not the register |
| Censuses | Whoever answered the enumerator, not named | Who lived together; relationships as the household described them; trades | Ages, which drift; the 1880 census gives Margaret 24 where every other record gives about 28 |
| City directories | Canvassers, months before publication | A year-by-year address and trade; a widow’s husband’s name | Identity, which rests on a name and an address; no relationships are stated |
| Brooklyn death certificates 1870–1888 | The physician for date, place and cause; family or hospital for the rest | Date, place and cause of death; burial; the person the certificate was delivered to | Age and trade (John “Hatter” at death); no parents’ names are asked |
| Town of Flatbush register | The town clerk, from the hospital physician’s return | Date, place and cause of Eliza’s death; burial | Her age, given by the hospital |
| Twentieth-century certificates | A relative as informant | Parents’ names, as the family knew them | Dates and birthplaces a generation back: Mary Agnes’s 1924 certificate, from her eighteen-year-old daughter, gives 1883 and an Irish-born mother |
| Printed register compilations | A modern compiler, from the register | Finding an entry | The entry itself, which should be read in the register |
| DNA | Living testers’ results, compared against documented trees | Testing a relationship the documents have proposed | Naming a relationship on its own |
Where records disagree, the one made closest to the event by the person best placed to know is preferred, and the disagreement is recorded rather than smoothed over. Two records that share an informant count as one witness. Living at the same address, sharing a trade or a disease, or being buried by the same undertaker can point the research toward a relationship; the relationship itself is proved only by records that state it in words.
Conflicts in the Record and How They Were Weighed
Mary Anne or Mary Agnes
The record saysThe 1924 parish certificate: Mary Anne Kenny. Her daughters’ birth certificates of 1905 and 1907: Mary Kenny. Her son’s of 1920 and her own death certificate of 1924: Mary Agnes.
WeighedThe certificate is the only record of her baptism, and no civil birth record has been found. Same parents, same birth date, kept by her own daughter: the same child. She is given as Mary Anne (Mary Agnes).
Mary Agnes’s year of birth
The record saysBaptism: born 8 February 1882. New Jersey death certificate: born 8 February 1883.
WeighedThe register entry was made four days after the birth. The death certificate’s informant was her daughter Lillian, eighteen, forty-one years later. 1882 stands.
Margaret’s birthplace
The record saysCensuses of 1860 to 1880 and her own death certificate: New York or United States. Her daughter’s 1924 death certificate: Ireland.
WeighedEvery record of Margaret’s own lifetime agrees. The 1924 line came from a granddaughter who never knew her. Brooklyn stands.
John’s trade
The record saysMat Maker (1870), laborer (1872 directory), Mat weaver (1875), matmkr. (1879, 1887), works mat factory (1880). Death certificate: Hatter.
WeighedApart from the 1872 directory, which calls him a laborer while he shared the rear house at 79 Walworth with his brother, every record from 1870 to 1887 puts John in the mat trade. “Hatter” at his death is the trade James had followed. The 1870 entry may also be read “Mart Maker”; the later directories’ “matmkr.” decides it.
Margaret’s age
The record says9 in 1860, 18 in 1870, 23 in 1875, 24 in 1880, 33 at death in May 1884.
WeighedFour records agree on a birth about 1851. The 1880 figure is the outlier.
George McKenney’s wife
The record saysAnn, 30, in 1860; Mary, 40, in 1870; the widowed Ann, 45, in 1875 and 1880. Mary F. MacKinney’s death certificate: mother Ann Lynch.
WeighedNo second marriage is in evidence and the ages run on. The 1870 “Mary” is read as an enumerator’s slip, perhaps carried from the daughter’s name below.
Two women grow younger
The record saysIn 1920 Mary MacKinney gives her age as 45 and her niece Lillian Kenny as 31. Their earlier records put them near 60 and 40.
WeighedBoth understated by about ten years. The identity of the 1920 niece with John’s daughter rests on the relationship, not the age.
The 1843 marriage
The record says“Kenny Rich 23 June 1843, Eliz. Kenny, John Rielly & El. Farrel,” in a printed compilation of St. Paul’s registers.
WeighedIt fits a family whose sons were born from 1846. Whether “Kenny” is Eliza’s maiden name or the compiler’s repetition can only be settled in the register. Held at Suggestive.
The surnames
Kenny and Kenney; McKenny, McKenna, McKinney, McKinny, MacKinney and McKernry all occur. Every form was searched separately. Identity was carried by matching households, addresses, trades and dates, never by spelling.
Where DNA Fits
The documents establish John Kenny’s parentage. DNA has been used on the next question back: whether Richard Kenny had a brother, Thomas Kenny of 525 Park Avenue, and a sister, Ann Kenny, wife of James Corcoran. Living testers are identified by initials only. B.O.H. is my mother; M.O. is one of her twin brothers.
| Match | Tester | Shared | Documented descent |
|---|---|---|---|
| G.A. | B.O.H. | 25 cM, 1 segment | Ann Kenney Corcoran, through the Dougherty and Heffernan line |
| M.K. | M.O. | 23 cM, 1 segment | Ann Kenney Corcoran, through the same Heffernan family |
| B.L. | M.O. | 37 cM, 1 segment | Ann Kenney Corcoran, through her son John C. Corcoran |
G.A. and M.K. descend from the same grandfather, so they are one line of evidence, not two. Single segments of 23 to 37 cM fit a fourth-cousin relationship, but they cannot by themselves show which Kenny sibling stands behind them, or that the shared ancestry is Kenny at all.
The documentary link is still thin. Thomas Kenney’s undated funeral notice calls him an uncle of Detective John Corcoran, Ann’s son, and a cemetery record places Richard and Thomas in the same grave, with Thomas’s wife Rosanna, who died in May 1860. An uncle may be one by marriage, and a shared grave may hold an in-law or a friend. The 1880 directory shows Thomas at 525 Park Avenue and the widow Eliza at 537, and an 1860 household in the same Ward 9 dwelling as Eliza may be his. Until a record states the relationship, Thomas and Ann are held at Exploring, and the DNA is read as consistent with that hypothesis rather than as proof of it.
Still Open, and What Transfers
Open questions
Thomas Kenny. Of 525 Park Avenue for decades; widowed when his wife Rosanna (McKeon) died in May 1860. Whether he was Richard’s brother, and whether the household sharing Eliza’s dwelling that August is his.
The sponsor James Kenny. John’s brother James died in 1875, unmarried. Thomas Kenny’s son James, born about 1849 and living until 1914, is listed at 525 Park Avenue in 1872, 1879 and 1885. If Thomas was Richard’s brother, the sponsor may have been John’s cousin.
John and Margaret’s marriage. About 1878; not yet found in civil or parish records.
The baptisms. Mary Anne’s 1882 entry in the St. Patrick’s register itself; Lillian’s of 1879; James’s and John’s of the 1840s.
Richard Kenny. His death between 1850 and 1855, and where in Ireland he and Eliza were born.
Eliza’s last months. When she entered the Kings County Hospital, and from which address.
The yeoman. Whether Lillian Marie Kenny of the U.S. Navy, 1918–1920, is John’s daughter. Her service file should name her next of kin.
What transfers to other cases
Follow the widow. A directory’s “wid. Richard” names a dead husband; read with her own name and address, it makes a common name particular. The 1885 page lists three widows of a Richard Kenny.
Read the whole page. Thirteen John Kennys on one page show the size of the problem, and the neighbouring entries hold the answer.
Let the trade lead, and the household prove. An occupation picks out a candidate; a record stating the relationship confirms him.
Read the image, not the transcription. Ages and occupations are easily misread, and a misread age can invent a conflict that the record does not contain.
Line up the ages before deciding identity. Set side by side, ages that look scattered often agree.
Look past the town name. A Brooklyn widow who died “in Flatbush” in 1887 had died in the county hospital there.
Let DNA test, not decide. Modest matches are read against a tree built from records, and matches that share a recent ancestor count once.
This methodology page accompanies the case study summary. The summary presents the findings; this page documents how each was established. Every record cited here is reproduced and transcribed in the document gallery.
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