The Park Avenue Kennys
One Census, One Grave
In October 1850 the census taker found Richard Kenney, a laborer of 40 born in Ireland, in Brooklyn’s Fifth Ward with his wife Elizabeth and their sons James and John. By June 1855 Elizabeth was a widow. No record of Richard’s death has been found; a cemetery record places him in a grave at Holy Cross.
Richard Kenney, 40, laborer, Ireland · dwelling 1012
Thomas Kenny, 40, labourer, Ireland · dwelling 997
Fifteen dwellings apart in the same ward, enumerated five days apart.
Thomas Kenny was Richard’s age, born in Ireland, and a laborer in 1850. Ten years later he owned $10,000 in real estate on Park Avenue. In every census from 1850 to 1880, his household and Richard’s, or the widowed Eliza’s, are found within a few pages of each other.
| Year | Thomas | Richard / Eliza |
|---|---|---|
| 1850 | Ward 5, dw. 997 | Ward 5, dw. 1012 |
| 1855 | Ward 7, dw. 562 | Ward 7, dw. 576 |
| 1860 | Ward 9, 22 Aug. | Ward 9, 14 Aug. |
| 1870 | Ward 21, p. 47 | Ward 21, p. 57 |
| 1875 | 525 Park Av. | 79 Walworth |
| 1880 | E.D. 214, p. 40 | E.D. 214, p. 41 |
Brooklyn’s ward lines were redrawn several times between 1850 and 1880, so the changing ward numbers do not mean the families moved. What matters is that each time the census was taken, the two households were found close together. Nearness is evidence of association, not of kinship.
Her Brother, Thomas
CORCORAN — At her late residence, No. 55 North Third st, E.D., on Tuesday, November 22, 1881, Ann, widow of the late James Corcoran, aged 62 years.
The relatives and friends of the family, also those of her brother, Thomas Kenney, are respectfully requested to attend the funeral.
Ten years later, Thomas’s own funeral notice called him an uncle of Detective John Corcoran of the Bedford Avenue station: Ann’s son. The two notices were placed by different families for different deaths, a decade apart, and each names the same relationship from its own side.
A death notice is written by the family within days of the death, for people who knew them. Two such notices, placed for different deaths ten years apart and agreeing on the same relationship, together with Ann’s maiden name on her daughter’s certificate, establish that Thomas and Ann were brother and sister.
Was Richard the Third?
Thomas Kenny was in Brooklyn by the 1830s. He worked as a laborer, a rosin oil maker and a foreman, and in March 1860 bought a house and a store-and-dwelling, with their lots, on Park Avenue near Spencer Street. His wife Rosanna died that May. He raised five children on Park Avenue, left the house in trust for his Feeley grandchildren, and died there on 13 April 1891, aged 78. His funeral was held at St. Patrick’s on Kent Avenue.
The families kept together for two generations. Ann’s grandson, Dr. James F. Dougherty, attended Thomas’s son-in-law James Feeley at his death in 1903, and Thomas’s daughter Mary in 1925.
How the two families were followed side by side, how Thomas and Ann were proved brother and sister, how each record was weighed, where DNA fits, and why Richard stays at Suggestive, are set out in the full methodology. Every record is reproduced and cited in the document gallery.
Full Methodology Document Gallery Evidence Trail Timeline