More Visiting Holy Cross Cemetery -- February 2015

In my last post I detailed a visit to Holy Cross Cemetery in October 2014 that was somewhat successful. In February 2015, I made another visit. This time I focused on Sections T, U, V, 4, and 5 which are in the north corner of the cemetery. This was a few more sections than I would normally cover in one visit, but they are all in fairly close proximity to each other and there are lots of family members buried there mostly between about 1920-1960. It was a particularly productive visit as nearly all the plots have a marker and there are family members on both sides buried there. I had located my Kenny great-grandparents in Section U on my second visit in 2012 and eventually found my Murray great-gandparents in Section U later that year. My Coleman great-grandparents are across the road in Section T. That puts three of my four sets of great-grandparents in the same general vicinity and gave me orientation points to find other family in the same sections.  

Patrick and Myrtle Mullane
are buried with relatives of
Patrick's wife Ellen
Mary Sullivan

Patrick's name is inscribed on the left
side of the marker

I hit Section T first as there was only one location to find there -- the site for Patrick Henry Mullane and his daughter Myrtle. Patrick was one of my great-grandmother Mary Mullane Murray's younger brothers. The headstone was very informative yet confusing since there were so many different names on it. I think I've figured out who everyone is  (or at least a best guess as is the case with the Comerfords) but I do have a mystery to resolve since Patrick's wife Ellen isn't buried in the same plot and I've as yet been unable to find out when she died or where she's buried.

My great-great grandmother
Bessie Gallagher Muckle
buried with her daughter
Theresa Muckle Epstine

Then I walked across the road to Section U where there are a bunch of relatives from my maternal side. My great-great grandmother was Elizabeth (Bessie) Gallagher and was born in County Roscommon, Ireland. She married Thomas Muckle who was born in County Down, Ireland. They spent most of their lives in Virginia City, Nevada and Tom died there. Bessie moved to San Francisco after his death with my great-grandparents.  She died in 1929 and was buried at Holy Cross. Her daughter Theresa Muckle Epstine was buried with her in 1937. The index at SFGenealogy.com indicates that Bessie is in grave 1 and Theresa is in grave 5 which has me wondering if there are other people buried in the plot that aren't in the database for some reason.

Kate Nowlan's daughter
Catherine Nowlan Delury
and family are between
Kate and Bessie

My great-great grandaunt
Kate Gallagher Nowlan
and her family a couple of
places to the right of Bessie

Bessie came to the United States with her two sisters Catherine (Kate) and Margaret (Maggie.)  Kate married Daniel Nowlan and also settled in Virginia City, Nevada before eventually winding up in San Francisco. Kate and Daniel Nowlan had five children and their daughter Catherine Nowlan married Daniel Delury. The Nowlans and Delurys are buried in the same row as Bessie Muckle and Theresa Epstine, so the three graves were easy to find as they were all side by side.

William Muckle and family.
William was my great-grandmother
Maggie Muckle Kenny's brother

A couple of rows away is another Muckle plot. This one is for another of Bessie Gallagher Muckle's children -- her son William Muckle and his family. William was my great grandmother Maggie Muckle Kenny's younger brother and he's buried with his wife and three children.

 My last stop in Section U was to look for the younger of my grandmother Audley Kenny Dwyer's two older brothers -- Harry Kenny and his wife Ethel. I'm pretty sure I located the where they are buried, but there wasn't a headstone. I'll need to go back and bring my phone to help double check. Harry and Ethel are buried with Ethel's daughter Merle Williams and mother Laura S. Glanville.

Daniel E.Delury and family.
Daniel was my grandmother
Audley Kenny Dwyer's second cousin

Ellen O'Leary Ford and family
Ellen was my great-grandmother
Lizzie O'Leary Coleman's sister

Next it was over to Section V where there was some more mixing of my families. I first found more Delurys in row 13 -- Daniel E. Delury, the grandson of Kate Gallagher Nowlan and son of Catherine and Daniel Delury, is buried with his wife Hazel and daughter Margaret. Over in row 14 and a few plots down I found my great-grandmother Lizzie O'Leary's older sister Ellen O'Leary Ford buried with her husband John and daughter and son-in-law Catherine Ford Dwyer and Edward Ambrose Dwyer.

Barbara Jane and her father
Douglas S. Evans
Barbara is my mother's third cousin

Jane Delury Evans is buried
next to her husband and daughter.
Jane is my grandmother's second cousin

This part of my trip was hugely productive and I found all of these folks relatively quickly. I headed then up the hill to Sections 4 and 5. My first stop was some more descendants of Kate Gallagher. Her granddaughter Jane Delury Evans is buried there. Jane Delury Evans's husband Douglas and daughter Barbara Jane are buried in the plot next to her.

Joe and Pauline Kenny

A few rows away, my grandmother Audley Kenny Dwyer's oldest brother, Joseph B. Kenny, Jr. is buried with his wife Pauline. My grandmother and Joe had a falling out somewhere along the line so my mother doesn't have a real memory of him other than family stories. Joe died in 1958, not long after Harry died in 1950. I don't have any memory of my grandmother speaking about either of her brothers so they've always been kind of mysterious people to me. That's why I was surprised to find that Joe's wife Pauline lived until 1985 and was living in Burlingame when she died. I grew up not far away in Millbrae and went to high school in Burlingame.

I continued up to Section 5 before heading home for the day. My first stop was to find John J. Coleman, Jr. and his wife Mildred. Jack Coleman was my grandmother Elizabeth Coleman's first cousin -- the son of my great grandfather's older brother John. Jack may actually be John Coleman, IV as my great-great grandfather's name was also John and if I have identified HIS father correctly I have four generations of John Colemans in a row. Jack Coleman was about 13 years older than my grandmother Elizabeth and worked as a clothing salesman. Mildred was actually his second wife and I've yet to learn much more about them. Jack died in 1979 in San Rafael. Mildred lived until 2002.

Margaret Coleman Madigan and
her husband Mike. The marker was a bit
overgrown and I had
to pull up some grass and dirt to read it.

My last stop on this visit was to my grandmother's sister's grave. Margaret Coleman Madigan is buried in Section 5 with her husband Michael. Mike died in 1961, well before I was born, but Aunt Margaret lived until 1999 so I have many fond memories of her. Margaret was my grandmother's younger sister and they were very close until Nana's death in 1973. I still have a few memories of Nana, but none of them are a sense of her personality since I was only four and a half when she died. Aunt Margaret gave me a good sense of what Nana's personality was probably like as all my father's siblings agree they were like two peas in a pod. She was a warm and loving lady and I miss her vivacity. 

This was definitely my most productive trip to date as I was able to locate all of these graves in about an hour.  It definitely helped that they were all so close to each other! 

Returning to Holy Cross Cemetery -- October 2014

One of the things I have been doing with some regularity is making trips to Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma to try and locate the many many MANY family members that have been buried there over the 150 or so years of the cemetery's existence.  Thanks to the San Francisco Colma Cemetery Index over at SFGenealogy.com, I can easily look up where and when family members were buried between 1887-2005 (the index actually goes up to 2012, but only records that are older than 10 years old are searchable.)  It's a great and useful resource, and I've recorded the names, dates, and locations for many of the family members so I can have a list handy when I go trekking around looking for gravesites.

Since Holy Cross is a large cemetery with about 40 separate sections and to date I've identified relatives in about 20 of them, I try to group my searches to two or three sections that are in reasonable proximity of each other.  Some trips are more successful than others as the row and grave numbering is seldom clearly marked and I can't always find where I'm supposed to be.  There are also the occasions when I DO find the right spot only to find there isn't a headstone to identify the plot, so the location is my "best guess".  On my most recent trip in November I did remember to grab my phone so I could use the database to help confirm my location which was helpful. 

I've learned from my trips and other inquiries that certain locations are mass graves either for the poor (Section A) or for those who were removed from Mount Calvary Cemetery when it was finally closed around 1940 (part of Section H.)  The older sections of the cemetery are a lot trickier than the newer ones as there are a lot of missing headstones (if there were ever headstones in the first place.)  Section M, where my great great grandmother Bridget McDonough Murray is buried with her daughter Nellie is one such section.  When I visited in 2012 looking for Bridget, there was no headstone at where I believe she was buried.

Arthur Patrick & Kathleen Ford,
my grandmother Elizabeth
Coleman's first cousin and
his wife

I have, however, had some successes.  On a trip in October 2014, I found the markers for Nana's first cousin Arthur Patrick Ford and his wife Kathleen.  They're buried in Section G2 just a few rows away from Nana and Grandpa Murray.

Mullane family plot where my
great-great grandparents T.J.
Mullane and Mary Manning
Mullane are buried with
their descendants.

On the same trip I was also able to locate the grave of my great-great grandfather Timothy John Mullane in Section F.  T.J. Mullane is buried with quite a few other members of the Mullane family including his wife Mary, sons Thomas Michael, John Martin, and Edward W. Mullane.  Also in the Mullane plot are Margaret E. Mullane, the infant daughter of Edward W., her brothers Raymond and Edward J. Mullane, and Edward J. Mullane's wife Frances Dorothy Donahue Mullane.  Not all of the Mullanes are listed on the headstone, and from the design I'm guessing it was put in later than the original purchase of the plot. 
 
My last stop on this visit was to the mass grave for the Mount Calvary Cemetery internments.  My great-great grandfather John Murray and his daughter Lizzie Frances Murray were moved there from their original burial place.  There is a nice marker there for the over 39,000 people who were relocated when the cemetery was finally closed in 1940. 

My next post will detail a very successful and productive visit in February, 2015.

Timlines: The Murrays

Working on my family tree has often meant hopping around in time as I focus on one particular branch or person. Doing that often makes things a bit confusing as I try to remember where and when people appear over the years. To help keep organized, I put together a couple of timelines to remind me of who, what, where, and when. I thought it might be useful to share that information here as a reference point.

I'll put up a couple of these posts as it's easier to follow one family at a time. Since I've spent the most time working on the Murray side of the tree, I'll start there. Look for follow up posts on the Mullanes, Colemans, and O'Learys.

MURRAY FAMILY TIMELINE:

About 1840:  John Murray born in County Galway, Ireland.

February, 1841:  Bridget McDonough born in County Sligo, Ireland.

About 1860-1862:  John Murray immigrates to the United States (this is my best guess to date, it's possible he arrived earlier than 1860.)

1862:  John Murray arrives in San Francisco and is working at Easton's Laundry.

About 1866:  Bridget McDonough immigrates to the United States (per 1900 US Census.)

1867: John Murray and Bridget McDonough are both working at Occidental Laundry in San Francisco.

31 August 1867:  John Murray becomes a naturalized citizen at the 4th District Court in San Francisco.

19 July 1868: John Murray and Bridget McDonough are married at St. Bridget's Church in San Francisco.

April 1869:  John Henry Murray is born in San Francisco to John Murray and Bridget McDonough Murray.

17 November 1870:  Mary (Mollie) A. Murray is born in San Francisco to John Murray and Bridget McDonough Murray.

10 August 1872:  Elizabeth (Lizzie) Frances Murray is born in San Francisco to John Murray and Bridget McDonough Murray.

25 July 1874:  Marshall Edward Murray is born in San Francisco to John Murray and Bridget McDonough Murray.

21 November 1875:  Elizabeth (Lizzie) Frances Murray dies of typhoid fever in San Francisco. She is buried in Mount Calvary Cemetery. After Mount Calvary is closed, her remains are removed to Holy Cross Cemetery in 1940.

4 July 1878: Ella (Nellie) Agnes Murray is born in San Francisco to John Murray and Bridget McDonough Murray.

17 August 1880:  Joseph Stephen Murray is born in San Francisco to John Murray and Bridget McDonough Murray.

20 November 1890:  John Murray dies of cirrhosis of the liver in San Francisco. He is buried in Mount Calvary Cemetery with his daughter Elizabeth (Lizzie.) After Mount Calvary is closed, his remains are removed to Holy Cross Cemetery in 1940.

14 June 1907:  Ella (Nellie) Agnes Murray marries Edward Nelson in San Francisco.

4 December 1907:  Bridget McDonough Murray dies in San Francisco. She is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA. 

5 March 1909:  Ella (Nellie) Murray Nelson dies in childbirth in Santa Rosa, CA. She is buried with her mother at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA. There is no record of the child being born/surviving the birth.

22 December 1909:  Mary (Mollie) Murray marries Charles Johnson (aka Carl Johanson) in San Francisco.

2 May 1910:  Joseph Stephen Murray marries Mary Agnes McCarthy (nee Barnes) in San Francisco.

About 1910-1912:  Marshall Edward Murray meets Mary Josephine Mullane. Mary Mullane is separated from her husband Denis Edward Hayes. As of this writing, I do not know what happened to Denis Edward Hayes, but I am guessing he abandoned Mary.

March 1912:  Mary Mullane Murray gives birth to a child who dies shortly after birth. Unnamed child is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery with Bridget McDonough Murray and Ella (Nellie) Murray Nelson. (This is a best guess based on several facts: [a] Edward Marshall Murray's birth certificate indicates he is the second child born to Mary Mullane Murray, [b] there is an un-named Murray buried with Bridget and Nellie on the Holy Cross burial record, and [c] there is a family story that Edward Marshall Murray had an older sister who died.)

8 May 1914:  Edward Marshall Murray is born in San Francisco to Marshall Edward Murray and Mary Mullane Murray. His birth certificate indicates his given name as John Marshall Edward Murray.

25 February 1917:  Mary (Mollie) Murray Johnson dies in Oakland. She was hit by a Key Route train while crossing the street during a rainstorm after having run out to the grocery store.

5 September 1918:  Marshall Edward Murray and Mary Josephine Mullane are married in Oakland. The marriage certificate shows Mary Mullane as Mary Hayes and that this is her first marriage.

3 February 1920:  Joseph Stephen Murray dies of tuberculosis in San Francisco. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA.

21 July 1930:  John Henry Murray dies in San Francisco. He is buried with his brother Joseph Stephen Murray at Holy Cross Cemetery. As of this writing, I do not have his cause of death. I haven't found any record of him ever marrying or having children.

5 May 1934:  Edward Marshall Murray marries Elizabeth Mary Coleman at St. Cecilia's Church in San Francisco.

16 April 1935:  Edward Kevin Murray is born in San Francisco to Edward Marshall Murray and Elizabeth Coleman Murray.

3 May 1937:  Daniel Jerome Murray is born in San Francisco to Edward Marshall Murray and Elizabeth Coleman Murray.

12 July 1940:  Mary Mullane Murray dies from heart disease in San Francisco. She is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA.

19 December 1943:  John Joseph Murray is born to Edward Marshall Murray and Elizabeth Coleman Murray

11 September 1946:  John Joseph Murray dies of bronchial pneumonia. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA.

8 May 1948:  Marshall Edward Murray dies of a heart attack in San Francisco. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery with his wife Mary Mullane Murray.

20 October 1948:  Diane Marie Murray is born in San Francisco to Edward Marshall Murray and Elizabeth Coleman Murray.

1940-1953:  Edward Marshall Murray and Elizabeth Coleman Murray have 3 other children who are still living, therefore will not be specifically named.

21 July 1960:  Daniel Jerome Murray is killed in a car acccident in Vallejo, CA. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery with his Coleman grandparents.

9 June 1962:  Edward Kevin Murray is ordained a Catholic priest in San Francisco.

1968-1989:  Edward Marshall Murray and Elizabeth Coleman Murray's children have a total of 8 children, including me. All of their grandchildren are still living, so will not be named specifically.

5 December 1970:  Diane Marie Murray marries Dennis Alan Earnshaw in San Francisco.

21 April 1973:  Elizabeth Coleman Murray dies of an aneurysm in San Jose, CA. She is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA.

April 1976:  Diane Marie Murray divorces Dennis Allen Earnshaw.

7 May 1980:  Edward Marshall Murray dies of cirrhosis of the liver in San Francisco, CA. He is buried with his wife Elizabeth Coleman Murray at Holy Cross Cemetery.

7 November 2005:  Diane Murray Earnshaw dies of cancer in San Bruno, CA. She is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA.

18 December 2012:  Edward Kevin Murray dies in San Francisco. He is buried in the priests plot at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA.

Another Mullane Mystery -- Thomas M. Mullane

In Answering and Reviewing Questions, Part 2, I mentioned I had recently discovered a death notice for Thomas Michael Mullane, one of my great-grandmother Mary Mullane Murray's younger brothers. The surprising bit of information that I discovered from that was that Thomas was married to a woman named Jennie. I set off to find out more about Jennie and what might have happened to her, and the first thing I turned up was a census record from 1900. Thomas and Jennie were living on Sixth Street in San Francisco with their one month old son, Thomas, Jr. and had been married for a year. That was even more surprising news! There was no mention of a child in Thomas's death notice in 1910, so was he left out or had he also died?

I then went to check the 1910 census and discovered it was taken in April -- a month after Thomas died. That meant looking for Jennie as a widow with a nearly 10 year old son.  Neither turned up. I checked the city directories and the death notice for an address and turned up 111 or 111 1/2 Germania Street. With that information I could identify the enumeration district for the 1910 census and search the images directly. I found 111 Germania, but not Jennie and Thomas, Jr. Looking at some of the other records on the page, I suspect 111 1/2 was missed as there are records for 109 1/2 and 107A. It's also possible that Jennie and her son have gone to live with her family, but as yet I don't know Jennie's maiden name to look for her there.

So, I tried to see if I could find a record of Jennie and Thomas's marriage in 1899. My best bet for that would be newspapers (and I am eternally grateful that both the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Call are available on line for these kinds of searches!)  Off to newspapers.com to run my search and I get a couple of hits on Thomas M. Mullane in June 1899 -- fantastic! Well, not so fast.

I took a look at the articles and they aren't a marriage notice, but brief articles on the theft of some shoes! A shop owner named H.C. Lucke reported an on-going theft of shoes from his shop. The name looked familiar to me, so I went back to my records and saw that Thomas Mullane was listed as working for Mr. Lucke in the 1896-1898 city directories!

The article that appears in the Call says that Thomas Mullane (spelled Mulane), age 23, had worked for Mr. Lucke for seven years. It seems Thomas and one of his co-workers had been stealing "only the most expensive makes" of shoes that cost "from $7 and upward" over a period of two months and giving or selling them to friends and acquaintances. When they were arrested, the police found "a dozen fine pair of patent leather shoes" and both men promptly confessed. Thomas's partner in crime, a Charles Rochette, had worked for Mr. Lucke for about three months and had been hired "as an act of charity."

For such a brief article, it contained a lot of information. For example, Mr. Rochette was married "to an estimable young woman" and resided at 217 Eighth Street. For my purpose, however, the line for Thomas was more promising as he was "unmarried" per this article.  So as of June 9, 1899, Thomas is not married. His son, Thomas, Jr. was born on May 10, 1900. That gives me a window to search for a marriage notice for Thomas and Jennie. Nothing has turned up on my searches, so I'm going to have to look at the papers manually.  I'm also going to need to follow up on the arrest of Thomas Mullane to see if there's any notice of punishment. The articles I found just say he was booked into the city prison for petty larceny, so I'm not sure how much time, if any, he would be in jail.

I'm also puzzled about why I haven't been able to turn up anything on Thomas, Jr. after 1900. He isn't mentioned in the death notice for his father, and I can't find any record at all beyond his birth notice. It's possible he died before his father, but I haven't turned him up in the California Death Indexes. The death indexes don't begin until 1905, so if he died as a young child he wouldn't be there, but I'm also not finding a burial record at Holy Cross. While it's possible that if he did die between 1900-1905 that he wasn't buried at Holy Cross, that seems a little unusual. His father is buried there in the family plot, so it would make sense if he were buried there too. Another possibility is that his mother Jennie remarried and her new husband adopted Thomas Jr. thus giving him a different last name.

It's going to take some digging and slogging through pages of newspapers and city directories to see if I can turn anything up on Thomas, Jennie, and Thomas Jr. Fortunately, I can do most of that research on line so I won't have to wait to gain access to the records I'm looking for. It will probably take some time though, particularly going through the newspapers as it's easy to miss things if you don't pay attention. Hopefully I'll be able to work out this puzzle and find out what happened!