What the "matchmaker" wrought

I've been enjoying the Irish Family History blog's Valentine focus this week. I was interested to learn that I'd done four unlucky things the day of my own wedding (I'm so glad I had two lucky ones on the list!). I've also enjoyed the posts on matchmaking and Irish weddings.

In honor of St. Valentine's Day today I thought I would remember some of the married couples in the Tierney/McCue family tree whose wedding dates I know (and some I don't).

Here's to all the loving couples in this extended family (several generations back). Without them there would be no family tree!

Michael & Mary (O'Neill) Tierney

Ralph & Bridget Kennedy

Frank & Catherine (Rogers) McCue

Patrick & Catherine (Kennedy) Tierney
Married August 16, 1874 at St. Stephen Catholic Church, Hanover Street, Boston, MA

George William & Margaret Helen (Tierney) McCue
Married October 11, 1911 at St. John Baptist Catholic Parochial Residence, Quincy, MA

John P. & Adeline (Sullivan) Tierney
Married in Oakland, California

Leo & Margaret (Wuerth) Tierney

Valentine image thanks to raggyann2 and eBay Forums.

A happy day in 1874: The wedding of Patrick & Catherine (Kennedy) Tierney

On August 16, 1874 Patrick Tierney and Catherine Kennedy, both of Boston, were married. To the left is a transcription of their marriage record from the Massachusetts archives. At the time of their marriage, it had been twenty-nine years since the first year of famine and sixteen years since Patrick had arrived in the United States. It must have been a very happy day for Patrick and Catherine.

The couple's marriage took place at St. Stephen Catholic Church on Hanover Street.. Plans for the church had started in 1802 and the famous Boston born architect Charles Bullfinch (the nation's premier architect) had designed the building. (The church is the only Bullfinch church to survive the Boston fire of 1872.) The church is now part of the famous Freedom Trail in Boston.

The building had originally housed the New North Congregational Church. The Unitarian congregration gave way to the Irish Catholic population during the Civil War and in 1862 the Catholic Church bought the church building for $35,000 and dedicated it to St. Stephen, the first Christian martyr.

According to the couple's marriage record, Patrick's parents' names were Michael & Mary (O'Neil) Tierney (Mary's maiden name is listed on Patrick's death record).  Catherine's parents' names were Ralph & Bridget Kennedy. I have not yet been able to find any further information about either of these couples (Patrick & Catherine's parents), even whether or not they emigrated from Ireland along with their children. Were they able to watch as their children marry that day in 1874, or did they remain behind in Ireland when their children left for America in search of a better life?

A rough start in Ireland

On March 14, 1841 a baby boy named Patrick was born to Michael & Mary (O'Neil) Tierney in County Tipperary, Ireland. Little did this family know what would transpire in their homeland in the near future.

Their lives, which were probably not too easy to begin with, would become tried beyond the imagination.

With the potato being the main food of the rural Irish, the failure of the potato crops in 1845-49 resulted in the disastrous Great Famine. Starvation and famine fever spread through the land; its greatest impact was in those communities on marginal lands. During the last part of the Famine, grain continued to be exported from Ireland to the markets of England, and Indian corn was prohibited by tariffs from entering Ireland (or England).

Government policies were criminally slow to react to the disaster. Workhouses, established under the Poor Law Act of 1838 for the relief of the destitute poor, were overwhelmed. At the height of the Famine, 3,000 per week were dying in the workhouses of Ireland. One million people perished due to the famine and within a decade or two, a further two million emigrated from Ireland.

Tipperary was relatively badly affected by the
Famine. Almost 70,000 people died in the county between 1845 and 1850 particularly in the years 1849 and 1850. The county population fell from
435,000 in 1841, to 331,000 in 1851 and to
249,000 in 1861. The rural population declined by two-thirds in that period and the town population by nearly one-half.

Read more about Tipperary history here.

Living a childhood in this kind of world, it is a miracle that young Patrick Tierney survived and went on to live to age 59, passing away in 1900.