Barack Obama's Clare connection

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smcarberry
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Barack Obama's Clare connection

Post by smcarberry » Sat Jan 17, 2009 4:35 pm

I stumbled onto a family historian's description of the Kearney family's descendant who will become the next U.S. president
within a week. I knew Obama had Kansas roots, and I knew of Clare families in Kansas, so this should not be all that
surprising, just not something expected. I cannot vouch for accuracy of the described lineage, but it does seem plausible.

Sharon C.


http://my.barackobama.com/page/communit ... ney/gGgRbM

"For years I have been researching the genealogy of my family. During the past year I realized that Barack Obama and I are fourth cousins three times removed.

Our common ancestors were Joseph and Sarah Healy Kearney who were married in County Clare, Ireland on April 3, 1761. Joseph was from Shinrone in Kings County (now Offaly County) and Sarah was from Moneygall at the southern tip of Kings County. Sarah and Joseph had ten children including William (from whom Barack is descended) and Thomas (from whom I am descended).

I believe that Thomas Kearney came to the USA right after the Revolutionary War. He was married in Baltimore in 1791. In 1801 Thomas moved to the northwest corner of Ross County, Ohio.

William Kearney had a son he named Joseph, after William's father. The younger Joseph had a son about 1830, named Fulmoth. In 1850 (during the potato famine), Fulmoth came to the US and settled across the road from Thomas's son James (my G-Grandfather) in Ross County.

After a few years Fulmoth moved to Indiana and later to Kansas. Fulmoth's daughter married Jacob William Dunham in 1863 in Indiana. They also moved to Kansas. Jacob and Mary Ann had a son Ralph Waldo Emerson Dunham in 1894. He married Ruth Armour and they had a son named Stanley Armour Dunham in 1918. Stanley Armour Dunham married Madelyn Payne and had a daughter named Stanley Ann Dunham. Stanley Ann Dunham married Barack Obama, Sr. in 1960. Barack Obama, Jr. was born August 4, 1961 in Honolulu."

pwaldron
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Re: Barack Obama's Clare connection

Post by pwaldron » Sun Jan 18, 2009 2:11 am

I think this Clare connection is spurious and results from a failure to realise that the boundaries of the DIOCESE of Killaloe extend far beyond the TOWN of Killaloe and indeed far beyond the boundaries of the COUNTY of Clare.

The original research on Obama's Irish roots can be read at http://www.eneclann.ie/Research/genealo ... story.html

It notes that `Joseph became a comber i.e. textiles/ weaving [1761 Marriage License Bond, Diocese of Killaloe]'.

These marriage licence bonds are listed at http://www.celticcousins.net/ireland/killaloe.htm
The relevant entry reads:

*KEARNEY, Joseph, comber, of Shinrone, Kingscounty and Sarah HEALY of Monegall, Kingscounty, Spinster. Bondsmen: Lambert HEALY of Monegall, comber, and Thomas WILKINSON of Killaloe, Co. Clare, innholder. 3 Apr 1761 (folio 162).

The place of marriage is not stated explicitly.

The present Catholic parishes of Shinrone (from which Joseph Kearney came) and Dunkerrin (in which lies Moneygall, from which Sarah Healy came) are both in COUNTY Offaly (then King's COUNTY) and in the DIOCESE of Killaloe. (See http://www.killaloediocese.ie/ParishesandSchools.htm )

Moneygall is in the civil parish of Cullenwaine. Lewis's 1837 description of Moneygall noted that `The church service is performed twice every Sunday in the school-house, there being no church in the parish.' (See http://www.booksulster.com/library/topog/m2.php)

So it is difficult to say exactly where the Kearney-Healy marriage may have taken place, but most likely it was neither in Clare nor even in a county adjoining Clare, but somewhere in the then King's County.

In former times, one often reads of marriages taking places `at her father's house', so my guess is that this 1761 marriage would have taken place either in the schoolhouse in Moneygall (if it existed 76 years before Lewis refers to it) or in the Healy family home.

If anyone has more specific information about the location of this marriage, I would be delighted to learn more.

smcarberry
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Re: Barack Obama's Clare connection

Post by smcarberry » Sun Jan 18, 2009 4:49 pm

Paddy W.,

Thanks very much for the further references on this. I have now located another descendant's description of these Kearneys, which definitely places Joseph and his sons in Offaly after the 1761 marriage. See
http://www.onthesquare.com/forms/Joseph ... ndents.pdf

However, the inclusion of Clare resident Thomas Wilkinson in the marriage bond did pique my interest. So I did a bit more
digging. First, it must be noted that this was a Church of Ireland marriage, as the descendants readily acknowledge.
Thomas Wilkinson and Maurice Cogan both served as bondsmen in the 1700s at Killaloe, according the the marriage bond
records; in fact they served together in one such bond, and in another Maurice Cogan is listed as "registrar." Maurice Cogan is also listed as assistant registrar in Philip Dwyer's 1878 book The Diocese of Killaloe from the Reformation to the Close of the Eighteenth Century [on Google]. Rev. Dwyer was Church of Ireland and provided descriptions of C of I parishes.
p. 126 Shinroan: vicarage, rectory, with mention of Rev. Clapham in 1619.
p. 536 further Shinroan description, with alternate spellings; mention of an ancient church ruin
p. 521 Shinroan's C of I parish in the Barony of Ikerrin is bounded by Shinroan, Corbally, Rathnaveoge, and Kyle.
p. 523 mention of Moni-a-gall in reference to the Danes' presence in and around Roscrea, Co. Tipperary.
p. 524 Moneygall is listed in or near the parish of Castletown Ely, Co. Tipperary, with only ancient church remains.

On p. 130 a C of I official in the 1700s notes that not many church buildings exist yet in King's County. On the other hand,
Killaloe is described as being central in this C of I bishopric, easily reached by existing transportation, and very short on money. (See p. 367: "Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex...on March 17, 1674-5, wrote...: ...The Bishoprick of Killaloe is the lowest of value in the whole kingdom.") The C of I practices of that time seemed quite commercial in nature, in that certain parishes were leased to C of I laymen, who presumably were entitled to some portion of the tithes. This sets up a possible
scenario in which C of I people desiring a nice but nearby location for a wedding might go to Killaloe's St. Flannan's Cathedral (then in C of I hands although later again a RC property, at all times a handsome building with a very nice east wall window), and include (as courtesy or perhaps a local rule) a local C of I official as a bondsman, perhaps in some way related to additional church or personal revenue. The 1761 Kearney marriage appears to have been a planned, not a rushed, event since it was likely a double wedding, as evidenced by the other marriage bond of the same date:
HEALY, Lambert, comber, of Monegall, Kingscounty and Elizabeth RYALL of Tomeaghter, Co. Tipperary, Spinster. Bondsmen: Joseph KEARNEY of Shinrone, comber and Thomas WILKINSON of Killaloe, Co. Clare, innholder. 3 Apr 1761.

However, the more general historical information which I gained this morning with this further look-see into C of I matters
in Killaloe diocese of the 1700s, was this mindset, which may explain why Protestants found emigration attractive at
a time when Irish government and economy were so well controlled by England, in Protestant hands:

p. 371 of the Dwyer book:
"From a curious paper entitled,'Aphorisms relating to the Kingdom of Ireland, humbly submitted to the Most Noble Assembly of Lords and Commons at The Great Convention at Westminster' (Jos. Watts, London, 1689), the following particulars are taken, as indicating the impressions of the English concerning the needs of Ireland:
...
V.Without the subjection of Ireland England cannot flourish, and perhaps not subsist.
...
VII. That the Protestants there, unless speedily relieved, must necessarily be ruined.
[p. 372]
VIII. That no people in the world are in so miserable a condition as the Protestants of Ireland. For they are not only insulted by their own servants, and in a certain way of beggary, but are also in continual fear, and under imminent danger of being massacred."

posted by Sharon Carberry

pwaldron
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Re: Barack Obama's Clare connection

Post by pwaldron » Mon Jan 19, 2009 1:39 am

Thanks for the extra information, Sharon.

While I live within sight of St Flannan's Cathedral, Killaloe, I must admit that I don't know as much as I should about its history - but I was surprised to read that it was "then in C of I hands although later again a RC property". It is firmly in C of I hands today.

Likewise, I don't know as much as I should about marriage licence bonds.

http://www.movinghere.org.uk/galleries/ ... reland.htm says:

As an alternative to having banns read in church, members of the Church of Ireland could take out a Marriage Licence Bond. The parties lodged a sum of money with the diocese to indemnify the Church against there being an obstacle to the marriage; in effect the system allowed the better-off to purchase privacy. The original bonds were all destroyed in 1922, but the original indexes are available at the National Archives.

I presume that somebody travelled to the seat of the Bishop (the town or Cathedral of Killaloe in this case) to deposit the money. Whose job was this? Did it happen a few days before the marriage? Did the marriage still normally take place in the bride's home parish? Are the marriages listed in the indexes to MLBs generally found also in surviving parish registers scattered throughout the diocese?

\pw

smcarberry
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Re: Barack Obama's Clare connection

Post by smcarberry » Mon Jan 19, 2009 1:21 pm

Ah, yes, history as an academic subject leads us to search for authoritative sources to cite, and thus facts come to light
and we are the better for it. Let me adjust that mention of St. Flannan's in Killaloe having reverted to RC at some point
after the 1700s: I thought I read that as I quickly scanned online articles, but likely that reference actually concerned
St. Flannan's in Ennis, which is RC. So, Killaloe's cathedral, which is assumed to contain the remains of the last
Dalcassian High King, has been a C of I place for centuries, which means there could be a lot of good info on all sorts of
local folk in its vestry books. Further, those books might still be accessible. That fact plus your specific questions on
marriage bonds are all good subjects of an inquiry to be posed to the RCB librarian in Dublin: library@ireland.anglican.org
Librarians have as their most essential duty the preservation and distribution of information from collections in their custody,
so it is well worth a try.

Also note this article, which might involve only the cathedral's architecture:
Bourke, F. R. 'St. Flannan's Cathedral, Killaloe' The Other Clare, 4 (1980), 16-18

Sharon C.

pwaldron
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Re: Barack Obama's Clare connection

Post by pwaldron » Mon Feb 09, 2009 12:50 am

The plot thickens:

The often notoriously unreliable Clare Champion on 23 Jan 2009 published a report by Peter O'Connell entitled `President Obama's link with Killaloe' which states:
`Joseph Kearney ... married Sarah Healy ... in Killaloe in 1761.

The wedding ceremony was held in an establishment belonging to innkeeper Thomas Wilkinson.

According to Church of Ireland records, the president is descended from Joseph Kearney ...'
Church of Ireland records alone are hardly sufficient to establish the ancestry of a president who, to the best of my knowledge, has never set foot in Ireland!

I wish the sources for this article generally were better documented.

http://www.eneclann.ie/Research/genealo ... tion7.html on the other hand says
"He married Sarah Healey 'of Moneygall' on 8 April 1761 in Shinrone Church of Ireland according to the parish register. The couple is also referred to in a marriage licence bond for Killaloe."

I am now reliably informed the the marriage record of Joseph Kearney and Sarah Healy in the Shinrone registers reads as follows:
1761 April 8[?]

Joseph Kearney married to Miss Sarah Haly[sic] by Lycence

I suppose it is possible that the marriage also appears in the Killaloe parish registers, which I have not checked. Someone who has reason to consult them might let us know whether Joseph Kearney and Sarah H(e)aly were married more than once.

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