Thomas McNamara

According to his obit Thomas McNamara, [aka Mack, Marck] was born in Galway August 1831. Due to genealogical research performed in 2025-2026 he may have been born on Inishbofin, Inishturk or Clare Island since his ancestral line seems to have moved from Clare then Galway to one of these islands. In the early 1800s there were numerous McNamara families living in the Murrisk barony of Mayo. Islands: Clare belongs in Mayo, Inishturk always belonged in Mayo, whereas Inisbofin moved from Mayo to Galway in 1898; which is the county he may have mentioned to his family and which appeared on his obit.

All available Irish Catholic Parish records do not reveal his baptism record but in the 1851 England Census he is found in Dunholme England at the age of 17, and where on October 24 1855 he married Mary Hasty at the Roman Catholic chapel in Dunholme. It is surmised they eloped as the RC requirement of that time was to make a public announcement of intention to marry at least twice – no public record has been found of that announcement. Additionally, typically a relative would attest at the marriage, but the attendees were not family.

On October 26 they boarded the Ship Orient arriving in New York Harbor [Castle Garden] on November 12, 1855. It is conjectured he got passage by helping to dig the Erie Canal and by July 1856 he was living in the vicinity of the canal and where his first son James was born.

He became a Naturalized US citizen on March 12 1859 and resided in Winfield Township on his farm until moving to Utica, New York in the care of his son Ambrose Myles until his death.

Thomas was a very prosperous dairy farmer with large acreage to support his dairy cattle. His and Mary’s children were James, John, Julia, Ambrose Myles, Thomas F, Edward W, William and Peter F.