Patrick Bannon

The history of St. Patrick's Catholic Church Daniel Mitchell & Other Irishmen Settled in Enfield, History of St. Patrick's Church in was Patrick Dolan, who came to America in 1834 at the age of 19 from Queens County (now Laois), Ireland, possibly from the area around Stradbally. This area is southwest of Dublin and is primarily agricultural. In the early 20th Century the names of two Irish counties--Kings and Queens--and many towns were changed from those imposed under English rule. Dolan first lived in New York and Connecticut as a railroad laborer for two years, and Cincinnati for three, working in a foundry, before coming to Shawneetown and then Enfield Township in 1839. Dolan spent the next 40 years in Enfield, interspersed with business ventures in Cincinnati and Evansville, and two terms in the Illinois General Assembly at Springfield. Dolan kept a general store on his farm and helped organize the Village of Enfield in 1853. Dolan's presence attracted other Irish immigrants to the rolling hills and woods of Enfield Township in White County and Crook Township in Hamilton during the bleak 1840s and '50s, when 750,000 Irishmen and women died from famine and disease and over a million immigrated to the U.S., Canada and Australia. In 1841 the Hanagan's, Dunn's, and Connelly's came to the area, and the Miller's joined the group when Daniel Hanagan sent for his bride-to-be. Others joining the community were named Bannon, Campbell, Crawford, Connery, Devoy, Driscoll, Erskine, Hayden, McCloskey, McGuire, McMahon, Mitchell, Pierce, Reagan, Shields, and Weeks, with roots in Ireland's Queens County, Cork, and Donegal.