Assisted migration from Leitrim

Hi Jeanne,

Is your gg-grandmother the Margaret who married Michael Foley and lived in NJ? If so, there are many trees for this family on Ancestry.

These trees note that Margaret had two older brothers, Patrick and John.

I saw two censuses giving Margaret's emigration date...one said 1850, the other said 1864. 

Transcript of Rooney-Foley marriage:

First name(s) Margaret

State New York

Last name Rooney

Country United States

Role Bride

Spouse's first name(s) Michael

Birth year -

Spouse's last name Foley

Marriage year 1865

Location Manhattan

Marriage date 08 Aug 1865

Record set New York Roman Catholic Parish Marriages

Parish St Peter

Category Birth, Marriage & Death (Parish Registers)

Archdiocese New York

from findmypast.com

Google AI gives the following info about Leitrim assisted emigration...

Assisted emigration from County Leitrim in the 19th and early 20th centuries was driven by severe poverty, famine, and population pressures. Passage was funded by landlords, local workhouses under the Poor Law, and private philanthropists like Vere Foster.Key Funding SourcesLandlords: Cleared heavily populated, uneconomic estates by paying for tenants' passages to North America.Poor Law Unions / Workhouses: Financed departures for destitute paupers and orphans from local unions (such as Carrick-on-Shannon and Manorhamilton).Philanthropists: Prominent figures like Vere Foster specifically funded young women from impoverished regions to escape local servitude and find work abroad.Destinations and ImpactPrimary Destinations: Emigrants predominantly traveled to the United States (Boston, New York, Philadelphia) and Canada (Quebec, New Brunswick).Demographics: Post-famine schemes heavily featured young women and single laborers who lacked inheritance or viable land holdings in Leitrim.Remittances: Many who left later sent vital money back to remaining family members in Leitrim, funding subsequent travel or sustaining homesteads.

It is possibIe your ancestor was part of an AE scheme, but 90 to 95 percent of Irish immigrants to the USA were not.

I cannot respond to each of the above individually, so I will reply to everything here.

Margaret is assumed to have disembarked at the Port of New York, pre-Ellis Island, of course, and she and Michael Foley married at St. Peter's in Manhattan at Church and Barclay streets. The transcription above is from their marriage record, of which I have a copy. They raised their children in Jersey City, all of whom were baptised at St. Peter's in Jersey City or St. Patrick's in Jersey City.

To Patricia: I have never seen a tree with sources that shows Margaret Rooney had two brothers. If you could provide the link to that tree at Ancestry.com, I would be interested in reviewing the information. I have seen many trees that have copied my tree, and I have not found siblings. I have not found Margaret in the US prior to her marriage in 1865 (the transcription provided above).

I will not pursue assisted immigration further, though I would love to have the sources cited by Google AI to review.

Thanks for your help.

Jeanne Foley Dwyer

jeanneedwyer@gmail.com

Thanks for your question, Teresa. 

Michael Foley was born in New Jersey abt 1842, but I have not located a baptismal record for him. We have found a marriage record for his parents Michael Foley and Bridget Murphy in Feb 1829 in Ferns, Wexford. Their first child Mary was born in Newfoundland in Dec 1829. (She married James Matthews in Jersey City, New Jersey, and they had several children, including Adelaide who was visiting her widowed grandmother in 1880 in Jersey City.) 

The earliest record in New Jersey I have found of Michael Sr and Bridget Murphy's family is from the 1860 US Federal Census in Jersey City, Hudson County, New Jersey. That census did not record relationships, and two people recorded with the family are a mystery: Henry and Joanna, both young enough to be Michael and Bridget's children, both with surname Foley, but both born in Ireland. I suspect they were Michael's nephew and niece (or nephew and his wife). Also recorded were daughter Margaret (born in New Jersey) as shown in later censuses) and Michael Jr. (born in New Jersey). The elder Michael died in 1868, and Michael Jr was married in 1865, and the 1870 Census in the same place shows Bridget, Joanna, and Margaret (who married a Moran per her burial record, but no marriage record has been located). Henry disappears and is presumably deceased or has  moved on by 1870. 

Margaret Rooney is my ancestor I believe, based on many DNA matches, who came from Leitrim. Her parents were Mary Coyle and Patrick Rooney per Margaret's death cert. As you are well aware, Leitrim's parish records do not go back far enough to have recorded their lives in any way. I have searched them anyway, thinking maybe they stayed behind and sent Margaret alone, but although there are many Rooneys in the records, this couple is absent.

Thanks for your time.

Jeanne