Part 758g – Brunhammer Doherty Genealogy – Great-Grandmother Hannah (aka Hanora Gallagher) Holmes – 1878, A Puzzling Search – Episode I

Good Day,

In the course of my genealogy search and research there are many doors that keep opening as I follow down various paths. All this work is my attempt to piece together the generations and re-create the branches of the Family Tree.

A critical branch of the Brunhammer Doherty Family Genealogy and Tree is the branch that provides evidence of the Mitochondrial DNA, mtDNA. This is Andy’s Maternal Line. This line would follow from Andy from his mother, Myrtle Frances Gertrude (née Doherty) Brunhammer, from her mother and Andy’s grandmother Hannah Myrtle (née Holmes) Doherty, from her mother and Andy’s great-grandmother Hannah (née Gallagher) Holmes… And so on…

And this is where I am delving into, and I have walked through a number of doors. At present there are a number of Family Trees that have been placed on Ancestry.com that indicate that great-grandmother Hannah (née Gallagher) Holmes’ parents were Daniel and Bridget Gallagher. The issue is that no source of proof of this relationship has been provided on any of the information accessible through Ancestry.com. I am not discounting the possibility that great-grandmother Hannah’s parents may have been Daniel and Bridget Gallagher. I have been able to discount a similar family unit from the 1860 US Census of Reading, Pennsylvania made up of parents Daniel and Bridget and daughter Hannah Gallagher. It is just a coincidence that this family unit did exist.

I did learn that from related Family History, great-grandmother Hannah’s mother may have died while she, great-grandmother Hannah was a very young girl. The story includes the notion that great-grandmother Hannah’s father may have “disappeared to Canada”. It, the tale, further relates that the very young great-grandmother Hannah was “adopted by a family who may have owned an ice-cream store.” These tales may center on about the Pennsylvania Counties of Carbon and Schuylkill.

And so the focus of attention in my research is to hone in on documentation and data around the early 1850s to and including the 1890s, centering in and on the Counties of Carbon and Schuylkill. In the course of my research I have also discovered and presented the listing of great-grandmother Hannah, also known as Hanora and as Anna, on the US Federal Censuses of 1900 through and including 1930. All this research can be found on earlier Postings of A Genealogy Hunt.

Most recently I have found documentation from the Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania Orphan’s Court. As I am not too well tuned into the legal system and names of the specific agencies, I had to look up a definition for Orphan’s Court. Here are ones that I found, online.

Orphans Court

A probate court (also called a surrogate court) is a specialized court that deals with matters of probate and the administration of estates. From Wikipedia.

In some jurisdictions, the court in which adoptions are finalized. An orphan’s court handles estates and trusts of minors and other incapacitated persons. From Nation Adoption Center.

Last night, at the local Family History Center I reviewed two microfilms that I had acquired from the Family History Library from Salt Lake City. The two microfilms: Orphans’ Court Dockets, FHL [2134249] Docket, v. 15-17, 1871-1880 and FHL [2134782] Index, ca. 1811-1935 provided me with an interesting find. The name of the find – Hannah Gallagher. The dates of the Documents – 1878.

I will be downloading, transcribing, and reviewing the Documents. Stay tune for my write up and possible discoveries in my next Posts.

I took a few liberties with the above inserted cartoon by Dale Wilkins entitled “American Maze”. I superimposed the sign reading “Welcome To Genealogy…"

Enjoy,

Jim