A Trifling Quarrel Ends in Murder

A week ago I was Deciphering an Irishman's Death.

The April 12, 1881 Iowa death registration for my third great-grandfather, John Flynn, was recently digitized. To my great delight, the record identified his birth county in Ireland: Clare. 

But just as I was about to book my travel to the Emerald Isle, I glanced at the cause of death and stopped cold. Was I looking at a victim of a potentially sinister attack?

John Flynn was killed by a "Wound upon the head, inflicted with a cinder or clinker when drunk."

Was John Flynn murdered? 

Stop the Presses!

A member of the Iowa Genealogy Network on Facebook turned up an important clue - a clipping from the Cedar Rapids Times dated June 16, 1881.

I soon discovered another snippet published two days later in the Ackley Enterprise. 

Murder Most Foul

I was shocked. I had no idea that I had a direct ancestor who was murdered. What were the circumstances of the quarrel between Flynn and Maddigan? Neither paper divulged the details of their "trifling affair."

I knew Maddigan was sentenced to ten years in "the penitentiary." But which penitentiary, and did he serve all of that time?

Ancestry has a collection titled, "Iowa, Consecutive Registers of Convicts, 1867-1970." It includes the "convict registers from three Iowa state penitentiaries: the Iowa State Penitentiary at Fort Madison, established in 1839; the Anamosa State Penitentiary in Anamosa; and the Iowa State Reformatory for Women in Rockwell City."

I found no Michael Maddigan (or Moddigan) among the records. Did he serve his time elsewhere? Where are those convict registers kept and are they available for review?

Next up was FamilySearch, which has a collection titled, "Iowa Deaths and Burials, 1850-1890." In these records, I found a transcription of the death registration for a Michael Maddigan who died in Des Moines on November 8, 1882 - about 17 months after the newspapers reported he was sentenced to penitentiary.

Unfortunately, an image of the original death record is only viewable in a family history library. I need to get a copy of this death register to see if there are more clues that would help determine whether this Michael Maddigan was the same as the man who was imprisoned for murdering John Flynn.

Shattered Families

Among Iowa's probate files, I found a package for the settlement of the estate belonging to the Michael Maddigan who died on November 8, 1882.

His widow, Nancy, struggled to make ends meet for years as the probate process dragged on. A guardianship petition named the four young children left without their father: Mary, Patsey, John, and Margaret. What became of them?

Michael Maddigan Iowa Probate Package

Of course, the devastation to my own Flynn family was equally severe. John's wife, Margret (Fahey) Flynn, had already pre-deceased him, leaving him the sole parent to provide for their children. With John's death, Lawrence, Carrie, Julia, Margaret, Anna, Ida, and John Flynn Jr. (my second great-grandfather) were all orphaned.

My branch of the Flynn family was severed and forgotten with the adoption of John Flynn Jr. by an O'Connor family, who changed his surname.

Imagine how these children must have suffered because of the violent quarrel. Again, I found myself wondering what was at the heart of the dispute between John Flynn Sr. and Michael Maddigan.

Finding His Day In Court

The 1881 court records from the trial could shed some light on the attack. But where were they located?

Earlier this week, I spoke with a staff member at the Iowa State Historical Society who told me that the records would be with the Polk County Courthouse in Des Moines.

I spoke with the Clerk's office at the Polk County Courthouse. They agreed to look into my query. After a precursory search of the records, I received a call today letting me know that nothing was found.

Really? Nothing at all?

Given how my genealogy has been so well-served by Iowa's robust records, count me skeptical. Let me loose in those courthouse archives, and we'll see who comes back with nothing!

Are you a family historian well-versed in Iowa research and collections? I welcome any recommendations on next steps for locating the surviving court records that will help me find John Flynn's day in court.

Deciphering an Irishman's Death: Was It Accidental?

In spring 2016, I learned that my second great-grandfather John O'Connor was actually born John Flynn Jr. His name was changed by adoption following the untimely death of his parents John (Sr.) and Margaret (Fahey) Flynn.

John and Margaret were born in Ireland and immigrated to the United States sometime in the mid-19th century. But where in Ireland were they from?

Two years ago, I found John Flynn Sr. in a transcription of the 1881 Iowa death index. Unfortunately, at that time, an image of the record was not yet digitized.

I wanted to get my hands on a copy of the original record because the transcription included a tantalizing clue about his ancestral origins: his birthplace. This is a highly-desired, mission-critical piece of information for anyone digging into Irish genealogy.

Frustratingly, the record transcribed his birthplace as: "County C..., Ireland." Real funny, FamilySearch transcriber. Hilarious!

John Flynn Sr. 1881 Iowa Death Record Transcription from FamilySearch

I'm glad we narrowed it down, but there are still four counties among Ireland's 32 that begin with the letter 'C'. Where was John Flynn Sr. born? Was it County Carlow? Perhaps it was Cavan or Clare? Maybe Cork?

It Pays To Revisit Genealogy Cold Cases

Fast-forward to July of this year, when I began revisiting some of my paused genealogy questions.

I plugged John Flynn Sr. into FamilySearch and, lo and behold, the microfilmed death record that was once tucked away in the Granite Mountain vault had finally been digitized. I now knew his Irish county of birth.

Drum roll, please...

John Flynn Sr. 1881 Iowa Death Record from FamilySearch

John Flynn Sr. was born in County Clare, Ireland. Those few additional letters will help narrow my Emerald Isle research, and I look forward to picking up that thread in the coming months.

But there was something else that caught my eye on the newly digitized record: John's cause of death.

Grandpa Died How?

John was only 50 years old when he passed away, which seemed relatively young. He was a widower at the time of his death, indicating that Margaret had pre-deceased him. What were the circumstances of John's death that would leave his son John Jr. an orphan and, eventually, adopted by the O'Connor family?

The death index recorded his place and cause of death.

John Flynn Sr.'s Place and Cause of Death

I could make out most of the cause of death except two key words:

Wound upon the head

Inflicted with a [indiscernible] 

or [indiscernible] when drunk

He was mortally wounded in the head by something or something else when he was drunk? Wait a minute. You mean to tell me that a long night (he died at 7:30 in the morning) of drunkenness forever changed the surname for a branch of my family tree - Flynn to O'Connor?

Unable to read the penmanship, I crowd-sourced an answer. I shared the above image with the Deciphering Genealogy Script Facebook group. Within minutes, genealogists began offering their interpretations of the script.

Twenty-four comments later, the consensus was that John Flynn Sr. was killed by a "Wound upon the head, inflicted with a cinder or clinker when drunk."

What in the world is a cinder or clinker? According to Merriam-Webster's online dictionary, a cinder is "the slag from a metal furnace" or "a fragment of ash" or "a partly burned combustible in which fire is extinct."

A clinker, on the other hand, is "a brick that has been burned too much in the kiln" or a "stony matter fused together."

Where does one find a cinder or clinker?

Mapping the Death Scene

I was curious about the location of John's April 1881 death. What was around him at 307 6th Street in Des Moines, Iowa?

I turned to the Library of Congress' wonderful maps collection, and found a March 1884 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map for Des Moines.

In 1884, the Sanborn map indicated that an empty lot and the U.S. Signal Service were located at the approximate site of 307 6th Street (marked by the red arrow below). However, next door was the Eclipse Coal Company with a coal and lime shed. Did the clinker or cinder that wounded John come from the Eclipse Coal Company?

1884 Sanborn Fire Map Des Moines, Iowa, Library of Congress

In the next city block there was another business potentially relevant to this case.

At 604 Walnut Street (the cross street between the 300 and 200 blocks of 6th Street) was a saloon. Next door, at 606 Walnut Street was another saloon with a billiards room. Perhaps they were the same establishment. In either case, the saloon was just minutes and yards from where a drunken John Flynn Sr. was found dead.

1884 Sanborn Fire Map, Des Moines, Iowa, Library of Congress

Did John spend his evening in this saloon before crossing to the 300 block of 6th Street where he suffered the fatal head wound?

Was it accidental? Did he slip and fall, hitting his head? Or was he attacked? Perhaps there had been a fight? For now, I can only speculate.

While we may never know the details, I'm on the hunt for a coroner's inquest - if one occurred and survives - and newspaper accounts of his April 12, 1881 death. Either one could shed more light on John's untimely passing.

Luck of the Irish Reveals Orphan History

Who were the parents of my 2nd great-grandfather John Francis O'Connor? I've puzzled over this question for years, confused by conflicting information that points at different individuals.

Records recently made available online now provide some clarity, but may also reveal a forgotten set of difficult circumstances that placed John's childhood in turmoil and ultimately led to his surname being changed.

The 1900 US Federal census indicated that John was born in December 1880. His SSN application gave Des Moines, Iowa as his birth location.

In oral histories, his grandchildren remembered him fondly. My grandmother said he was "very nice, very kind." Her half-brother, my great-uncle, agreed, "Grandpa John was without a doubt the nicest, kindest man that you ever wanted to meet. [He] always wore a little fedora hat and always had a cigar shoved in his mouth."

John Francis O'Connor

His parents' identities were always of particular interest to me because on several census enumerations John indicated that they were born in Ireland. The prospect of tracing them to the Emerald Isle was exciting.

But, as I mentioned, there was confusion and uncertainty about the identities of his parents. First, there was John's death certificate. His son, also named John O'Connor, was the informant and indicated his father's parents were Peter O'Connor and Margaret Fahey Flynn.

These names were repeated on another record. In his elder years, John Sr. was admitted on September 5, 1964 to the Little Sisters of the Poor care home in Denver. The enrollment record required his parents' names and birth locations, which were written, again by son John Jr., as Peter O'Connor and Margaret F. Flynn. Both were reported to have been born in Ireland.

Clearly, John Jr. believed his father's parents were Peter O'Connor and Margaret Fahey Flynn.

The 1900 census in Rolla, Missouri is the only record that shows John F. O'Connor living with his purported father Peter O'Connor. However, Peter's wife's name on that 1900 census was not Margaret but rather Catherine. Was this part of Margaret's full name, or was this a second wife altogether? It sure would be handy to have the 1890 census right about now!

Curiously, the only record created by John himself - his SSN application signed December 1936 - listed his parents as John Flynn and Margaret Fahey. Was John Flynn a mistake? John listed his own surname as O'Connor on the record. Was it supposed to be John Flynn O'Connor and the surname was mistakenly left off? I couldn't reconcile the discrepancy between Peter O'Connor and John Flynn.

There was another clue in John F. O'Connor's 1972 obituary published in the Rocky Mountain News. It said that he was survived by a sister, Mrs. Annie Campbell of Denver.

I found a 1974 Denver obituary for an Anna Flynn Campbell who was also born in Des Moines, Iowa (same location as John). According to her obituary, she was the widow of Charles Campbell whom she had married in Iowa in January 1904. Frustratingly, it provided no information about the identity of her parents.

The Iowa database on Ancestry.com includes a marriage record for an Anna Flynn to a C Campbell in January 1904. The record included Anna's parents' names: John Flynn and Margaret Fahey. The names were an exact match to the those that John F. O'Connor listed on his SSN application!

I plugged the name John Flynn into FamilySearch and found an index of an April 1881 death in Des Moines, Iowa. It stated this particular John Flynn was widowed at the time of his death and born in Ireland (sadly, the indexed record cuts off his Irish birth county). I'm still working to locate a copy of the original death record.

I next turned to the Iowa probate records on Ancestry and found this John Flynn's packet. The file included an August 1881 petition by John's brother Michael Flynn, who asked the court to assign him as guardian for John's minor children who were all under the age of 14. Seven children were named and included both an Anna Flynn and, drum roll please, a J. F. Flynn. Was this my 2nd great-grandfather John Francis O'Connor?

The court did eventually appoint Michael Flynn as the guardian for his nieces and nephews. For eight years, he reported to the court on expenses incurred in support of the minors and requested reimbursement from John's estate. Ultimately, it appears two daughters emancipated themselves and Michael eventually resigned his role as guardian in 1889. If he was in fact the youngest ward, John F. O'Connor would have only been about eight years old at that time. Who took him in when Michael resigned as guardian?

Was this where Peter O'Connor entered the story?

The evidence uncovered makes a strong argument that John F. O'Connor was originally John F. Flynn son of John and Margaret (Fahey) Flynn. After his parents' untimely demise, John F. O'Connor somehow wound up in Rolla, Missouri living with a Peter and Catherine O'Connor as their, I presume, adopted son. Where was this Peter O'Connor before 1900? Was he a neighbor in Des Moines, Iowa who decided to take in and adopt the orphaned John F. Flynn? Or was he a distant relative? Was Catherine O'Connor's maiden name Fahey? Was she a relative to John, perhaps a sister to Margaret Fahey?

None of John F. O'Connor's surviving grandchildren - my grandmother or her half-brother - recall ever hearing anything about him originally being John Flynn. With these questions now swirling, there is certainly a role for DNA to play in this case. My great-uncle recently submitted a Y-DNA sample to FamilyTreeDNA. Will the majority of his surname matches be O'Connors or will they be Flynns?

While I've built an interesting circumstantial case with plenty more to investigate, I do feel as though I had the luck of the Irish pointing me to these documents and revealing an unknown bit of family history. Perhaps, as this case continues to unfold, I'll have a different surname to trace in the Emerald Isle.