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Sunday 4 September 2011

The children of Edward Pennefather of Templeogue.


I got the following information from a Burke's Peerage entry from the 1930s;  it also appeared in Burke's 'Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry, Volume 3'. I've edited it to make it easier to read. I've also been adding bits of information to it as I discover more.
The original entry noted that Edward Pennefather was of Wellington, Templeogue, County Dublin and was formerly of Sion, Co. Kildare and of 8 Nassau Street, Dublin, son of John Pennefather of Golden, Co. Tipperary and Rector of St. John's, Newport, Co. Tipperary, and half-brother of Major Kingsmill Pennefather of Golden, Tipperary.

Edward Pennefather,  from whom we descend directly, had been born to the Rev. John Pennefather of Newport, Co. Tipperary, possibly in Cork in about 1785. His mother has never been identified and was either the first wife of Rev. John Pennefather  (the Reverend's 2nd wife being Elizabeth Percival who he married in 1789)  or else our Edward was illegitimate.

Edward Pennefather's half- siblings were Kingsmill Pennefather, William Westby Pennefather, Sir John Lysaght Pennefather, Laura Pennefather and Joseph Lysaght Pennefather.  Edward would name three of his children after them later, namely John Lysaght Pennefather (our immediate ancestor), William Westby Pennefather and Joseph Lysaght Pennefather.

The Rolls of the Freemen of Dublin, which are available to view in Pearse Street Library in Dublin, show that Edward Pennefeather (sic) was admitted as a Freeman in 1810; he was noted as a saddler of Grafton Street.
His son, John Pennefather, was later admitted to the Freemen on 6th September 1845 and the address was again given as Grafton Street.
Edward's son, William (Westby) Pennefather, was admitted to the Freemen on 11th March 1858.  He was a commercial clerk of 1, Hacketts Buiildings, North Strand, Dublin.
Edward's son, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather, was admitted on 6th May 1858. He was a carpenter, living at home with his parents at 15 Fairview Avenue, Clontarf.

Edward Pennefather was also mentioned in 'The Treble Almanack' of 1815 -  under the heading of 'Merchants', Edward Pennefather appears as a saddler at 8 Nassau Street, Dublin, and this tallies with his later entry in Burke's Peerage which gives his address as 8 Nassau Street and Wellington, Templeogue.   8 Nassau Street is at the corner of Nassau Street and Grafton Street, the address used when Edward and his son, John, were admitted to the Dublin Freemen.

Edward Pennefather was also noted as a farmer who farmed at Sion outside Maynooth, Co. Kildare - the Tithe Applotment Index  notes him at Laraghbryan townland just outside of Maynooth in 1825.  I inspected the Tithe Applotments on microfilm in the National Library - Edward was farming 83 acres of land at Sion, Laraghbryan.   Closeby were Thomas Reynolds, 42 acres, and Lawrence Reynolds. I mention the Reynolds because, later in Dublin, a Henry Reynolds witnessed a number of family marriages there along with Edward Pennefather's son, John Pennefather, and there may have been some sort of a link.

On 5th June 1821, Edward Pennefather married Eliza or Elizabeth White, the daughter of George and Ann White of St. Peters parish, south of Stephens Green in Dublin.  The witnesses to the marriage were Robert Morrisson - possibly a cook/vintner of Dawson Street - and W.C. Humphries who was, perhaps, the Staff Surgeon of the Royal Military Hospital, Phoenix Park.
http://alison-stewart.blogspot.ie/2014/08/george-and-ann-white-parents-of-eliza.html

The Dublin voters' lists for 1832 note Edward Pennefather, farmer, at Tallaght, Newcastle, Co. Dublin, wihch is adjacent to Crumlin where his children were born at this time.
The Dublin Register of Voters for 1837 shows Edward Pennefather, a farmer, living at Wellington (Crumlin), Co. Dublin.

Edward and Eliza Pennefather lived for a time at 4 Nottingham Street near Parnell Square in Dublin city before moving out to Clontarf, north of the city.  In 1847 when Edward's son, John, married Emily Courtenay in St. Marys, Dublin, it was stated on the marriage certificate that Edward was a farmer although the address was not noted.

By June 3rd 1856 when Edward's son, William Westby Pennefather, married Emma Hay in St.Thomas's on Cathal Brugha Street, the family had moved out to Clontarf.

Edward's wife, Elizabeth Pennefather, née White, died at 15 Fairview Avenue, Clontarf, on 1st January 1864.   She had been ill for seven days with bronchitis which killed her.  Her daughter, Maria Bonis, was present at death.

The Dublin Electoral Roll of 1865 noted Edward Pennefather's address as 15 Fairview Avenue, Clonturk.  Also living there with him was his son, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather, and his son-in-law William Bonis.

Edward Pennefather died in Belfast on January 11th 1874 at the Belfast residence of his son, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather, 65 Botanic View.  Edward, a gentleman farmer, had died of senile decay which he'd been suffering from for the previous 12 months.


Edward Pennefather (1785 - 11th January 1874) and Eliza White (1794 - 1st January 1864) had the following children:

1)  John Lysaght Pennefather (13th January 1823 - 29th March 1869) was  named after his paternal uncle, General Sir John Lysaght Pennefather.
http://alison-stewart.blogspot.com/2011/07/john-pennefather-and-emily-courtenay.html


2)  Edward (1825 - 1869)  who married in Kilmichael, Co. Wexford, on 16th December 1854 by Rev. B. Waller, Sarah Turner,who died in 1896, the daughter of the late Daniel Turner, land agent to the estate of Blagden, Northumberland.
Daniel Turner had been born in 1779 to Daniel Turner, yeoman of Hilton, then Leeside, Durham.  He appeared briefly on the 1841 UK census living in Stannington, Northumberland, with his four children - Frederic born 1817, Ann born 1819, Elizabeth born 1821, and Sarah born 1823.  Daniel Turner's will was probated in 1851, and administered by his son, Frederick, also a land agent, and by his daughter, Ann Turner.
Edward Pennefather settled at Cahore, Co. Wexford, where 'The Life-Boat, or Journal of the National Life-Boat Institution' of 1868 noted him as the Assistant Hon. Sec. of the Institution.
Edward Pennefather died of pericarditis which he'd been suffering from for a year, aged 44, on 24th December 1869. 



I'm indebted to Michael Richardson for sending me on the above photo of the younger Edward Pennefather above.

The four children of Edward Pennefather and Sarah Turner were:
   a) Edward John Lysaght Pennefather, born 8th October 1855, died 7th October 1879.
   b) Flora Pennefather, born 1858;  died 20th September 1869 of encephalitis. Her death was registered on 7th February 1870 by an Esther Thompson of Newtown, who also registered the death of Flora's father, Edward Pennefather, which occurred on Christmas Eve 1869.
    c) Maria G.A. Pennefather, who died aged 20 at 54 Upper Sackville Street, Dublin, on 23rd May 1883 - the 'Dublin Evening Express' of 24th May 1883 named her as the youngest daughter of the late Edward Pennefather of Cahore, Co. Wexford.
   d) Henry William Frederick Pennefather (5th June 1867 in Donomore, Wexford - 21st August 1914), married Eliza/Lizzie Davis (born May 4th 1871 in Drumgold, Enniscorthy) , the daughter of Roger Davis (1842 - 1881) and Catherine Williams (1853 - 1923).  Roger Davis and Catherine Williams married in 1870 and had Lizzie, Thomas Davis (1873 - 1951), William Davis (1878 - 1948) and Joseph Davis (1881 - 1955).   Roger Davis died in 1881 and his wife, Catherine, married James Fortune in early 1886 - they subsequently had Patrick Fortune in 1886, James Fortune (1888 - 1946) and Catherine Fortune (1891 - 1962) whose grandson, Michael Bembridge, kindly shared these family details with me.  His grandmother, Catherine Fortune, married his grandfather, Joseph Hawkins (1879 - 1947) in Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford, in 1911.  Joseph Hawkins was the son of an earlier Joseph Hawkins (c.1850 - 1908) and of Mary Corrigan (1846 - 1904) who had married on 30th December 1871.  Along with Joseph Junior, they had Margarret Hawkins (1872 - 1872), William Hawkins (1873 - 1942), Ellen Hawkins (b. 1875), John Hawkins (1877 - 1957) and Michael Hawkins (1885 - 1938).

  Eliza Davis and Henry married in St. Mary's, Enniscorthy, Wexford, on August 2nd 1887. The witnesses were Robert Clingham and M.A.Williams.
     The 1911 Census states that Henry and Eliza had thirteen children of whom only 8 survived....I can only find information on 12 of the children:
  • Henry and Eliza Pennefather had Edward John Lysaght Pennefather on 11th November 1887, who married in 1925 Violet Maud, the daughter of William Henry Meredith.  
  • Henry and Eliza Pennefather had Flora Pennefather, born in King's County in about 1888.  She married Christopher Saunderson on 15th February 1917.
  • Henry and Eliza Pennefather had Maria Pennefather in 1890.
  • Henry and Eliza also had Henry William Frederick Pennefather, born 4th Dec 1891 who married, in 1930, Lily Abraham, the daughter of Richard and Mary Anne Abraham of Rathrobin, Offaly. Henry and Lily had a daughter, Elizabeth Margaret in 1931.  Henry Pennefather joined the Army Reserve when he was 17 in 1909, and the following year he enlisted with the 4th Battalion,  Leinster Regiment/ Royal Berkshires.  He served overseas during the first World War in India and France, and was discharged because of sickness on 9th August 1918. He  joined up again in 1921, but emigrated briefly to Vancouver - in 1928 he was working for Mr. C.A.Call as a french polisher, with an address at 2313 Victoria Drive.  Later, Henry returned to Ireland, and lived at Green Street, Birr. In 1931, his wife, Lily, sailed from Belfast to Quebec with their 4-month-old daughter, Elizabeth.  The manifest stated that she'd been born in Tullamore, Offaly, in 1896, and that she was travelling to visit a friend, She had been in Canada before, from 1913 until 1925, and again from April 1931 until August 1931. Her husband was Henry Pennefather of Green Street, Birr.
  • In 1894, Henry and Eliza also had Charles George Turner Pennefather who married Cissie Harte (born 1897 in Birr)  in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, and they had a son, Albert. Charles George Turner Pennefather died Jan. 29th 1940, and his wife, Cissie, died on Jan. 5th 1959 in Bloemfontein, South Africa.
  • In 1897, Henry and Eliza also had Joseph Thomas  Clive Pennefather who was married twice. By his first wife, Florence the daughter of Hugh McCullough, he had Henry Edward de Fonblanque Pennefather (great name!)  and a daughter, Kathleen Pennefather.  By his second wife, Sarah Foster, who he married in 1934, he had Joseph Thomas Clive Pennefather.
  • Henry and Eliza had Kathleen (1899 - 1904).
  • Henry and Eliza also had James Pennefather (Emmet Street, Birr, Kings County), born 29th May 1901, who married in 1934 Dorenda (1910 - 1992), daughter of Robert Williams and Dorinda Thomas of Willfield House, Kinnity, Birr.    James and Dorinda had Lavinia Laura Dorinda Flora (who kindly sent me on her family tree, and who went to school with my mother in Dublin),  Charity Dorothea Elizabeth Ann, Jacqueline Kathleen Alice Maria, and Kingsmill Robert Edward James Lysaght.
  • Henry and Eliza finally had, on 9th or10th January 1904, Alfred Roger Samuel Pennefather who married in New York, Helen Moylet - they had a son, James Pennefather.   Alfred was later known as Roger Samuel Pennefather.  He emigrated to New York aboard the 'Celtic', arriving on January 17th 1928, in the company of a friend, John Egan of Birr.  Both men were carpenters, and were heading to stay with John Egan's family at 1081 Anderson Avenue in the Bronx. By 1929, when Roger applied for naturalisation, he was working as an auto trimmer.  He married Helen/Ellen Moylett on January 8th 1930 in New York.  She had been born on August 17th 1905 to Patrick and Bridget Moylett in Castlebar, and had emigrated to the US in November 1923.  By 1936, when the young couple re-applied for citizenship, Roger was working as an upholsterer, and they had a son, James Alfred Pennefather, born October 19th 1932.  Their address in 1936 was 345 West 122nd Street, NYC.     In 1938, the Michigan City Directory showed them living at 55 West 17th, Holland City, Michigan, where Roger was working as a french polisher.  He would die in Michigan in December 1974.  His wife and son, however, seem to have left him to settle in Buffalo, New York - on 18th August 1939, the passenger manifest of the 'Mauretania, sailing from Cobh to NYC, showed Helen Pennefather, housewife, returning home from a visit to her mother-in-law, Mrs. E. Pennefather of Birr, Offaly, in the company of her 6-yr-old son, James.  They gave their home address as 55 Holland Place, Buffalo.  Later still, on March 26th 1952, son James Pennefather was recorded by US emigration hitchhiking across the border from Canada into the US.  Now aged 19, he gave his nationality as Canadian, with his last address as 29 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto. He had been born 19th October 1932 in NYC and was currently an unemployed labourer, who was travelling to Buffalo for two days only to seek advice.  His destination was his father's friend, D. Woods, c/o Funeral Parlour, Main Street, Buffalo.  The document stated that he's lived in the US fro 1932 till 1938,  from August 1939 till December 1940, and from September 1946 til June 1948.  His mother was now named as Helen Charters of 18 Edmond Street, St. Catherines, Ontario, which seems to confirm, given that Roger Samuel Pennefather only died in 1974, that the couple had divorced and that Helen had remarried.    Son James Pennefather appeared on the Canadian Voters Lists for 1965 at Lakeshore Boulevard, Toronto, along with his wife Shirley Pennefather.  They were still there in 1974;  James was a driver and Shirley was a tester.
I found the following on the Limerick City Library website, which has published obituaries from The Limerick Chronicle online for free;  The Limerick Chronicle picked up the following information which had been published in The King's County Chronicle in May 1907:   'A Birr Phenomenon -  On Sunday 26th May, the wife of Mr. H. Pennefather, cabinet maker, presented him with two sons and a daughter at his residence Cappaneal, Birr, but the little fellows died within the next four and twenty hours, and were interred in Clonngill cemetery on Monday.  The female it is stated is not a robust child.  The parents have had about twelve children, all living but three, including the last infants. The youngest of the nine living is about three years of age. We don't know if the deaths of the last infants will preclude the King's usual gift of three sovereigns on such unusual events.'     The daughter died also - the three children were named Francis, Samuel and Mary.

3) William Westby Pennefather who married Emma Hay, the daughter of Alexander Hay. Burke's Peerage states that Alexander Hay was the Clerk of the Crown and Hanaper but this is incorrect - he was an engineer.  It was his son, David, who was the Clerk of the Crown and Hanaper. 
http://alison-stewart.blogspot.com/2011/09/william-westby-pennefather-and-emma-hay.html

4) Joseph Lysaght Pennefather, born 1834, married Eleanor Maria Dunne.  The couple married on August 2nd 1867 in St.Thomas's, Dublin.  At the time of the marriage, Joseph was living in Gloucester Street in Belfast and was working as a builder/contractor. Eleanor's father was a bookkeeper of Dublin, Benjamin Dunne (1815 - 1902) who would be declared bankrupt in March 1863 at Coburgh Place.   Coburgh Place was off Seville Place near Connolly Station - on Griffiths Valuation of 1854, Benjamin Dunne was living at 5 Lower Oriel Street, also close to Connolly Station.  In the 1840s, Benjamin Dunne and his wife, Catherine, were living at 20 Monck Place, Dublin.   Benjamin Dunne of Stafford Street, a writing clerk, was declared insolvent in September 1841.  Later, in July 1856, he was noted as a mercantile clerk at Oriel Place.
The widowed Benjamin Dunne would later appear on the 1901 census in the household of his son-in-law, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather, and his daughter, Eleanor. His grandson, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather Junior, was also present.

The witnesses to the wedding of Joseph Lysaght Pennefather and Eleanor Maria Dunne were Eleanor's father, Benjamin, and her brother, Henry James Dunne, a draper of Grafton Street, who would later, in St. Bride's, Dublin, on 21st August 1882, marry Mary Anne McGarry, the daughter of a tailor, Michael McGarry.   Mary Anne Dunne died on 24th February 1900 at Grantham Street;  in 1901, the widowed Henry James Dunne (1854 - 1804) was still living at 11.1 Grantham Street, along with his two unmarried sisters, Emily Dunne (who had been baptised as Amelia Letitia Dunne in Monck Place on 13th October 1844 - 1909) and Susan Dunne (1850 - 1921).      In 1911, Susan Dunne was visiting a 63-year-old caretaker, Frances Derham of 20.1 Lower Exchange Street, as was her nephew, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather Junior, a commercial clerk.

(In the Dublin Street Directory of 1858, Joseph's brother, John Pennefather, was noted at 23 Summerhill - also noted at the same address was a Miss Dunne. Was this his future sister-in-law, Eleanor Maria Dunne, I wonder?)

On 6th May 1858, Joseph Lysaght Pennefather (senior) was admitted to the Freemen of Dublin.  He was admitted by birth, his father, Edward Pennefather, having been admitted in 1810.  Joseph was noted as a carpenter of 15 Fairview Avenue, his parents' family home.

Joseph Lysaght Pennefather and his wife spent a number of years living Belfast;  Joseph's father, Edward Pennefather, died in Belfast on January 11th 1874 - he had been suffering from senile decline for 12 months, and was living with his son, Joseph, at 65 Botanic View, Belfast.  Edward's occupation was given as a gentleman farmer.

Although Joseph Lysaght Pennefather was still living in Belfast in 1874, when his father died there, he carried out work from time to time in Dublin.  'The Dublin Builder' of 2nd April 1860 noted that Joseph Pennefather was building a house in Victoria Avenue, Sandymount, for a Francis Salmon. He was also constructing the waterworks in Friarstown, Co. Dublin - both of these projects had been designed by the architect J.S. Sloane.

The family had moved home to Dublin by 6th March 1891 since the papers reported that Joseph Pennefather of 24 Clarinda Park, Kingstown, had been fined for travelling without a ticket on the Merrion to Salthill train.

In 1910, the Street Directory shows that Joseph Lysaght Pennefather and his family were living at Sandyford House in Dundrum, South Dublin.


Joseph Lysaght Pennefather died in 1919, leaving issue:
  •     Joseph Lysaght Pennefather, born 25th May 1870 in Belfast. (An earlier child of the same name had been born there on 15th May 1868 but his death was registered in Belfast in 1868.)  Joseph Lysaght Pennefather Junior later worked as a commercial clerk - as mentioned above, in 1901 he was visiting a Frances Derham at Lower Exchange Street along with his maternal aunt, Susan Dunne.  I can find no further trace of the younger Joseph Lysaght Pennefather following the 1901 census.  
  •     George Edward Benjamin Pennefather (born 29th March 1873 in Belfast), photgrapher,  married Kate Helen, the daughter of the artist Joseph Elwood Potts and Caroline Amelia Potts, in All Saint's, Dublin, on 20th August 1902.  The witnesses were Alfred Huband and Maggie G. L. Potts.  Kate Potts, the bride, had been baptised in Kentish town, Camden, London, on 16th June 1878;  her father, Joseph Elwood Potts, was a draughtsman who would later work in stained glass, as had his own father, James Potts, before him. After the death of Joseph Elwood Potts, his widow, Caroline Amelia Potts, moved her family to Dublin, along with her elderly father-in-law, James Potts.  George Pennefather appeared on the 1901 Census visiting friends, the Wills, in Belfast - he gave his profession as an artist.    Following their marriage in 1902, George Pennefather and Kate Helen Potts had Percy William Pennefather on 8th November 1903 in Belfast.  George Edward B. Pennefather died of diabetes in Belfast at 49 Palestine Street on 28th December 1904 and was buried in Plot A1-680 in the City Cemetery, and his widow married an Englishman, John Edwin Chapman, in Dublin in 1908.  John Edwin Chapman had been born in Buckinghamshire in 1882 to the tailor, Valentine J. Chapman and to Clara Clark. He moved to Dublin where he worked in the Registry of Deeds on Henrietta Street - oddly, there was an earlier John Edward Chapman working there in the 1850s and 1860s, and I wonder was this a relative of John Edwin Chapman.  John Edwin Chapman and Kate Helen Potts Pennefather had a son, Frederick Elwood Chapman in Dublin in 1910.  The son of George Pennefather and Kate Helen Potts, Percy William Pennefather, married, in 1931, Flora the daughter of Thomas McIllwaine of Dublin and the couple had a daughter, Dorothy Pennefather, born 11th February 1932.  In 1934, the passenger list of the 'SS Almanzora', sailing from Brazil to Southhampton, recorded the family - Percy William Pennefather, aged 30, was an engineer;  his wife, Flora, was 28, and their daughter, Dorothy, was 2.  The family had been living in Buenos Aires, Argentina, but had a Dublin address at 146 Richmond Rd., Drumcondra.    Later, in 1941, at the height of World War II,  the passenger lists of the 'Andalucia Star' once again recorded Percy William returning to the UK from Buenos Aires.  His proposed address was given as River Plate House in London;  this same address was used by most of the other passengers aboard the ship.  River Plate House was the London headquarters of the Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway Co. Ltd., so perhaps Percy William Pennefather was working for this company in Argentina as an engineer.  The 'Andalucia Star' was one of several first class passenger liners owned by The Blue Star Line, and had been commandeered by the British government  during the war to carry much needed food and supplies to Britain.
  •     Joseph Pennefather and Helen Dunne also had a daughter, Laura Kathleen Pennefather (born Belfast 10th December 1875) who, on 7th December 1898 in Knockbreda Church, Co. Down,  married William Hugh McGill, the eldest son of George Millan McGill of Dublin ('Belfast Newsletter', 8th December 1898); the couple had three sons - Lionel George McGill was born in South Dublin in early 1900,  William Lysaght Pennefather McGill was born in South Dublin in early 1903,  Norman Lysaght Pennefather McGill was born in South Dublin in 1910. 
Joseph and Eleanor Pennefather can be seen on the 1911 Census at 31 Balally, Dundrum, Dublin. He was a clerk of works in the building trade.
Their daughter, Laura Kathleen, and her husband, William H.McGill, are living with them along with the McGills' three children - Lionel G McGill, aged 11, William Lysaght Pennefather McGill, aged 8, and Norman Lysaght Pennefather McGill born 1910 - and a boarder who was a relation of the McGills. William and the boarder, Walter J. McGill (1869 - 1937), were engravers.
From the Street Directories of 1900:  William H. McGill, memorial brass and general engraver, 20 Essex Quay.  He was still working at this address in 1913.  William Hugh McGill died in South Dublin/North Wicklow in 1948.

William Hugh McGill, who married Laura Kathleen Pennefather, in 1898, had been born at 13 Wexford Street, Dublin, on 28th October 1864, to the brass founder, George Millan Frederick McGill and to Mary Jenkins.   George McGill of 17 Constitution Hill, brassfounder, and Mary Jenkins had married in St. Michan's on 2nd January 1864, and also had a daughter, Constance Mary McGill who had been born in Wexford Street on 10th March 1866.
The brass founder, George McGill, had been born on 7th April 1859 in Inchicore, Dublin, to James and Elizabeth McGill.  James McGill was also a brass founder. James and Elizabeth McGill had other children in Inchicore - Ellen McGill, born at 4 South Terrace, Inchicore, on 23rd June 1860;  Albert Edward McGill born there on 8th November 1861;  Thomas McGill born there on 6th March 1863.

The McGills' son, William Lysaght Pennefather McGill, married Mary Noble of Fraserburgh, Scotland, later in Buenos Aires, Argentina - he worked on the railways (as did William's cousin, Percy William Pennefather)  and she was a teacher.  The passenger list of the 'Asturias', which was sailing from Buenos Aires to the UK in 1932 showed up this couple - William Lysaght McGill was an engineer with an address at 'Ard Garth' in Lucan, Dublin, while Mary Anne Taylor Noble was a 25-yr-old teacher who hailed from 54 Cross Street, Frazerburgh, Scotland.  They hadn't yet married.
Later, in 1948, William Lysaght McGill sailed from Buenos Aires to the UK aboard the 'Andes'.  This time his profession was noted as an engraver like his father;  he lived at 'Wakefield', Ulster Terrace, Stillorgan Park, Dublin.

5) George Pennefather, who was named for his maternal grandfather, George White, was born in 1836 in Crumlin and died of cholera in 1849.

6) Maria Pennefather, who married a chartered engineer, William Bonis (1st July 1830 -  9th January 1874), the son of a farmer, Daniel Bonis who was living in Canada when his son married Maria Pennefather in the Parish Church of Clonturk in Drumcondra on 27th July 1859.   William Bonis' address was the Valuation Office, No.6 Ely Place, where he worked as a clerk, while Maria was living at home with her parents, Edward and Eliza Pennefather, at 15 Fairview Avenue.  The witnesses were J.A. Sommerville and Maria's brother, John Pennefather.   The newspapers noted William Bonis as being of the General Valuation Office.  The bride was noted in the papers of the day as the only surviving daughter of Edward Pennefather of Fairview, Clontarf, which means that Edward Pennefather and Eliza White had had other, unidentified daughters.

'The Phoenix' newspaper (of Arizona?) of 27th August 1859 announced the marriage of Maria Pennefather and WIlliam Bonis - this means there were relations to be informed in the US.

William Bonis applied to join the Civil Service in 1871, and, on 13th October 1871, declared, as proof of his age, the he had been born on 1st July 1830, and went on to state: 'I, William Bonis, of Alexis Lodge, Dalkey in the County of Dublin, Clerk in the office of the General Valuation of Ireland, No 6, Ely Place, Dublin...I do not remember having heard in what church in the neighbourhood of my birthplace I was christened, or whether my baptism took place privately in my father's house or in church...that my family left Ireland for Canada more than 20 years since, and that I am widely separated from all the other members of my family, but that as well as I can remember having heard, I was born in Cloonrallagh in the county of Longford on the 1st of July 1830, and was therefore 41 years of age on my last birthday, 1st July 1871.'

William Bonis (named in the Freemens' archive as William Borris), a gentleman of 15 Fairview Avenue, was admitted to the Dublin Freemen on 4th December 1859 by virtue of his marriage to the daughter of Edward Pennefather who had been previously admitted in Midsummer 1810.  15 Fairview Avenue was his wife's family's address.

William Bonis CE, appeared on the Dublin Street Directories of 1868 and 1870, living at Alexis Lodge, Convent Road,  in Dalkey, South Dublin.   Maria was present when her mother, Elizabeth Pennefather, died on 1st January 1864 at the family home in Fairview.

William Bonis attended the annual meeting of the Masonic Female Orphan School in the Exhibition Palace in Dublin in May 1874.

William Bonis died 9th January 1874 at Alexis Lodge, Dalkey. Administration was granted to a James Finlay of 10 Richmond Avenue, who was the Treasurer of the Provident Civil Servants Society for Ireland and, as such, had interest.  This according to William Bonis's will of 1874.

The Bonis Family of Cloonrallagh, Co. Longford:
As stated in 1871 when he joined the Civil Service, William Bonis, son of Daniel Bonis, had been born in Cloonrallagh, Co. Longford on 1st July 1830.  His family had emigrated to Canada in the 1850s and they had seemingly lost contact with each other.

Cloonrallagh is a townland in the parish of Templemichael immediately north of Longford town. In 1826, a David Bones (sic) was paying tithes on land here.  There are a few surviving baptism records for a Bonis family of Templemichael but it is unknown if these are related to Daniel and his son William of Cloonrallagh - on 23rd October 1796 a Mary Bones was baptised in Templemichael by her father Henry Bones.  Henry Bones and his wife Catherine Reilly baptised George Bones here in March 1798, while a George Bones and Margaret Cane baptised their son George on 18th April 1797.

Daniel Bonis, the possible Longford-born father of William Bonis of Dalkey, died in Canada aged 82 on 20th July 1870, the informant being his son Robert Bonis.  Daniel Bonis was Church of England, ie, Protestant, and was a land steward at Huron, Usborne, Ontario. He was buried in the Bonis family plot in Elimville Cemetery in Usborne.
Daniel Bonis had married a Mary Thompson (1798 - 1859) who was also buried in the Elimville Cemetery.

Daniel's Irish-born son, Robert Bonis (1825 - 29th February 1896), married Mary Wilson (1832 - 1911) and settled as a farmer in Blanshard, Perth South, Ontario.  Mary Wilson had been born on 14th August 1831 in Co. Longford to William Wilson and Isabella Kennedy and she died in Blanshard on 26th June 1911.
Robert Bonis and Mary Wilson had children in Blanshard - Mary, Harry a schoolmaster/principal who died aged 93 on 13th November 1953 and who had married Elizabeth Elizabeth Villiers Raynes, Margaret, Laura, Isabella, David, Annie, John, Eliza (born 9th December 1870) and Sarah (born 30th January 1873).  The family appeared on the 1861 Canadian Census;  immediately next door to them was the Irish-born Isabella Bonis and her Ontario-born children, Isabella, Minnie, Fannie and Robert.

This Isabella Bonis was the wife of another of Daniel Bonis's sons, George Bonis (1828 - 4th June 1877).  Isabella had been born in Longford also to William Wilson and Isabella Kennedy - two of the Wilson sisters had therefore married two of the Bonis brothers.  She had married George Bonis of Kippel, Ontario, son of Daniel Bonis and Mary Thompson, on 1st March 1870 in the residence of Robert Bonis in Usborne.
George Bonis and Isabella Wilson had Isabella born in Grey on 2nd April 1871 (she would marry George Crozier in Blanshard on 7th March 1922), Mary born 15th January 1873, Robert born 20th March 1875 (he would marry Eliza Clements on 14th July 1923) and William Bonis (born Perth 3rd December 1876 - 27th January 1877...cause of death: diphtheria).

4 comments:

  1. Hi Alison...tried to email you regarding recent discovery of my Penefather ancestor but the email was bounced back.. Can you let me know how best to contact you? Thanks Annemarie Murdoch

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Annemarie,

    My email is rosygirl41@hotmail.com

    Is that the email you used?
    Alison

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ahh I read the l as an extra 1! I will send again. I have some more information since my last message so will re do my email. Thanks so much for getting back to me. Annemarie

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  4. I'm not sure where this Thomas Pennefather fits in? Any ideas?
    https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Hunt-15615

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