John O'Brien
John O'Brien was born on 17 June 1877 at Fair Green in Callan, County Kilkenny, Ireland, the son of John Brien, a labourer, and his wife Ellen, formerly Murphy. Callan is a small market town in the south of Ireland, about ten miles south west of the city of Kilkenny. His father registered the birth twelve days later and signed with his mark. John gave this date and Callan as his birthplace when he declared his intention to become an American citizen in 1926, and he is the only John Brien registered as born in the Callan district that year. His petition of 1931 gives 18 June.
He went to America about 1904. In June 1905 he was working as a servant in the town of Mount Pleasant, Westchester County, New York, about thirty miles north of New York City. The state census lists him, 29, born in Ireland, one year in the country, in the household of Luther G. Billings, 62, with Laura B. Billings, 59, and their son Luther G. Jr., 27, a lawyer. Two other servants lived in the house. One was Emily, 30, a Swiss woman who had been in America twelve years.
John and Emily married on 5 May 1906 at Pleasantville, the village inside the town of Mount Pleasant. The State of New York recorded the marriage as certificate 8626 of 1906, with the groom as John J. O'Brien and the bride as Emily Smith. Both were 31.
Within five years they were back in Callan. On census night, Sunday 2 April 1911, John and Emily were living at house 13 in Prologue, one of the streets of the town. John was 35 and Emily 36. Both were Roman Catholics and both could read and write. They had been married five years and had no children. John was a general labourer, and Emily was still working as a cook in domestic service. John filled in the household's form and signed it John O Brien.
Six months later they had moved to Green Street, Callan. There on 20 September 1911 Emily gave birth to a daughter, Margaret, their only known child. Emily registered the birth on 20 October, and the registrar entered John as a labourer of Green Street.
The family stayed in Callan for thirteen years. On 23 August 1924 John, Emily and Margaret sailed together from Cobh, the port the British had called Queenstown, on the Samaria, and they landed at Boston on 30 August. On the ship's list John is a labourer of 48, married, with his last home in Callan and his destination New York City. As his nearest relative in Ireland he named his father, John O'Brien of Green View, Callan, still living. The second sheet of the list describes John as 5 feet 8, with a fresh complexion, fair hair and blue eyes, and records his earlier seven years in New York, from 1904 to 1911. The family was going to join John Smith of West Cornwall, Litchfield County, Connecticut. By November 1924 the family was in New Haven County, Connecticut.
On 11 February 1926 John declared his intention to become a citizen before the United States District Court at New Haven. He was 48, a labourer, living at 627 Congress Avenue in New Haven. The clerk described him as white, with a florid complexion, brown hair and blue eyes, 5 feet 7 and a half inches tall and 160 pounds, with no distinguishing marks. He renounced George V, King of Great Britain and Ireland, and signed John O'Brien.
The census of 12 April 1930 found him in the twelfth ward of New Haven, renting for $20 a month, with Emily and Margaret. He was 55 and a labourer in the building trade. He filed his petition for citizenship on 10 March 1931, living at 878 State Street, New Haven. Two neighbours swore they had known him since 1 April 1925: John F. Delaney, a labourer of 47 Edwards Street, and Henry F. Nugent, a salesman of 83 Gibbs Street.
Naturalized that year, John took his wife and daughter back to Ireland in the summer of 1931. They sailed home from Cobh on 2 October 1931 on the President Roosevelt. The ship's list enters John, 54, as an American citizen naturalized by the District Court at New Haven.
In April 1940 Emily and Margaret were living in Philadelphia without him, and Emily was still entered as married. What became of John after 1931 is not known.
Sources
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Cite: Heirology, "John O'Brien (b. 1877)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/john-o-brien-1876-0ac97b.