A Coogan Family of County Monaghan
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As the Nineteenth Century dawned, our Coogan family lived in the Lake Muckno/Castleblayney area of County Monaghan. The Coogans and their close relatives seem to have lived on both sides of the Monaghan/Armagh border:
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COOGAN: County Monaghan, Clontibret Parish - Corlealackagh [proposed] County Monaghan, Muckno Parish - Lurganboy [proposed] MCCONVILLE: County Armagh, Creggan Parish - Crossmaglen [proposed] O'HARE: County Monaghan, Muckno Parish - Tullythisney [proposed] LYNCH: County Monaghan, Muckno Parish - Drumakill [confirmed] County Monaghan, Muckno Parish - Tullyrahan [confirmed] | |
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We have found indications that the surname for our family may have originally been Cooghan. Interestingly, other Cooghans found in early records of North America (i.e. Canada) originated in County Armagh.
EMIGRATION
There are several reasons why the Coogans and their relatives would have left Ireland, but the most obvious reason was the Famine of the mid 1840s. From records in Castleblayney: "The populace of the Muckno Parish was decimated by starvation and plague deaths during this time." It is no surprise, then, that our ancestors began their exodus in the late 1840s.
Upon arriving in the United States, our family resided in Kingston, Ulster, NY. This area was well known for its farmland - and later for its quarries. The Coogans began a hotel business that sustained them for nearly 20 years. Most of the later descendants entered the stonecutting trade, cutting stone for government buildings in Albany and for the Brooklyn Bridge.
DIASPORA
The Coogan family was finally completely divided by economic troubles in the early 1870s. They were forced to sell their hotel and other parts of the country began to sound more promising. Several of the Coogans moved to Iowa, where relatives had established successful farms. Still more moved to the New York City area. By 1930, only a very few Coogan descendants still resided in Kingston.
The only reason that the families did not completely lose touch with each other was because descendants of Owen Coogan (who had moved early to Montreal, QC, Canada - and later to Boston, MA) and descendants of Patrick Joseph Coogan (whose family moved to Brooklyn in the mid 1870s) remained close. For the next 80 years, there was constant interaction between Boston, Montreal, and Brooklyn.
Contact was finally lost in the 1950s, as older relatives passed away and details of relations to the Coogans in Boston & Brooklyn to the western Coogans of Iowa (and later, Washington State) faded. By the 1970s, no one in any of the six descendant families of this website knew members of the others.
INTERNET REUNION
With the internet (and a great deal of luck) we have reconnected living members of the Owen, Terrence Francis, Patrick Joseph and Michael Patrick lines. It has taken extensive research of Census, City Directory, and Vital Records. It was very difficult to make the final leap to draw the lines of this family tree - and we keep refining the data.
The Twin "Gene"?
After analysis of the Coogan family branches in this project, we have determined that there were several twin births in the documented lines. Additionally, we have verified that the lines are genetically connected (Y-DNA). So far, we have found multiple births as follows:
| Owen [Charles] 3 sets |
Terrence Francis 7 sets |
Patrick Joseph 1 set |
Hugh J. 0 sets |
James J. ? |
Michael Patrick 2 sets |
Interestingly, several other families that we have encountered from the Monaghan region have a larger than average incidence of twin births.
We welcome your ideas and suggestions. Keep visiting to follow the progress of our research!
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