Benburb St. 1940s : Family Tree Mission

Feeded · 23-02-2011 11:37pm #1

Hi all...i've exhausted familysearch.org and the rest. The census won't help me so im hoping that i might be able to get some help here. I'm not new to the research thing as i've been working on the other side of my family for the past few years and it's fierce exciting.

My gran, aged 83, who is just a legend, opened up to me last month and told me that her brother John and wife Sheila moved to Benburb St. in the 1940s. They had a little girl called Mary. He died soon after and my gran has never met his little girl, who's about 65 today.

He was in the Irish army (Permanent Defence Force) from 1937 to 1944.
He was discharged due to illness before he passed away 1945/6.

To put it bluntly, i'd like for my gran's to meet her before my she passes away. I'd hate to find out later that i could have found info. on boards.ie.............his surname was O'Brien and his wife Sheila remarried after his death....that's the trickiest part as i don't know if she reverted to her maiden name (Kearney) or progressed with O'Brien.

Thanks for reading this.

Feeded

pinkypinky · 24-02-2011 10:59am

OK, we need more information before we can help you.
This niece is very likely still alive but she will probably be married.

What's the niece's birth name? She may have assumed her stepfather's name.
I have never come across a widow reverting to her maiden name when re-marrying but I have seen both surnames on the second marriage cert (eg: Anne Jane O'Brien (nee Murphy) ). It's really only with divorce that you get women reverting, and even then, that's only a very modern concept. So I think you can be pretty sure she stayed Sheila O'Brien.

Depending on how quickly she remarried, you should be able to find the second marriage on familysearch. Even though you don't know the husband's name, you can still make a list of Sheila O'Brien marriages:

Name: Sheila O'Brien
Registration District: Dublin North
Event Type: MARRIAGES
Registration Quarter and Year: Apr - Jun 1952
Volume Number: 2
Page Number: 449

Name: Sheila O'Brien
Registration District: Dublin North
Event Type: MARRIAGES
Registration Quarter and Year: Oct - Dec 1950
Volume Number: 2
Page Number: 406

Name: Sheila O'Brien
Registration District: Dublin South
Event Type: MARRIAGES
Registration Quarter and Year: Oct - Dec 1953
Volume Number: 2
Page Number: 654

So these are the only 3 Sheila O'Brien marriages in Dublin between 1945 and 1958, which is as far as the index goes. So just order all 3. Even though Benburb St is on the northside, you cannot discount the southside one: she may well have moved after her second marriage.

Now finding the niece is going to be the harder part - as I said, likely alive and married so a different unknown name. You want to check newspaper archives for marriage announcements: Irish Times is online for a small subscription. http://www.irishnewsarchive.com/ will give you the Indo and others. That's a long shot. I presume you have googled her birthname to see what comes up and exhausted the facebook options, etc.

Despite what I've said above, the easiest way to find her is an ad in the paper or a letter to the Irish Times (if they'll publish it).

Best of luck!

Benburb St. 1940s : Family Tree Mission

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