THE McCORKELL FAMILY AND ITS AFFILIATES

By Jim McCorkell - jim.mccorkell@@shaw.ca

Forward to the 2000 Edition

This is the complete text of the original document. It has been edited for spelling and typographic errors only and converted to a modern computer accessible file. No information has been added, deleted or changed. You are free to use this document or parts of it but please maintain the Forward and Preface. For more information contact jim.mccorkell@@shaw.ca"

Table of Contents

Part I The McCorkell Line Page 2
The Original McCorkell Family
Joseph McCorkell Emerges " 8
McCorkell Exodus " 11
Sarah O'Donnell " 11
May O'Leary " 13
Peter McCorkell " 15
Vincent McCorkell " 17
Ignatius McCorkell " 21
Philomena McLaughlin " 25
Rosella Gettings " 28
Edmund McCorkell " 30

Part II The O'Donnell Line " 34

Part III The Mangan Line " 44

THE McCORKELL FAMILY AND ITS AFFILIATES

Preface

The story I began to tell was the origin and growth of the McCorkell family to which I belong but after proceeding on this idea for several generations the story seemed to take itself out of my hands and became the story of Ellen Jordan whose towering figure began at this point to dominate our history and give it unity. Deploying like a commander-in-chief her younger sisters at strategic points across the continent, she fortified her home front by the marriage of her eldest daughter, Mary to Joseph McCorkell thereby drawing my own branch of the McCorkell family into what can be described as a giant merger.

All this sounds mysterious and militaristic but it will become clearer as the story develops. The date of that important marriage was February 13, 1877. From that moment the story is a different one. But its widened scope is due to addition and not to subtraction. Accordingly, I shall proceed as I first intended giving the McCorkell background, and then taking notice of its enrichment by its confluence with the Jordan family, carrying all the main lines forward successively, beginning with the McCorkell line.

In writing about a many-branched family with its roots in the pioneer period and without prehistory in Ireland or elsewhere, the writer has to depend largely upon memory, his own and those of senior citizens who have survived. It is true that there are some documents; baptismal and marriage records and cemetery burials, but these are not complete nor well organized, nor is the writing easy to read when it is found. There were, of course, no civic registrations of births, marriages and deaths, as we have today.

This dependence upon memory has largely determined the style of the writing. It is a story of people and events from the point of view of the writer. It includes what he knows and is interested in. It is not necessarily the point of view of every reader, nor within the scope of his interests. On the other hand the reader will escape the dullness that is inevitable in a telephone directory style, which is little more than a sequence of names. In short the writer aims at investing the story with a human interest, though he does not claim to have entirely succeeded.

I gladly acknowledge assistance from others. Many a telephone call has cleared up a relationship or made a date precise. My sister, Rosella (Mrs. Gettings), as one of the eldest in my immediate family, naturally knew my paternal grandfather quite well, and was able to penetrate his habitual reticence, to the meager extent revealed here. More significantly an investigation into the origin of the Heenan family on the occasion of a family marriage at Toronto in 1966, solved some mysteries, even if it created others, all investigations are apt to do. Still more substantial help from genuine research studies has been offered by Mart in Duffy of Qualicum Beach, Vancouver Island, B.C., and by Mrs. John J. Dalton of Toronto. Formerly with the C.P.R. communications department at Winnipeg, but now in retirement, Martin Duffy has told in a circular letter a fascinating story of how his interest in the subject was aroused, and how his new, exciting and fantastic discoveries, despite the occasional blind alley or mare's nest, led him to a fuller knowledge of his own identity as one related by affinity, at least, with the Jordan: family.

Oddly enough his findings have been largely in the West and Southwest where we have a larger membership that one could suspect. This has made possible regular, if not annual meetings of the "clan" membership near Oakland, Calif. Still more oddly I think is the fact that the gaps in Martin's findings have been in central Canada, otherwise Brechin, where it all started. For Martin the longest way round was the shortest way home. Frances Dalton on the other hand, has left no gaps in her competent study of the entire Mangan chapter in our history. As a daughter of Patrick Mangan, she began with a good knowledge of her subject, and has significantly increased it.

Part I - The McCorkell Line

(a) The original McCorkell family

Patrick Joseph McCorkell, my grandfather, was born in 1822 in County Donegal, not too far from Downpatrick which though in the neighboring County Down is a kind of a metropolis for the area. Patrick's own father was Augustine McCorkell, and his mother was Mary McGill. For his wife he chose Sarah Doherty, and thus we see beginning to appear the family names used by the McCorkell clan in the first two generations on this side of the Atlantic. Patrick McCorkell's first son was naturally called Augustine. He was born in Ireland, but whilst he was still a mere child his parents migrated to Canada, landing at the port of St. John, New Brunswick. The year was 1847 or 1848. It seems that the child Augustine was brought to Canada by his aunt the following year to rejoin his parents.

The McCorkells made their home in St. John for a few years. The breadwinner of the family worked with a construction company and on one occasion described his work as "carrying the hod". Another child, Edward, was born, and subsequently Patrick, feeling the urge to penetrate more deeply into the heart of the country took his family to Toronto and settled them in a house on Richmond Street. Edward, the second child, died while still quite young but others were born in due course. These were James, Catherine, Joseph (my father), John, and Sarah who died young.

The McCorkells were welcomed in Toronto by the Dohertys, their in-laws, one of whom had come there before 1837, doubtless my grand uncle John Doherty. In his wife's prayer book there is recorded under date Nov. 20, 1837 his marriage with Margaret Esmonde (note the name Esmonde) and a family of 12 is listed. The family came to be well established in so-called Doherty Corners, but this was perhaps later.

My own acquaintance with the Dohertys began when I came to Toronto as a student in 1907. At that time, Tom Doherty, a first cousin of my father, lived with his wife, Jane at 19 Henry Street. They had no children. Tom died soon after that date, and at his funeral Martha Doherty appeared. She had been living with her sister, Mrs. Dickson, in Clyde, N.Y. Two children of the Dicksons, Bernadette and Esmonde, came to my ordination in 1916, and I returned their visit a year later. This contact I have kept up ever since with Bernadette, who is living still in retirement at Elmira, N.Y. The Dicksons in Clyde told me that another Doherty sister called Sarah lived in Minneapolis. When I visited my brother Vince in the Twin Cities some years later I went to see Sarah, who was then Mrs. McFeely. She told me that a nephew of hers lived at Vancouver, B.C. and I thereupon recollected that I had met a son of that nephew at Upper Canada College and his name was Cameron McFeely.

There was a third sister in the Doherty household. She was Rose, and she took for her husband, Tom Waldron of Orillia. They had 2 children, Vincent a railroad engineer who died young, and Kathleen who later went with her parents to Regina, where she met and married Dominique Melanson. I knew the Melansons later at Vancouver where they are still living. Their only child is Gloria who spent a year in graduate study in Toronto where she impressed her relatives with her culture and charm. On returning to Vancouver she became the wife of Michael McDonough, a helicopter pilot, and has become the mother of 4 wonderful children. Who among us can doubt that Gloria McDonough recapitulates in a striking way the entire Doherty strain in our many-branched family tree.

I am certain that my father was born in Toronto in 1854. He was almost certainly baptized by one of the Basilian Fathers (to whom I myself belong) who came there in 1852 to look after the spiritual needs of the Irish immigrants and also to open a college for boys, later to be called St. Michael's College. There is little doubt that Fathers Soulerin, Vincent, and Moloney, all Basilians, knew the McCorkell family, and instructed the boys, particularly the older ones in Christian doctrine.

Just when the McCorkells moved to Brechin, 80 miles north of Toronto, cannot now be determined. My sister Rosella once heard my grandfather say that he came to Brechin on the same day as Andy Cox.

That does not help us much. Peter Cox, Andy's son, was in the dark about the precise date. It is probable that my grandfather bought the farm (it was owned briefly by an earlier settler) before bringing the family from Toronto. Described in the official bill of sale as lot 10, concession 7 (north half) it was 100 acres in area but to it was added another wood lot, mainly swamp, located within concession 8 near Mud Lake. This had special value as a source of wood for winter, and for lumber and timber to erect the various buildings proper to a farm.

The Township was called Mara. Why? The wheels in a government official's head are unpredictable in their turnings, and inexplicable in their decisions. It has been stated in Sacred Scripture, Exodus XV-23, that the waters of Mara were bitter, and this may be the reason why the land around and north of Brechin has been saddled with the name Mara. There is plenty of evidence that there was an oversupply of water there because Lake Simcoe was higher than it is now. Most farmers had to drain their land and keep the drains in good order. In that sense the waters of the Brechin area were bitter. Roads were quite primitive of course. It is an interesting example of the irony of history that the McCorkell farm has survived the "bitterness" of its origin. It is now on the modern Trans Canada highway.

There were 2 distinct groups of Irish settlers in the Township of Mara at that time. One was called the Connaught settlement, presumably from the area in Ireland where the settlers originated; the other was called the Dungannon settlement for the same reason. At first both settlements were in the one single parish of Uptergrove (St. Columbkille's Church -Irish certainly). Later when Brechin was raised from the dignity of a mission and became a parish in its own right, the area called the Connaught settlement was squarely in the middle of it. It is, of course, a curious fact that the church then built for the new parish was dedicated to St. Andrew, who in the popular mind is associated with Scotland. This confusion of identities is due to the fact that the most energetic citizen, the pusher, Foley by name, in the whole movement, though an Irishman himself, had a wife who came from Brechin in Scotland. It was therefore her place of ethnic origin that are immortalized in the name of the village and the title of the church. It is, in short, an example of Irish chivalry. Foley had pushed successfully for a separate school in Brechin the '80's be it remembered) and put up $10,000 of his own money as an endorsement. He earned the right to give the village its name...

(b) Joseph McCorkell emerges

Up to this point my grandfather, Pat McCorkell, has been in the foreground. His migration, the names of his sons and daughters and of his first wife have been listed, and touched on rather briefly. Only one of them, John, the youngest son is given a fuller treatment. The reason is that he has been more closely connected with my immediate family than any other who is not a member of it.

My own father, Joseph McCorkell, merely mentioned before, now emerges as the leading character, and becomes like Abraham of old the father of sons and daughters who will greatly enlarge the family tree in their turn. This section (b) will be much longer than section (a) and perhaps more exciting.

Now to proceed: Patrick McCorkell, the founder of the family in Canada, died in June 1904. The wife whom he brought from Ireland, Sarah Doherty, had died some years before, and he had then married Mrs. John Mayock, a widow in the settlement, installing her in a second small house on the farm a short distance from the log mansion which was the original home of the family. I remember very well this second Mrs. Patrick McCorkell, whom I called Grandma, though I knew nothing of the complicated relationships in our family. Evidently she loved Joseph and John, her stepsons. I often heard her speak in praise of the way Joe and Jack got along together as they grew from boyhood to early manhood, working with their father, until they set up homes of their own. "Never a harsh word between them" she would assure me. She was, of course, typically Irish of that period, believing in ghosts and other supernatural signs. The tragic accidental death of a farmer a mile away from our home provided Grandma with the opportunity to descend upon me with her certainties about ghosts in the form of lights flitting across the fields for a whole week previous to the accident. Obviously they were fireflies, but how was I to know. I began to fear the dark. But there was plenty of time in daylight for me to visit grandma and sample her cakes and other goodies, even at the risk of another ghost story.

I can also say confidently that she had the traditional Irish piety, conspicuously devoted to the beads (as Granddad also was) and to other vocal prayers, vocalized to the level of an Irish whisper. She wanted to be anointed every time she felt ill, which came to be annoyingly often. One Sunday on the return from Mass, the family vehicle, which was described as the double buggy, was met on the road by Dr. Gilpin, driving back from a sick call. Pausing to exchange greetings, the doctor said to Grandad "How's the old woman?" To which Grandad returned: "Some times she is asking for the priest, and sometimes for the doctor, and between the two of you I do not know what to make of her."

Finally, there is another memorable circumstance of her life. She had a niece, Mary Kirby, and a nephew, John Kirby, recent Irish immigrants. For a time they made their home with their aunt, especially John, who in fact never quite separated himself from the McCorkell family to which he was bound by ties of affinity. He was truly quite a character in his own right. He worked with several farmers, and especially with my uncle John McCorkell for several years, and for a longer stretch with my father. Eventually he was seized by the wanderlust and went to Alberta. What money he had saved up, he loaned and lost, and finally he returned to Brechin where his friends set him up in a small tobacco store. He died in 1948.

As indicated above, Patrick McCorkell, the founder of the family in Canada died in 1904. His retirement to a new house fifteen years earlier had cleared the way for my father to marry, and assume the direction of the farm. But the expenses he soon had to face were considerable. The drainage of the farm was obsolete, the livestock had to be improved and increased, a substantial rent had to be paid to his father for the farm, and to all this there was added the expenses of a growing family. (There were six children born in eleven years.) So the old log house had to serve for another twenty years.

As the turn of the century approached my father nevertheless decided to go modern. He planned and built a new house, brick of course, and large too, with gothics and other gimmicks like some of the more affluent neighbors had. Sarah, Rosella, and May, the three eldest were growing up, and longing for more contact with life. Even Peter and Vincent were no longer mere kids. They had ideas and along with older sisters were keen about the new house. Discussions in the family circle about the design were spirited, if not always profitable. The intriguing idea of a spare room (unthinkable until now) especially caught the fancy of the girls. Certainly there was divergence of opinion. Once there was a heated controversy where the spare room ought to be located, the discussion took place in grandad's house nearby, where a wider freedom of speech was tolerated. But at last the old grandfather's patience was exhausted. "Spare rooms" said he, "yes spare rooms and rare rooms, and rooms you will never spare". That was the end of the planning for that day.

The new house was completed in 1897. With the idea of getting a preview I stole into the house when the painters were at lunch, and finding open cans of paint and brushes lying about I made colorful use of them, and might even have finished the job, had not the banging of a storm door (it was November) sounded the alarm. Every McCorkell within earshot, including my irate father converged upon me, and I was soundly spanked. Little consideration was given to the fact that I was only 6 years old. I was made painfully aware of the generation gap.

The house was opened just before Christmas 1897. I remember being worried about Santa Claus being misled, and so passing us up for the year. Christmas had a special glow about it and it did not cease with Xmas. The spaciousness of the new house introduced an era of gaiety and camaraderie. Several house-warming dances were arranged. This was a field day for the three girls, who were becoming of marriageable age. Mother had taught them the arts of housekeeping and baking, and as time went on their reputation spread. As I remember the specialty of Rosella and May was pie making; apple, raisin and raspberry. Pete and Vince used to steal pies at intervals from the pantry, and purchase my silence by allowing me a piece, ridiculously small. Once Vince pilfered a raisin pie, hot from the oven, and put it in the woodpile to cool whilst he went for a neighbor, Pat McCann, to give him a treat. In the meantime the pie was missed and a search was made. It was discovered, and so when the two lads got there the woodpile was bare, and as in the Mother Hubbard story, the poor lads got none. I was innocent enough to be the cat's-paw of Vince who master minded a variety of escapades. Once I was silly enough to go to my grandma's house (quite near) to get a cup of sugar for Vince, (he even brought me the cup). Rosella wanted the sugar to bake pies, he said. I was however so poor an actor that Grandad got suspicious, and following me out, drove me back to our own house at the point of his walking stick, whilst Vince looked on from a safe distance.

The thrill of the new house wore off all too soon, and farm life resumed its drabness, at least for my older brothers. For me however there were interesting things to learn about the farm.

There was also the novelty of going to Mass on Sunday in the new double-buggy. No lesser vehicle could carry all of us, or rather all but one, who would stay at home to keep an eye on things. I some times did that, but preferred to get to Brechin, and to Mass, out of sheer curiosity, I am sure, or a hunger for experience. Sometimes the organ would play and that was something. But the biggest thrill I got up to my tenth birthday was the first Masses of the two Roach brothers (Tom and William) who were ordained together in St. Basil's, Toronto, (they were of course, Basilians): this thrilling experience was sprung (on me at least) without warning. It was a quick glimpse into a world, entirely different, one I had never dreamed of, and it started me thinking and dreaming.

My Mother used to tell me about a former Brechin boy, Quigley by name, who went to Chicago and became a priest. Since the boy's family were far from wealthy, there must have been a divine intervention. The finger of God was there. I am sure that Mother used to pray that something like that would happen to me. Years afterwards at Chicago, when I was in graduate studies there, I went to see Father Quigley. He was able to identify me when I gave him my Mother's name. He was a family connection of some sort. Anyhow he was the first vocation to the priesthood from Brechin parish. There were to be others in due course.

(c) The McCorkell Exodus

It is the experience of life that families grow up and separate, each to begin over again the human (and divine) work of founding new families. The McCorkell exodus began early. The big year was 1900. Sarah, the eldest was married in August, May five months later, and at some date in between when the plowing was done, Peter went to earn some money felling trees and logging in a lumber camp in Northern Ontario. Three departures in five months:

Leaving for the present the rest of the family at the old homestead, brick house and all, on the 8th concession line, with the clock of time standing still, let us follow each of the three McCorkells who went their separate ways in 1900. ...