William Kennedy & Mary Bridgen

William Kennedy, father to Robert (my great x 2 grandfather) and another possible 16 children is still an enigma to me. I’ve begun to trace his presence in Canadian censuses and do know that he came to Canada from Ireland, but no other specifics. Here I am relying on the possibility that other family members who have descended from William’s line might have some stories, photographs or information on the man.

His wife, Mary (Bridgen) Kennedy, born July 26, 1820 in Ontario, has been photographed and through her weathered face it is maybe a little easier to imagine who she was (see photograph below). Thankfully my grandmother kept many photographs which included her grandparents and in this case, great-grandmother too. I also have been able to locate her death records which provide more information, and death records of one of her children have given me her maiden name.

My search into the Kennedy family began with a particular photograph that my mother and I found in my grandmother Helen (Leavoy) Boomer‘s possessions. This photograph shows the very recognizable faces of Robert Kennedy and his first wife Sophia McDonnell. Alongside this couple are members of the Kennedy family: siblings and the matriarch, all carefully labelled by my great-grandmother Mary Bea (Kennedy) Leavoy (I’d like to call attention here to how Bea must have had a lot of forethought into how others in the future may want to know who the individuals depicted were…). Unfortunately I don’t know where the photograph was taken.

After posting this photograph on Ancestry.com, many people seemed to take interest in it, adding it to their trees, although I’ve had no comments on the aunts and uncle’s identities. Despite this, I’ve determined by cross-referencing censuses that this photograph was likely taken in the early 1900s and before 1911.

The people depicted are (from left to right, top to bottom): Tilly’s husband (as evidenced by another photograph found in my grandmother’s possessions), the woman beside him appears to be Mary (b. 1866) although I am only guessing based on age, “Aunt Tilly” is Matilda (b.1869), “aunt Sarah” is Sarah McKerrow (1861-1955), The youngest here appeas to be Ruth, again I am basing this guess on age (b.1874), “Mother” is Sophia (McDonnell) Kennedy, I am unsure who the child is, “Grandma Kennedy” is Mary Bridgen, and “Father” is Robert Kennedy.

After this photograph, identifying the Kennedy family in records became much easier: I had some other names to work with.

The first actual record that I’ve found of the Kennedy family is the Canadian census from 1871 (below). In Bedford, part of Addington district, the large family lives on a farm next to another Kennedy (who might have been a brother to William). Tichborne, in Bedford county is also the town given for Robert Kennedy‘s birthplace on marriage record and censuses when he is an adult, so I can be sure that this is indeed his family. One thing to note is the spelling of the name Kennedy: it looks as though it is a “y”, an “a” or a “u” at the end, and this is a trend that follows in other censuses with some family members going with the spelling “Kenneda”.

This record reveals that William Kennedy was 51 that year, making his birth year sometime around 1820 in Ireland. He was a methodist farmer, and with his wife had at least 13 children. Mary, his wife, is also of Irish descent. There is a discrepancy in the records of her place of birth: some documents give Ontario while others claim that she is also from Ireland. She was 2 years her husband’s junior, making her birth year about 1822. If the couple were married before the birth of their children, I can safely say that this was before 1849. The children named on this census, all born in Ontario, are as follows: Eliza Jane who is 22, William James is 20 and helps his father farm, Anne is 19, John is 17 and is also farming, Samuel is 15, Isaac is 14, David is 12, Sarah M is 10 and attends school, as does Robert who is 8, and Alonzo who is 7. The young ones are Mary who is 5, Matilda A. who is 2 and Albert O. who is only 2 months and was born in July. Those 3 children would have been cared for by mother and the elder sisters who were unmarried. Such a large family would have necessitated that the children all help out to run the home and farm.

The Kennedy neighbours on the adjacent farm are John (age 35) and his wife Catherine (37) who were recently married in September. Although William is 51 at this time, it is feasible that John is a much younger sibling in another very large family. The question here is whether or not William came to Canada as an adult or as a child with family members. Below are their farms that I’ve found side-by-side in 1880, just outside of Tichborne.

Incidentally, Tichborne itself is a very small village in Bedford. It had some importance in the late 1800s as it was a stop between Kingston and Pembroke for the K&P railway which supported the lumber and mining industry. This rail line was eventually usurped by the CPR and the last part of the line to close was between Tichborne and Pembroke.

Ten years later, in the census of 1881 (below), I have found the family on the same farm. Now William “Kenada” is 62 and Mary is 50. This is the last document that I have found where William is living. At this time the dynamics have changed somewhat: the family is now called Presbyterian, and there is now a boarder in the home: a man named John Sharpe who is a 51-year-old Irish-Canadian school teacher. He could have been a friend of William and Mary, and also may have helped to provide some support to the family. It is interesting to see the “N” next to the four youngest Kennedy children, which indicates that they are not attending school…they may have had private instruction at home. Three of these youngest children are new additions to the family, meaning that Mary was still having children in her 50s. Now there is Ruth Lora (7), Frederick (9) and Marcus Allin (5). The eldest children from the previous census: Eliza J., William jr., have left the family home, married and moved south of the border. I am unsure what happened to Anne (descendants, are you out there?). Samuel (25) has also left the home, although he can be found next door on his own farm with a young family: a wife, Harriett (20), and William James (3) and Mary Ann (1).

Beyond these two censuses, I have no other firm record of William Kennedy. In the 1891 census (below), Mary is now a widow. This means that William died sometime within the decade of 1881-1891, and I am on the hunt for his death record. After William’s death, Mary moved in with her son John on his farm and also lived with her daughter Mary (? this could be John’s wife?). Interestingly, this document contradicts others in that it claims that William Sr. and Mary’s parents were from Scotland. This may have been the bias of the enumerator, as they were now living in Glengarry county (a Scotch settlement).

The 1901 census (below) shows Mary continuing to live with her son John who is now 47, and his wife, Mary (41),  and family of 7 children. This census is more specific, giving birth dates for the individuals. On adjacent farms are some other family members who would have helped to look after Mary, including the previously mentioned John and Catherine Kennedy who are now older,  and 43-year-old son Isaac Kennedy (spelled “Asic” by the enumerator) and his family. I have also found Alonzo (35) and Samuel (44) living next door to one another with their families near by.

Mary has also been documented  in her death. Her medical papers show that she was visited by her doctor in York several times in the months before her death and that she eventually died of apoplexy on November 20, 1911. Curiously, her death record shows that she was born in Ireland and at the time of her death she was residing at 223 Ontario St. in Toronto. Her daughter Sarah McKerrow was living in Toronto at the time, which might reveal that she was supporting Mary in her final years. There are many missing pieces to this puzzle that I’d love to find answers to. If you have any knowledge as you read this, feel free to comment or send an email.

The list below of their children and descendants gives an approximation of their lives and families that followed. Note the repetition of names through the Kennedy line- there are many! I’ve compiled this information through census research and through records from descendants:

1. Eliza Jane (Kennedy) Hayes born 1 October, 1849, in Hinchinbrook, Ontario. On February 27, 1879, at age 27 she married a farmer named Robert Hayes (born 16 March, 1856). It appears that they may have moved south of the border to Buffalo and then Watertown, New York (I’ll need to verify this). If this is so, then she gave birth to 9 children before she died (October 1918): Marcus Allen Hayes (1876-1959), Ann Amelia Hayes (b. 1879), Arthur Sixsmith Hayes (1881-1953), William S. Hayes & Thomas Robert Hayes (b. 1884), Wellington Hayes (1886), Samuel John Hayes (b. 1888), Mary Elizabeth Hayes (b.1890), Matilda A. Hayes (1892-1918).

William James Kennedy and Emily Moore

2. William James Kennedy was born on 23 February, 1851 in Tichborne, Ontario. He moved to Wisconsin where he met and married a woman named Emily Jane Moore on the 24th of July 1871 in Montford, WI. They had a family of 13 children and their descendants in this line have done much research into their tree with photographs of many of their children. See my blog about this family.

3. Anne Kennedy was born in about 1852, in Tichborne, Frontenac, Ontario. I have yet to have located her after she left the home of her parents.

4. John Kennedy born 27 February 1854 in Ontario was a farmer in Bedford like his father. He married a woman named Mary Margaret Bertram (born April 10, 1859) and they had at least 7 children in Bedford, Ontario: Eliza Kennedy (March 6, 1883), Harriet Kennedy (21 March, 1884), Maud Kennedy (18 Sept, 1886), Alonzo Kennedy (Feb 1, 1889), William James Kennedy (17 June, 1890), James H. Kennedy (17 August, 1892), Mary A. Kennedy (1 July, 1895). They housed his mother Mary after his father passed away.

5. Samuel Kennedy born 25 October 1856, in Ontario, farmed in Bedford. His wife Harriet Hester died young, leaving him to care for their children before remarrying to Caroline Bertram. His children were: William James Kennedy (1877-1956), Mary Ann Kennedy (1879-1907), Sarah Jane “Jennie” Kennedy (29 July 1881), Isic Kennedy (15 Sept., 1883), Samuel Henry Kennedy (6 Dec., 1885), Albert Kennedy (29 Dec., 1886), Matilda Kennedy (7 Dec., 1888), Ethel Kennedy who died as an infant in 1892,  Edith Kennedy (1 March 1894).

Isaac and Anastasia Kennedy

6. Isaac Kennedy born 20 May 1857 in Tichborne, Ontario, continued to farm in Bedford. He married a woman named Anastasia Emily McPherson (born 31 May 1861) the same year that his brother Robert married his wife Sophia: 1883. Their marriage was witnessed by John McPherson and Mary Kennedy. The couple had 9 children that I know of:  Samuel J. Kennedy (9 July, 1884), Mary Ann (Kennedy) Thompson (1886-1911), Marguerite “Maggie” (Kennedy) Wallace (12 October 1887), Joseph Kennedy (9 October 1889), Mellanie Kennedy (16 June 1894), Sarah E. (Kennedy) Grover (2 April 1897-1979), Isaac O. Kennedy (5 May 1900), Bertha May Kennedy (14 Sept., 1902), Russel E. Kennedy (23 Feb., 1906). Isaac died in North Colchester, Essex County, Ontario on 10 April, 1932.

7. David Kennedy was born on the 27th of April, 1859 in Tichborne, Ontario. A marriage record shows that David married at a young age, because at age 24 he was already a widower and was marrying for a second time. The document also tells that David worked as a foreman on the railroad- this was likely the K&P rail line that went through Tichborne, mentioned above. On the 18th of January, 1883, his marriage to Sarah “Jane” Robinson (18) of Pembroke was witnessed by his sister Eliza Hayes and her husband in a Methodist Church in Bedford. The couple lived in Wawanosh, Huron, Ontario as evidenced by the 1891, 1901 and 1911 censuses. This is where they had their 11 children: Alexander Kennedy (1884), Peter Kennedy (1885), William Kennedy (1887), David Kennedy Jr. (1889), Duncan Kennedy (1894), John Kennedy (1896), Annie Kennedy (1898), Agnes Kennedy (1901), Mary Kennedy (1902), George Kennedy (1903), Jean Kennedy (1905).

Sarah Melissa (Kennedy) McKerrow

8. Sarah Melissa McKerrow was born on February 16, 1861, in Tichborne, Bedford county, Ontario. A marriage record shows that on August 25, 1882 she and a labourer named William McKerrow, 10 years her senior, married in a Methodist church in Bedford. The wedding was witnessed by her brothers John and Isaac. The couple started out in Renfrew, where they had 5 children: David McKerrow (1883-1920),  William T. McKerrow (1883), Mary McKerrow (1885), John McKerrow (1890- 1971) and Thane E. McKerrow (1897-1954). By 1911 the family had moved to Toronto west where Sarah is documented as a widow- living with a daughter, grand-daughter and 2 sons. In 1911, Sarah worked as a confectioner in a shop. She died on February 25, 1955 in York.

9. Robert Kennedy, my great x2 grandfather, was born in 1863, in the small township of Bedford, Ontario. He married Sophia McDonnell and had 6 children. After Sophia’s death, he remarried to Minnie Sargeant (Sophia’s cousin). See their page for details.

10. Mary Kennedy was born on August 25, 1865 in Bedford, Ontario. I had not traced her beyond her family home.

11. Alonzo Kennedy was born on 19 April, 1866, in Bedford, Ontario continued to farm. He married Annie Stinson (b. 23 May, 1867) on December 26, 1888 at the church of England in Hinchinbrook. In the years following they settled on a farm in Bedford and had 9 children: Robert Kennedy (18 Sept., 1889), William Kennedy (28 Oct., 1891), Sarah Kennedy (28 Dec.,  1892), Ida Kennedy (10 March 1895), Ella Kennedy (15 Nov.,  1896), Marshall Kennedy (28 Aug., 1898), Edna Kennedy (28 Aug., 1900), Edward Kennedy (3 June, 1904) and Floyd Kennedy (12 June, 1907). Alonzo died of heart disease at age 51 in his home on Sharbot Lake, May 20, 1924. His son William was the informant of his premature death.

Matilda Adeline Kennedy and family

12.  Matilda “Tilly” Adeline Kennedy was born on the 25th of February, 1868, in Bedford, Ontario is documented in photographs with her family, although I’ve had difficulty actually tracing her through other records. Some researchers have assumed through census records that she married another Kennedy, although I don’t think there are enough facts to verify this yet.

13. Albert Oscar Kennedy, appears to have been born in July of 1971, in Bedford, Ontario (according to census records). Some researchers place him in New Hampshire later in life, but again there are not enough facts at this point to verify.

14. Frederick Kennedy born 1872, in Bedford, Ontario has not yet been traced beyond his childhood in the family home.

15. Ruth Laura Kellar was born in 1874, in Tichborne, Ontario. Her descendants have claimed her marriage date to be 1891 when she was 18 years old, to a man named Simon Peter Kellar (1829-1932). I am currently looking for marriage records to verify the date and other life events. The couple did have at least one child: Nina Rose Kellar (1902-1967) and Ruth is claimed to have died on September, 1962. More research could be done on this family.

16. Marcus Allin Kennedy born 1876, in Bedford, Ontario is another child who needs further research.

Beyond these descriptions, I also have several photographs of Kennedy family members who I’ve been unable to name. I have also posted these on Ancestry.com, but have not been given any comments or leads on them. If you know or have an idea of who these people are, please comment or email me.