Fitzhenry family from County Mayo

After the publication of my article on the Ancestry blog, I was dead chuffed to get an email from Peter Fitzhenry who lives in Somerset, but whose family came originally from County Mayo via Wigan and Staffordshire. 

I already had Peter's family in the database as family group number 73, and was delighted when he then volunteered to participate in the Fitzhenry/Fitzharris DNA study.*

Although we haven't positively identified the family back in Ireland, we know that they came from "County Mayho" from their entry in the 1881 census when James Fitzhenry (aged 33, a coalminer) and his wife Bridget (aged 32) were living at 9 Walsh's Yard, Scholes Street, Wigan. 
They had 7 children that we know of Martin (born 1870) Bridget  (1873), James (1875), Mary Ellen (1876), Edward (1878), Thomas (1880) and Joseph (1882).
There may also be an eighth child, a daughter called May. In the 1881 census she is listed as May Kenny, daughter, aged 19, married, cotton operative. However May does not appear with James and Bridget in the 1871 census, and May's age in 1881 would mean that Bridget was only 13 when May was born. I suspect May was a boarder and the census enumerator mistook the word "boarder" for "daughter".

Peter would be delighted to hear from anyone descended from this family, and you can send him an email through the Blog.

* Peter's is the third DNA test we have done over this winter. We would also like to welcome Jim Fitzharris from County Carlow (our first Fitzharris man to test!) and another Peter Fitzhenry from Australia, who is a descendent of Lesley Champion's Fitzhenry family. We welcome all of them, and are looking forward to the results over the next couple of months.

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