Tadgh "Tady" Coyne : Short Biography

My 2nd great grandfather, Tadgh “Tady” Coyne arrived in the US on March 19, 1862 and went directly to Marcellus, NY in the upstate county of Onondaga.

He traveled aboard the ship Jas Foster with his wife Catherine (Lydon/Lyden) and their two children: John (my great grandfather) not yet 4 years old and his sister Bridget only a year and a half. Traveling with them also were two other children, Patrick and Mary “Coyne” ages 7 and 6 but these children never appear in Marcellus. I suspect he was bringing the children of a friend or relative with them and the kids were traveling under the Coyne name in order to stay together.

Catherine was pregnant on the voyage giving birth to their first child in Marcellus, Mary Ann on August 10, 1862. Mary Ann’s godparents were Austin and Margaret (O’Malley) Welch/.Walsh who may be connected to Tady’s mother but not confirmed yet. I always wondered why he went directly from NYC to the tiny village of Marcellus but in my research I found later he already had two brothers and a sister here before him! His older brother, Patrick, and wife Mary (Coyne, also) first appear in the Marcellus census of 1855 with their first child, Bridget born in Ireland also. Patrick was born about 1813. Their brother Rodger Coyne also appears in the 1855 census for the first time with his wife Ann (Gannon) and their two children, Bridget and Thomas, born in Ireland. Rodger was born about 1820.

Around the same time, sister, Sarah (Salle) Coyne arrived in NY City on Oct 30, 1854 with her daughter Catherine aboard the ship Washington. Her husband, Phillip Gannon (brother to Ann, wife of Rodger Coyne above) had come over first arriving alone on May 6,1851 aboard the ship Doctor Kneiss from Galway and settled in Marcellus. He may have been the first connected relative to come to Marcellus although there was a Peter Coyne family who was in Marcellus before him arriving in 1848 but I have never found a direct connection to my Coynes but from the same area in Ireland so probably cousins at least.

I have Tady and Patrick’s death certificates which show their parents were John Coyne and Ellen “:Nellie” Welch/Walsh. Connected to Tady, his wife Catherine had a sister, Jane, who married Thomas Thornton in Ballinakill Chapel in Renvyle area in the civil parish of Ballynakill, Galway on Sept. 5, 1869 and left Ireland right after with Jane and Catherine’s parents Patrick Lydon and Bridget (Coyne also) arriving together on February 16, 1870 aboard the ship Minnesota and also came to Marcellus..

The Lydon parents would live back and forth with Tady Coyne and Thomas Thorntons families. Thomas and Jane Thornton later would purchase Patrick Coyne’s farm around the bend from Tady and Catherine Coyne on Falls Rd. outside the village in Marcellus Falls which was a booming area with many mills which provided work for the town’s new influx of Irish immigrants. The Catholic church of St. Francis Xavier was built to accommodate the new Catholic residents and all of these people are buried in St. Francis cemetery, Patrick Gannon, being the first on May 1, 1862 not long after my Tady arrived and just after the land for the cemetery was bought in April 1862.

Based on the names and the place of Jane’s marriage, I found all the families had come form the Parish of Ballynakill. Tady, Patrick, Rodger, Sarah and the Gannons came from the townlands of Ross (where Coyne and Gannon rented land for farming) and Tievegarriff where John Coyne and Thomas Gannon each rented a house. The Lydons were from nearby townlands Moyard and, later Ungwee and Thomas Thornton was from townland of Letterfreck.

In this photo, of the Coyne house on Falls Rd, Marcellus, NY containing three generations, are (back row) Tady Coyne, his wife Catherine (Lydon) and their son Michael Coyne. In front seated are Catherine’s parents, Patrick and Bridget (Coyne) Lydon and the child with them is Tady’s youngest son, Timothy William. The photo was taken likely in 1888 as Timothy was born in March of 1882 and Patrick Lydon died on Oct 30, 1888.