Bridget's Whereabouts

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KGDevil
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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InterestedReader wrote: Sun Feb 18, 2018 11:23 am Well this is the crux of the problem. Where does she fit into this family, Alder St Bridget?
Is her husband John
Johanna's brother?
Eugene's brother?
So far, we found the answer to be no.

I've found extended family for Alder St Bridget, but they don't link back to Eugene & Jo.
You are so right about that. It has been easier to prove who she isn't. But, I think all of the evidence points to this being the information for more than one Bridget Sullivan being wrapped up into one myth. So, I believe that's why it's hard to trace how these people are related. You are trying to find links to family members that probably do not exist.
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KGDevil
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:?:
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:arrow:
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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Breda stands out, I think. She ran a dressmaking business and seems to have done quite well for herself. She liked a lot of variants on her name.
How are you establishing her birth-year of 1885?
She told huge lies about her age and when she died, Otto didn't have a clue how old she was, according to her death certificate.

Eugene's brothers and sisters, Johanna's brothers and sisters - they're none of them quite the right age to be the same generation as the Bordens' Bridget, are they?
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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InterestedReader wrote: Sun Feb 18, 2018 3:05 pm
How are you establishing her birth-year of 1885?
She told huge lies about her age and when she died, Otto didn't have a clue how old she was, according to her death certificate.
I used a combination of marriage records, census records, and death records to settle on a date. Nothing set in stone since it does vary somewhat in different records.
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:?:
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:?:
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:?:
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Crime is common. Logic is rare. Therefore it is upon the logic rather than upon the crime that you should dwell. - Arthur Conan Doyle
KGDevil
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:?:
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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:?:
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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by KGDevil » Tue Feb 20, 2018 3:08 pm

Pallbearers for Mark Sullivan in 1936 has interesting names as well: Tim Sullivan, Gene Dudley. (Gene Dudley seems to be a pallbearer at everyone's funeral. )
Check out my post from March 2017: "Bridget Sullivan and the Dudleys."
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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bridgetfuneral.doc
Eugene Dudley was also a pallbearer at Bridget's funeral. The obituary appeared in the Montana Standard on March 30, 1948.
Bernard Sullivan, another pallbearer, was the son of Timothy & Mary Sullivan of 112 E. Woolman Street.
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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irishlass78 wrote: Sat Feb 24, 2018 1:45 pm bridgetfuneral.doc

Eugene Dudley was also a pallbearer at Bridget's funeral. The obituary appeared in the Montana Standard on March 30, 1948.
Bernard Sullivan, another pallbearer, was the son of Timothy & Mary Sullivan of 112 E. Woolman Street.
Yes, I've seen the obituaries and other listings about Bridget's death. I have copies that I've posted here as well. I've also traced a Eugene Dudley that I believe to be the one mentioned in the articles. I have found no relation to the women in Fall River.
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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I have found no relation to the women in Fall River.
I respectfully disagree. Good luck with your research.
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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I'm actually thinking of writing a few articles. I've approached a few people about that recently. And some of these people have such interesting stories! I think it would be fascinating.
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Bridget - PROOF Please!

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So let's put this simply.

Two photos have gained fame for being Bridget Sullivan in later life. The Bridget Sullivan, that is, who either saw or did murder most horrid... or washed windows and saw nothing at all.
Are these photos Bridget? Almost certainly not. But yes! they are! you say, because they look exactly like Bridget, her one known photo. Well, we see what we want to see. Oftentimes we see what we are told to see. So apart from a possible resemblance, what makes them Bridget? The real Bridget?

The photos were supplied by the Porter sisters, who have said they show their 'Great Aunt Bridgie'. Who was thought to be the real Bridget Sullivan. Who married that smelterman John M. Sullivan and lived at 701 Alder St, Anaconda.
So where does that 'Great Aunt Bridgie' fit into their family tree?

I've never seen that specified, exactly. Exactly what the connection is.

The Porter sisters' paternal grandparents do not relate to the story in any way.

Their maternal grandparents were Eugene and Johanna Sullivan, who lived in Butte.
'Great Aunt Bridgie' must be a sister or sister-in-law of their grandfather Eugene, or a sister or sister-in-law of their grandmother Johanna.
Yes?

Eugene was born in Ireland, one of 11 siblings. He did have a sister called Bridget, who made the crossing most probably in 1912. She married twice, had a fancy for calling herself Breda, lived mostly in Butte like her brother Eugene and died as Breda Schrieb. She ran a dressmaking company. She sometimes shows on records as 'Bridgie'. She was indeed 'Great Aunt Bridgie.' However, she didn't marry a John M. Sullivan or live in Alder St Anaconda and she was not the Bridget.

So, one sister Bridget for Eugene, and none of his brothers married a Bridget. None of his brothers was a John M.

Over to Johanna. Johanna has no sister Bridget, and she has no brothers married to a Bridget that we've ever found. But she does have a brother John. And on one or two Ancestry family trees which include the Porter sisters' genealogy, you will see that brother named as John M. Sullivan of Alder St, husband of Bridget Sullivan.
We're assuming that's how Bridget has been tacked onto this family.

The problem is... Johanna's brother John D. Sullivan was married to a Mary Harrington. Yes, he lived in Butte, Montana, but he was an entirely different man from John M. Sullivan of Anaconda, Montana. Johanna's brother John was not married to a Bridget.
Any Bridget.

KG Devil has researched this genealogy painstakingly and that includes cross-referencing the newspaper obituaries. I've researched the Butte community and also how the myth of Montana Bridget took hold. You'd be surprised how very little of a factual nature there is to it. It's a single remark amplified to a claim, essentially, and there's no sign even of it ever being a rumour. Rebello is too much in error to be of help here.

Yes, John M. Sullivan of Anaconda had a relative or two in Fall River, as did many among the vast community of Irish immigrants in Montana. Identifying the family-members of both this man and his wife fails to furnish any link with the Bordens' Bridget - and there's no apparent family connection with the Porter sisters' grandparents, either.

There are many many reasons why I don't believe Bridget Sullivan of Anaconda was the Bridget Sullivan employed by the Bordens... But here I focus on these two photographs provided by a family who say Bridget Sullivan of Anaconda was their great-aunt.

Would someone please explain just how?
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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Also, about Eugene and Johanna Sullivan's relatives, Eugene's brother Patrick's obituary has John M. Sullivan listed as an old time friend of Patrick. Not a brother.

"The pallbearers, all old time friends of the deceased, were as follows; Patrick Duffy, John Sullivan, John Sullivan, David Harrington, Quinn Leary, and John M. Sullivan."
Crime is common. Logic is rare. Therefore it is upon the logic rather than upon the crime that you should dwell. - Arthur Conan Doyle
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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I've become more dubious after looking at several family trees of the Knightly/Hockaday/Noon clans. One has their parents as Marguirite and John Knightly. Marguirite and her parents, Eugene Sullivan and Johanna Lastnameunknown, according to this tree all hail from Peckham, London, England.
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

Post by snokkums »

:!: I didn't know she had worked for other people before the
Bordon's. I just always thought that she worked for the Bordons. I just learned someting!!
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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Always nice to learn new things.
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Re: Bridget's Whereabouts

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InterestedReader wrote: Fri Feb 05, 2016 10:39 pm
irishlass78 wrote:hi Wendy:

I posted this back in November under "Bridget's Will" regarding the beneficiaries: (Note: The Irish census can be found at the National Archives of Ireland website).
by irishlass78 » Sat Nov 21, 2015 2:38 pm

In the Lizzie Borden Quarterly, Vol. 3, #2, April 1996, genealogist Richard O'Dwyer identified Bridget's 11 siblings and their spouses. According to O'Dwyer, Bridget's brother, Eugene Sullivan, married Margaret O'Sullivan, daughter of Daniel O'Sullivan & Ellen O'Sullivan.

In the 1901 Irish census for Billeragh, Cork, Eugene, age 45, is a widower living with his in-laws, Daniel and Ellen Sullivan, and four children: Mary, age 16; Catherine, age 14; Patrick, age 14; and Margaret, age 11. In the 1911 census, neither Catherine or Margaret are in the household.

In Bridget's will, she makes a bequest to three nieces:

1. Kate Moriarity. Kate Sullivan, age 22, born in Castletown, Cork, married John Moriarity in Butte in 1911. She died in 1960 in Silver Bow, Butte. Birth date: Aug. 9, 1886. Occupation: Domestic. Parents: Eugene Sullivan & Margaret Sullivan. Informant(s): John & Ed Moriarity. According to the 1930 U.S. census, she immigrated in 1905.

2. Mary Sullivan. This is the niece who resided with Bridget at the time of her death. Mary Sullivan died in April 1951 at Silver Bow, Butte, residence 112 E. Woolman St. Her father was Jerry Sullivan, no mother's name given, husband: Timothy. She was probably Bridget's niece via marriage.

3. Margaret “Margery” Sullivan, b. Aug. 7, 1889, Cork, Ireland married 1) George McNally, date unknown, by whom she had two children: George Anthony McNally, b. Silver Bow, Montana in 1907, and Margaret McNally, b. 1908, Silver Bow, Montana.
She then married 2) Kenneth McLeod on Sept. 15, 1925 at Silver Bow, Butte Montana. She died in 1966 in Silver Bow, Butte. Occupation: Maid. Parents: Eugene Sullivan & Margaret Sullivan. Informant: George McNally. According to the 1930 census, she immigrated in 1907.

So Kate Moriarity and Margaret McLeod could very possibly be the daughters of Bridget's brother, Eugene.

She also referenced a nephew, Denis Sullivan, in her will. I haven't been able to identify him, but a Denis Sullivan did reside at 109 E. Woolman St. (Bridget resided at 112 E. Woolman St.).

I cross-referenced Sullivan families living in Billeragh, Cork in the 1911 Irish census according to O'Dwyer's findings. It appears that most of Bridget's siblings and their children still resided in Billeragh and Kilmichael parishes at that time.
There's also a Julia O'Donnell mentioned as a beneficiary. I believe this is John M.'s niece, daughter of his brother, Jeremiah Sullivan. Here's her death certificate:
And Julia lives at 611 Alder Street.
Mary Sullivan is at 112 East Woolman Street.
Denis Sullivan at 109.

This evidence connects the Bridget Sullivan death-certificate to the Alder Street Bridget.

Mary...who dies in Silver Butte in 1951, is there no age-match with Eugene's Mary born in 1885?
Have you checked if she could be Bridget's own daughter? Living together at the end suggests blood-kin.

There's a Billeragh race of Sullivans, a Bridget comes to the States, her brother Eugene's daughters later come to the States. Kate in 1905, Margery in 1907. That seems to match a Bridget 'settling' in 1905. O'Dwyer provides a genealogical template for a Bridget. The woman living on 701 Alder Street is a likely fit... It seems to work.

And none of it proves she was the Borden Bridget.

Sullivans, Sullivans, Sullivans. You've never seen such a biblical horde of one name in one spot. Or two. Silver Bow and Butte. It would be astonishing if she didn't have a relative there.

You're now convinced it's not her aren't you, Irish?
Julia Sullivan, the daughter of Jeremiah Sullivan at 1900 Yale, died in 1945. She never married anyone named O'Donnell
Crime is common. Logic is rare. Therefore it is upon the logic rather than upon the crime that you should dwell. - Arthur Conan Doyle
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