This is a bit strange...

Still catching up on emails that have information in them that I haven't yet posted here.
Nola Marshall wrote to me back in March about this rather strange situation in the family.

I am fascinated by the thought that Francis Hannagan had two families at the same time. Do you know if Catherine was in Melbourne with him in the 1850s? I have found him on the 1856 Electoral Roll living in a house off Little Lonsdale Street. Occupation Tailor. As you are aware three children were born in Australia, the mother being Mary Ann Kearns (Cairns). Another daughter was born in NZ just prior to Catherine having her last child. It begs belief that the women did not know of each others existence. Do you have any family knowledge of how this arrangement worked?

There are several photos of Martin John and Frank Hannagan and the tailoring business in Mt Gambier at the following sight.

Google Mt Gambier Library and Click on Photographic section. Type in Hannagan and the relevant photos should come up. [The first time I tried this I got two pages of photos; today I can only get four.]

My mother was Nola Rita Hannagan, youngest daughter of William Francis Hannagan, born 17th Feb 1883 and Aileen Todd.

William Francis Hannagan (1860) and Frances Hargreaves settled in Victoria.

William had a tailoring business in Brighton and his son William took over the business after his fathers' death in 1918.

Aussie Hannagans

Well, I've just spent a couple of hours inputting a large number of Australian Hannagans onto the Family Tree. Tailors abound - it was obviously a common occupation in those days - but there's a theatrical agent amongst the group, which is a bit different (!)

As always there are several common names running through the generations, but there are some unusual ones as well. One that struck me as interesting was Kearns Hannagan. The Francis Hannagan (Francis is a frequently-used name) from 1825 (my great-great grandfather, if I've remembered to put enough greats in) was married to Mary Cairns, but there seems to have been some question about the spelling of her name. It might have been Kearns. A generation or three down the track someone seems to have thought so and named one of their sons with that spelling.

The other thing about this afternoon's work is that we now have a tree going back to 1800 - approximately. In fact, it might be a little older than that, as William Hannagan's birth date isn't secure. However, he was my great-great-great grandfather (I've just checked it using the 'relationships' part of the 'People' menu). William has the distinction of being the oldest person on the tree at this point - unless he happened to have married a woman (Brigid Daly) who was older than him. Again, her birth date is not quite known.

William left a huge legacy of descendants - whatever date he was born!

Another bit of the tree

A couple of days ago I received an email from a Hannagan in Australia. The writer's name is Nola Marshall, and she says:

I recently found your homepage for Hannagan.
I am a descendant of the Australian Hannagans.
My Grandfather was William Francis Hannagan, brother of Martin John Hannagan. I have information and photos of this side of the family if you are interested.

This bit of the family is a little confusing - at least at this point. William and Martin were the sons of Francis Hannagan (born in 1825) and his second wife, Mary (nee Cairns). On the family tree as it currently stands, I have two William Hannagans - I suspect they may be the same person, and we've got the information a bit confused. It isn't entirely unusual for people in the Victorian period to give two children the same name, if the first died very young. However, I don't have any evidence for this, as yet.

We'll keep you informed when I hear back from Nola.