Did I just stumble onto something useful? The McGovern Family

I was looking at the McGovern family tree this past week and trying to figure out if some of the people who I did not have death dates for were buried in New Cathedral Cemetery.  That cemetery has an on-line search function that sort of helps find relatives.  You have to search by the exact first and last name that they have in their database and their database seems to have quite a few errors too.  On Granddad Smith’s mother’s side of the family, there were many relatives buried in New Cathedral including Granddad’s grandparents, James McGovern and Catherine Dixon.

Now I have only been looking for James & Catherine’s descendants so I was excited to find two plots (K16 and E46) that seemed to contain the remains of several Driscolls, Clancys, Morrisons and Porters – all descendants.  Between those two plots, I knew of 13 people from the tree who are in residence.  James & Catherine’s oldest child was Anna McGovern who married Dennis Driscoll on 5/23/1871.  They had nine children, two boys who died unmarried and young, three other boys and four girls who married a Porter, Carroll, Morrison, and Burroughs.  The Morrison’s eldest daughter married a Clancy.

Judging from the individual grave numbers of the 13 people I knew, I figured that there were many more people resting there.  Who were they?

I sent off an e-mail to my good friends at New Cathedral and within a couple of days they replied with a list of everyone in those two plots along with their burial dates.  It turns out that not a single one of the other 12 people buried there were on my tree despite several more Driscolls, Clancys, Porters as well as a couple of Tierneys, an Ewing, a Leary and three Dixons.  Wait!, What?!?! Dixon?

So far, I have not figured out who Catherine Dixon’s parents were.  She was born in Ireland sometime around 1826 and emigrated to America sometime between then and when she married James in Philadelphia’s St. Michael’s Church on 1/1/1849.  But here, in a plot with four of Anna's children, I’m told that in side-by-side graves are Joseph Dixon (buried 7/15/1880) and Anna Dixon (buried 9/22/1890).  One the other side of the plot, there was also a Mary Dixon (buried 10/5/1878).  Could these be Catherine’s parents and sister?

I don’t know the answer yet but maybe if there are gravestone with birth dates and relationships, it may help.  I haven’t found anything in Ancestry.com or Maryland death indexes but I’ll keep working on it and visit the cemetery in December.

The rest of the people in those New Cathedral plots were:

K16 5 NANNIE I CARROLL 10/3/1916 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 4^th child, married to James Carroll)

K16 6 JOSEPH DIXON 7/15/1880 (possibly our great-great-great-grandfather?)
K16 7 ANNA DIXON 9/22/1890 (possibly our great-great-great-grandmother?)
K16 8 JOSEPH S DRISCOLL 10/4/1910 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 7^th child, unmarried)
K16 8 THOMAS CLANCY 11/8/1941 (possibly a son of Hazel’s or brother of James Clancy?)
K16 13 MARY G MORRISON 8/31/1923 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 6^th child, married to Daniel Morrison)
K16 13 MARGARET P CLANCY 6/27/1931 (possibly a daughter of Hazel’s or sister of James Clancy?)
K16 13 HAZEL C CLANCY 10/29/1945 (Mary & Daniel Morrison’s eldest daughter married James Clancy)
K16 14 DANIEL L MORRISON 2/18/1935 (married to Mary G. Driscoll)
K16 14 HELEN J CLANCY 7/29/1939 (possibly a daughter of Hazel’s or sister of James Clancy?)
K16 15 MARY DIXON 10/5/1878 (possible sister to Catherine?)
K16 16 CATHERINE I PORTER 12/6/1910 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 2^nd child, married to Robert Porter)

E46 1 MARY A EWING 3/18/1924 – who?

E46 1 TERESA BURROUGHS 8/4/1950 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 8^th child, married Joseph Burroughs)
E46 2 JOHN T TIERNEY 3/18/1898 – who?
E46 3 PATRICK LEARY 9/12/1882 – who?
E46 4 HANNAH TIERNEY 1/14/1929 – who?
E46 5 DENNIS M DRISCOLL 2/27/1893 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 3^rd child, unmarried)
E46 5 ANNE DRISCOLL 12/15/1933 (eldest child of James & Catherine McGovern)
E46 5 ETHEL DRISCOLL 3/5/1974 (married Leo Driscoll, Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 9^th child)
E46 7 HAZEL M PORTER 1/12/1897 (I believe Myrtle’s twin died at 4 months old)
E46 7 MYRTLE E PORTER 12/11/1906 (Catherine & Robert Porter’s 1^st child, died at 10 years old)
E46 8 CATH DRISCOLL 11/3/1884  – who?
E46 8 DENNIS M DRISCOLL 8/25/1906 (son-in-law of James & Catherine McGovern)
E46 8 LEO J DRISCOLL 9/7/1938 (Anna & Dennis Driscoll’s 9^th child, married Ethel Marck)