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Kerry (county)
Hello there. I'm trying to find out anything I can about my grandfathers mother. All I know is that she was a red head like me, her name was Josephine Victoria May O'Connell and that she died at age 26 in 1916 in New Zealand, leaving my grandad an orphan.Theres no record of her being born in NZ, so I'm wondering if she was sent there from Ireland? But that made me wonder, why would a young girl be sent to NZ between 1890 and 1908 (the year she got married)?
Any help would be great thankyou.
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Any help would be great thankyou.
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You may want to check any records of criminals in both Ireland and England. A person of almost any age could be put in prison for very small crimes, such as taking a piece of candy. Children were hung, put in prison or shipped to penal colonies to serve their time rather than be hung. Australia and New Zeeland were such area's along with many others.
Hope this helps.
Good Luck
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Hope this helps.
Good Luck
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If she was 26 in 1916, she was born in 1891. Have you looked for a marriage certificate? Sometimes that will say where a person was born. Have you checked the Passenger Lists? ancestry.com has a fair bit of data that can be searched but so might New Zealand's National Archives. The right search engine lets you put in the person's name and searches for it on ships' lists in the time period you give it. Maybe you can find her name on a ships' list.
If there's no record of her birth - what does her death certificate say? Often they do say where the person was born. What about New Zealand's national census? Sometimes census takers ask for a person's birthplace.
Where did she live in New Zealand? That can help to tell where a person comes from - sometimes people move into the neighborhood where others from their birth country are living.
As so little is known about her, it might be that she came with her parents who were dead at the time of her marriage. You don't know what age she was when she arrived in NZ. I don't think NZ was ever a penal colony and certainly it wasn't one in the 1890s. If she were an orphan, she might have been sent to live with relatives in NZ or in search of work.
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If there's no record of her birth - what does her death certificate say? Often they do say where the person was born. What about New Zealand's national census? Sometimes census takers ask for a person's birthplace.
Where did she live in New Zealand? That can help to tell where a person comes from - sometimes people move into the neighborhood where others from their birth country are living.
As so little is known about her, it might be that she came with her parents who were dead at the time of her marriage. You don't know what age she was when she arrived in NZ. I don't think NZ was ever a penal colony and certainly it wasn't one in the 1890s. If she were an orphan, she might have been sent to live with relatives in NZ or in search of work.
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