Verifying What is Written in Stone I - Mary Ann Barry

I mentioned in my last post that I am trying to verify the information found in this headstone from Donald's family.  I decided to go in chronological order of deaths and the first death on this stone is that of Mary Ann Barry, the daughter of William Barry and Winifred Coughlin, Donald's 2nd great-grandparents. Mary Ann's death is recorded on the stone as March 24, 1880 and her age as 4 years and 2 months.

I started with the 1880 census because I knew I had it and Mary Ann is listed there with her family. It took me a while, but I eventually realized that if the information on the stone were correct, she should not be listed. The 1880 census should only have captured people who were alive as of June 1, 1880.

The stone says it was erected in memory of John Coughlin, Mary Ann's uncle, by Winifred and her sister Ann which should mean it was done in 1884, well after Mary Ann's death as recorded on the stone, not immediately after her burial. We also know that there are other errors on the stone, such as the spelling of Winifred's name, so the information here is just not that reliable. It was time to dive into vital and church records.

New York City research is notorious for its challenges, but I have found records and index entries before with less information, so I was pretty shocked that I came up empty time and time again. I searched FamilySearch for births and deaths using broad date ranges and different combinations of known information, as well as Find My Past for baptisms and Ancestry for basically anything where I repeated those searches. I even looked page by page through the baptismal register from the church where a sibling was baptized. Still nothing. 

I considered contacting Calvary Cemetery for a list of interments, but the fees were prohibitive. I will probably do this at some point, but not right now.

Finally, I decided to turn to the New York City Genealogy Facebook group, not so much to have other people research, but to ask for suggestions for other places to look. Well, shortly after I posted there, I took my car in for an inspection and tires and by the time I got home, a few members had left some suggestions and one had found her baptism (they knew I have a FMP subscription) and her entry in the death records index. Amazing and humbling! I'll have to work on my search parameters, clearly.

According to her baptismal record (in Latin!), Mary Ann was born on December 23, 1876 and baptized as Anna Maria on January 7, 1877. The death index entry says that Marry (sic) Barry died on 14 Mar 1881 and was buried the following day at Calvary Cemetery. The spelling of her first name was incorrect and no parents were listed but there was an address and it was a match.

So how accurate was Mary's information on the headstone? She was about 4 years and 2 months old when she died, but it was not in 1880 nor on March 24th. I feel pretty confident in the records I have found, but I do hope that some day I can back up the church records with civil records and vice-versa.

The next burial, according to the headstone was Mary Ann's cousin, Eddie Tucker. It will be interesting to see if his details will be confirmed or corrected by the records.