Verifying What is Written in Stone Part VIII - Ann Coughlin

 

This is part eight of verifying the information on this headstone and brings us to Ann Tucker, née Coughlin.

Ann was the younger sister of Winifred Coughlin, Donald's 2nd great-grandmother. The stone provides us with her dates of birth and death and elsewhere on the it also says that she was the sister of John Coughlin and the beloved wife of John Tucker.

Ann/Annie/Anna was baptized in the parish of Clontuskert, County Galway, Ireland. I posted about finding those records here. Ann was baptized on June 6, 1842 at four days old according to the original register and the transcription that was done later by a parish priest, which matches the information on the headstone. The parental match also tells us that Ann had the same parents as John, although we don't actually have proof of her relationship with Winifred through the registers, since the entries surrounding Winifred's purported date of birth are missing.

Ann's relationship to her husband is still unverified, but I will keep searching civil and religious records. A 1900 census entry where Ann Tucker and John Tucker are living with a niece with the last name of Coughlin does give me some documentation of marriage and a clue, saying they have been married for 20 years.

An entry in the death index for New York City matches the date of death on the stone, May 7th, 1916. As Ann was predeceased by her husband, I am guessing that Winifred was the informant on her death certificate. Whoever it was provided the names of Ann's parents, and that is also a match to her baptismal record and to her siblings' records. The indexed entry does not provide any details of Ann's marital status or give us a spouse's name.

Although I have not yet found an obituary or death notice for Ann, I did find this interesting item in a paper seven months after her death.

The date and the names of related beneficiaries make it clear that this is our Ann Coughlin. The amount of Ann's estate surprised me, to say the least. According to an inflation calculator, the estate would be worth over $600, 000 today and she left Winifred the equivalent of $90,000! There must be more to uncover there.

For now, though, I feel that the information on this headstone for Ann/Annie/Anna Coughlin is likely correct, but there is still so much to discover!