From Leitrim to Connecticut · a life in the records, 1867–1915
Catherine
of Warren Court.
Before she was her brother’s destination,
she had a life of her own.
Catherine McPadden Kelly · Mary and Michael’s daughter.
James McPadden’s older sister—not Catherine McNiff, his future wife.
City context during Catherine’s American life—not her arrival, her home or her view. Photograph and source (new tab)
A person within the city
A household.
A family.
Someone to find.
Bridgeport was more than the end of an ocean crossing. For Catherine, it became the setting of a marriage, children and a household recorded at Warren Court.
In 1904, her younger brother James named “Sister Mrs James Kelly” at 11 Warren Court as his destination. Behind that address was a woman whose American story was already well underway.
We can follow parts of that life. Other parts—including the identification of her own passenger record—remain unresolved.
Begin with her Irish birth recordThe Irish and American records form a very strong working identification, not yet an unbroken documentary chain. The story keeps that distinction visible.
Tullynascreen, County Leitrim · 31 July–5 August 1867
A recorded beginning
Before she became the sister in America, she was Catherine.
Catherine is often encountered as the sister named in James’s passenger record. Her own story begins earlier: a daughter of Tullynascreen who built an American household before her younger brother James ever left Ireland.
Catherine McPadden was born at Tullynascreen on 31 July 1867, the daughter of Michael McPadden, a labourer, and Mary formerly Conlon. Her father registered the birth five days later by mark.
This line places Catherine inside the household whose later departures would reshape the family. It does not yet connect her by name to an American record—but the full pattern of age, surname, marriage and sibling contact makes that later identity a very strong working conclusion.
Long before an arriving brother named her as his destination, Catherine had a beginning of her own in this Irish household.
Original Irish civil birth entryNo American record yet found names Catherine’s parents or exact Irish locality. The Bridgeport identification is very strong, not an unbroken documentary chain.
- Catherine’s birth date and place, and parents Michael McPadden and Mary formerly Conlon.
It does not by itself connect the infant to every later American record bearing a similar name.
Project-authored factual summary—not a facsimile or complete transcription.Citation and research context ↗View the holding source