Michael Harrington

Michael Harrington was a mystery when the first draft of this website was uploaded in the autumn of 2005. It was known that Nancy Anna Branson had given birth seven times, and had lost one of those babies, because of the statistics recorded in the 1900 census. Also, the name “Michael” was included, without dates, surname, or other information, on a handwritten list of the children of Nancy composed in the 1940s, after Nancy herself had passed away. The list was written down either by Nancy’s niece Maude Branson Chamberlin, or was created at Maude’s request by one of Nancy’s surviving daughters, or by Nancy’s sister Mary Jane Branson Johnson. (The list later came into the possession of Maude’s brother Ivan Thorpe Branson, whose files were consulted during the research done for the website in 2005.) It was unclear if Michael was a child sired by Peter Harrington or Nancy’s second husband John James Napier. For four years, he was included here as Michael Napier, with the caveat that this was a guess.

In October, 2009, a Branson-clan relative noticed that a photograph of the Calvary Cemetery, Merced, CA gravemarker of Peter Harrington had been added a few months earlier to FindaGrave.com. The inscription on that headstone not only contained facts about Peter, but mentioned his son “M.H.” with the birthdate 4 October 1881 and a death date of 7 October 1881. This is a match for Michael Harrington, with the only uncertainly being whether the second initial referred to his surname, or a middle name that started with “H.”

The 1910 census states that Nancy only produced six children. It seems unlikely that Nancy would have forgotten about Michael, given that she had remembered him for nineteen years in order to tell the 1900 census enumerator the correct stats. Chances are that the informant for the household in 1910 was Babe Napier, who may not have remembered to include a lost baby he personally had never known.

Images on this page courtesy of Lady Annne. Used by permission. To see her list of FindaGrave memorials and find a link to her own website, click on her name.)

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