Patrick and Catherine (Belson) Shinners

Great-great grandfather Patrick Shinners (1814-1872) was born in County Limerick, Ireland, where it appears he married his first wife, Ellen Griffin (1820-1845) in the early-1840s. Shortly after their marriage, they immigrated to America and were living in the Town of Erin in Washington County, Wisconsin Territory, by at least 1843. Patrick and Ellen Shinners produced two sons, James in 1843 and Edward in 1845. However, Ellen Griffin Shinners died in 1845, perhaps in childbirth.

A year later, Patrick Shinners married another Irish native living in Erin, Catherine Belson Shinners (1824-1900). Patrick and Catherine settled on a farm near the village of Thompson in northern Erin Township, and they got busy adding to their family. Beyond James and Edward, noted above, from 1849 to 1859 they would add John, Michael, Lucy, Thomas, Patrick, and William, making lucky Lucy the lone sister among seven brothers. Their son, Thomas, born in 1856, would become our great grandfather.

Patrick Shinners died in a gruesome accident in September, 1872, in Erin, and the widow Catherine continued living with her son William until her own death in 1900. Below, read the Milwaukee Weekly Sentinel news report on Patrick Shinners’ death.

(Note: These specific death years are provided by an unknown genealogy researcher in Ancestry.com. While they are consistent with my own general estimates based on census research, I cannot confirm the specific years.)


Thanks to cousin Don Shinners for the newspaper article to the right concerning the death of Patrick Shinners in 1872.

Newspaper article courtesy of Cousin 

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