John and Margaret (Hennessey) Whalen

Great-great grandparents John Whalen (b. 1814) and Margaret Hennessey Whalen (b. 1823) were both born in Ireland, but they immigrated to America at different times and met and married in the United States. As a 13-year-old, John Whalen came from the Aran Islands off the coast of Galway to Boston in 1827 with his parents, Peter and Mary (Gill) Whalen. Peter and Mary Whalen are one of two great-great-great grandparents who lived in the U.S and whose identity is mentioned in this family history. Margaret Hennessey had lived in County Cork in Ireland, but we do not know when she came to America. We do know that John Whalen and Margaret Hennessey met in Boston and married there on July 3, 1842.

Soon after their wedding, John and Margaret headed west to farm in the Wisconsin Territory in the Town of Erin in Washington County. Arriving in 1842, they were among the very first white settlers to purchase land in Erin. Their farm was on the outskirts of the village of Monches near the southern border of Erin, just one farm away from Waukesha County where many of the Larkins of 'Tosa now reside. It's worth noting that a second, unrelated Whalen family had settled at the same time near Holy Hill, but it is the "Monches Whalens" who are our ancestors.

From 1843 to 1863, John and Margaret would have ten children in Erin. While the census records are incomplete, the Whalen Family History identifies these kids as Mary Jane, Pete, John, Jr. Robert, Margaret, Ann, Luke, Joseph, Ellen Marie, and Catherine. Their daughter, Ellen Marie, born in 1859, would become our great grandmother.

The last record we have shows John and Margaret Whalen living on their farm with six of their kids in 1870. However, their paper trail then disappears. We have no information on their lives or their deaths after 1870.