Michael Faunt, Blacksmith

A genealogy buddy who is from the very small town where my Faunt family emigrated to in 1869 found me a funeral record on Michael Faunt.Michael was the baby of the family and the only surviving son born in America. A son William ( there were two) died in Belfast prior to their coming and another son Edward died within months of his birth in 1885.

Michael, unlike his infant brothers lived to adulthood and died of consumption at the age of 31. Nine children were born to the couple and four died in early infancy.I have speculated that they immigrated after the death of their second son the first William in Belfast. Ellen and baby Willliam Joseph emigrated first before William and my Patrick.Was it a reaction to the infant death or just because? I wish I knew.

Michael's funeral expenses paint a picture of the man and the family enclosed on a ledger sheet.His older brother William received the bill as both parents were deceased by 1911.
He was single and a Blacksmith like his father, grandfather and his Uncle Patrick who remained in Ireland.They needed three carriages and Michael wore new patent leather shoes to his eternal rest.

My own Grandfather Edward Faunt had a fixation about new shoes and death.To this day I cannot set shoes on a bed or a table as it is bad luck and a death will follow. After seeing "Far and Away" I can only assume it is due to having the deceased "Waked" on the bed or table in the old country. Grandpop would have attended this funeral in one of the three coaches and at 13 he was already in the workforce.

Who then is the Michael Faunt who has a child, Walter decease in June 1901 of cholera? Walter is a family name in this line and there are still Walter Faunts( William Walter) living in New Jersey.Cousins perhaps?

I have long wondered who Ellen Faunt and baby William lived with when the came, 6 months before William Sr. with his military pension which they surely used to live on. Six months is not a time span long enough to track them as the 1870 census is taken within a year and they are in Beverly.

A George Faunt lives in Philadelphia and according to the Census I find him in he is born in America and surely not related to my family? That is what I have thought for several years.Patrick my great grandfather names his son from his second marriage George Patrick; he is killed in Italy in WWII.

I have indicated to other Faunts that it is one very small family descending from William born in Fethard Tipperary.Some have not been so sure. Maybe they are right.