Michael Casey and Mary Hennessey

Michael Casey was a New York Policeman. He was born

about 1856 in Tipperary Ireland. He died August 15, 1898 and was buried in St Raymond's Cemetery in New York.

Mary Hennessey was born 1855 in Greenwich Village, New York. She died in 1933 and is buried in Riverdale NY. I think also in St. Raymond's.

It is interesting that these two individuals lived during the era described in the Gangs of New York movie. The Civil War began in 1861 and was finished in 1865. My mother told me that Mary Casey, her grandmother, told her she once saw an African American man hung in Greenwich Village.

The Encyclopedia of the Civil War (The NYC Cicil War Draft Riots):

The nation is at this time in a state of Revolution, North, South, East, and West," wrote the Washington Times during the often violent protests that occurred after Abraham Lincoln issued the March 3, 1863, Enrollment Act of Conscription. Although demonstrations took place in many Northern cities, the riots that broke out in New York City were both the most violent and the most publicized. With a large and powerful Democratic party operating in the city, a dramatic show of dissent had been long in the making. The state's popular governor, Democrat Horatio Seymour, openly despised Lincoln and his policies. In addition, the Enrollment Act shocked a population already tired of the two-year-old war. By the time the names of the first draftees were drawn in New York City on July 11, reports about the carnage of Gettysburg had been published in city papers. Lincoln's call for 300,000 more young men to fight a seemingly endless war frightened even those who supported the Union cause. Moreover, the Enrollment Act contained several exemptions, including the payment of a "commutation fee" that allowed wealthier and more influential citizens to buy their way out of service. Perhaps no group was more resentful of these inequities than the Irish immigrants populating the slums of northeastern cities. Poor and more than a little prejudiced against blacks-with whom they were both unfamiliar and forced to compete for the lowest-paying jobs-the Irish in New York objected to fighting on their behalf. On Sunday, July 12, the names of the draftees drawn the day before by the Provost Marshall were published in newspapers. Within hours, groups of irate citizens, many of them Irish immigrants, banded together across the city. Eventually numbering some 50,000 people, the mob terrorized neighborhoods on the East Side of New York for three days looting scores of stores. Blacks were the targets of most attacks on citizens; several lynchings and beatings occurred. In addition, a black church and orphanage were burned to the ground. All in all, the mob caused more than $1.5 million of damage. The number killed or wounded during the riot is unknown, but estimates range from two dozen to nearly 100. Eventually, Lincoln deployed combat troops from the Federal Army of the Potomac to restore order; they remained encamped around the city for several weeks. In the end, the draft raised only about 150,000 troops throughout the North, about three-quarters of them substitutes, amounting to just one-fifth of the total Union force.

The incident that Mary Hennessey related to her granddaughter Marion Kier may have been related to these riots.

Mary Hennessey and Michael Casey were married in 1875 in Manhattan, New York. To the best of our knowledge they had 10 children.