John Lawler's sons: John, Mike, Dan, Pat, Fenton
According to an old history of John Lawlor's family, John, his wife Mary and their two oldest children, John Jr. and Bridget, came to the US in 1846. They left the younger children, Margaret, Fenton, and Daniel behind in Ireland with relatives because they thought they were too young to make the crossing. The three younger children joined them in Iowa in about 1852.
John and family sailed to New Orleans where they stayed for a couple years. They then went on to Lexington, Kentucky in about 1848. (The family history gives 1849 for the move to Kentucky, but other records show their daughter Mary was born in Kentucky in 1848.) About 1850, they came to Clinton County, Iowa.
John is linked as a son of Phenton only by circumstantial evidence at present.
Family tradition among Daniel's descendents is that Daniel and John entered the US through New Orleans while Patrick came through NY. These same traditions say that Daniel and John worked on Senator Henry Clay's % plantation % in KY, probably as indentured servants.
The migration dates are fixed in part by the birthplaces of his children as shown in the censuses. According to the 1860 census, John's sons Daniel and Fenton, both 14, were born in Ireland, Mary, age 12, and Patrick, 10 were born in Kentucky, and Michael, age 8, was born in Iowa.
John had a farm of 200 acres in the east of Section 14 of Washington Twp, Clinton county, Iowa in 1874.
Sometime before 1880 John and all his children moved to Crawford County, Iowa. The Lawler history gives 1872 for the year of the moved to Crawford County. Father Scallon, who was a priest at Villa Nova for a long time, convinced a large group of people from Clinton County to go to Crawford County.
John obviously felt very connected to Clinton County, though, since his body was taken back there for burial at Villa Nova.
Here are some excerpts from the circa 1944 Lawler history:
There were a lot of
Irish going to Canada and Australia, but they didn't want to live under
the British Crown. They figured there would not be anything but
oppression. Thus they decided to try their fortunes elsewhere.
When John Lawler Sr. was settling up with the land lord, he struck him
with his elbow across the mouth. John Sr. threw his arms around him
to hold him, accidently, of course!, and held him under the open
fireplace, until all the hair was burned off his head. He was
arrested, and fined 10 shillings --- $2.30 in our money. He said that
he had one satisfaction leaving Ireland.
After a stormy voyage of 11 weeks, on an old sail boat by way of
Queenstown and Liverpool, they finally landed at New Orleans. The
ship being pulled in by 3 steam tug boats, up the Mississippi.
During the voyage, they were becalmed 3 days off the coast of Cuba,
and only 1 pint of water was allowed each day to each one. John
Jr. grabbed a can of water, ran to the far end of the boat, and drank
his fill, not caring whether he got punished or not.
The first few months, John Lawler Sr. worked shelling corn with a
little hand sheller, and also in a sugar refinery on the old Jackson
battle ground of 1812.
There was $100, and an outfit of clothes, if one would enlist in the
Army, as the Mexican War was going on. John Jr. walked to town to
enlist, but they told him that the war was over.
After some months in New Orleans, they took the steamboat up the river
to Lexington, Kentucky.
Their chief diet was corn bread and salt pork.
One night Bridget, daughter of Mary and John Sr., was left to take
care of Patrick James, who was then a baby, (who was to become the
inventor of the cornhusker), when the log cabin caught fire. Bridget
ran for help to put out the fire forgetting the baby. John Lawler
Sr. ran through the blaze, getting his hands and face badly singed in
doing so.
The Cholera epidemic was raging at Paris, Kentucky, a few miles away.
The people were dying at the rate of 8 a day. The 2 Lawlers, John
Sr. and his brother Dan, were working at a stone quarry, when a man
drove by with the casket with the dead body of his wife in a dump
cart. Then something went wrong, and the casket was dumped into the
middle of the road. The 2 Lawlers helped him load it, although badly
scared.
The wages were low on account of the slave trade, and for the whites
that had to work, it was pretty hard going for them. They decided on
moving to a free state, which was Illinois.
They again set forth by boat for a new home. When the boat docked at
Cairo, Ill., it was raining, and it looked dark and gloomy outside.
When John Lawler Sr. was taking out his citizenship, he was asked if
he would renounce the British Crown and Queen Victoria. His answer was
``With all my heart and soul.''
John Lawler Sr. and wife, Mary decided to go farther, so came to
Clinton, Ia., making their way by ox team out to Center Grove, now
known as Villa Nova.
The part of the county the Lawlers settled in was nearly all timber,
and it was a big job to cut the trees down, and grub out the stumps,
to plant corn, and sew some grain.
One of their winter food supplies was a barrel of sorghum. They used
to get Richard Benton to grind, as he owned the only mill in that part
of the country.
When Michael, son of John and Mary Lawler, was born, John Sr. went on
foot 9 miles for the Dr. The Dr. got on a horse and came, and John
Sr. had the 9 miles to walk back. Mrs. Richard Benton was the nurse,
because as a young woman she had worked for a doctor.
The grain was sowed with a hand seeder, or broadcasted by hand. It
was harvested with a cradle, or a hand binder, on which 2 men rode and
bound the grain, and one man drove. Their threshing was done with an
8 horse power thresher.
Their hogs were all slaughtered at home, hauled by ox team to Clinton,
and ferried across the river to be put on the railroad.
During this time John Lawlers had left 3 children in Ireland with
Mrs. Lawler's brother, Daniel. They though they were too young to
stand the voyage. Margaret, Fenton, and Dan. John's brother, Daniel,
left 2 of his children in Ireland for the same reason. They came some
years later direct to Clinton county. This party crossed the water
together were Fenton and Daniel aged 7, Margaret aged 9, Mary and John
Lawler (children of Dan Lawler) and Thomas Dunn, who later became the
husband of Margaret Lawler. When this party landed at New York, they
were going up the street, and a parrot in a cage screamed out, "look
at the Greenhorns."
John Sr. and John Jr. dug a few wells in Clinton about 40
ft. deep. They lined the wall about a ft. thick with lime rock, which
they shaped themselves, with a stone hammer and chisel.
After some years in Clinton Co., the Lawlers decided to move further
west. The railroad wanted $85 for a car to come out to West Side.
They decided to drive with the covered wagons. They made 40 miles a
day across the prairie on the way out. John Lawler Jr., Patrick
Lawler, Fenton Lawler, Dick Langton, Thomas Dunn, were in the party
coming out.
John Lawler started for the West with $1500, a team of horses, 3
colts, a wooden frame drag, a wooden beam breaking plow, buying 240
A. at $6.50 an A., of Crawford Co. land.
John Lawler Sr. located on the place now occupied by his grandson, Joe
Lawler, son of Fenton Lawler. His house still stands, but is used as
a granary on the farm of Joe Lawler. It was built about the year
1878.
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