pilot whose name was Tom Everell; in the
next generation a singular change took place in his patronymic; it stood
transformed thus : Everell Tom. Everell Tom, in the course of time, became
the respected sire of a numerous progeny of Sons and daughters: Jean
Baptiste Tom, Norbert Tom, Henriette Tom, and a variety of other Tom.
An ingenious Quebec Barrister, in a
curious paper, read at the annual Concert and Ball of the St. Patrick’s
Society at Montreal, 15th January, 1872, has pointed out much more
startling transformations in some unmistakable Irish names, to be met with
in the Church Registers.
" Who could guess, asks John O’Farrell, that ‘Tee
Corneille Aubry,’ married at Quebec, on the 10th September, 1670, was an
Irishman? Yet the Register leaves no room nor doubt upon the subject; he
was the son, says the Register, of "Connor O’Brennan," and of Honorah
Janhour, of St. Patrick’s (Diasonyoen), Ireland, his real name being
"Teague Cornelius O’Brennan." In this connection, I may mention that, when
I was pursuing my studies in the College at Quebec, our Rector was the
Rev. Dr. Aubry, a worthy and pious Divine, and one of three brothers in
the Priesthood in Lower Canada, and the uncle of two other young Canadian
clergymen. Dr. Aubry, until quite recently, lived in the firm belief that
he was of purely French extraction; in fact, if my memory serves me right,
he used playfully, at times, to pull my little ears for being, as he used
playfully to say, such a wicked little Irlandais. Now the
researches of Father Tanguay, in the musty old Church Registers of Lower
Canada have revealed the astounding fact that Dr. Aubry is, after all, a
countryman of our own, an Irlandais, a lineal descendant of that
Teague Cornelius O’Brennan; another of his descendants is Parish Priest in
the town of St. John’s, near this city, Montreal.
Who, again, I ask, but one able to
answer the sphinx, could fancy that Jean Houssye dit Bellerose was
an Irishman. He was so nevertheless; was married here on the 11th October,
1671; and as the Register attests, he was born in the Parish of St. Law
rence O’Toole, Dublin, and he was the son of Matthew Hussey and of
Elizabeth Hogan, his wife, both Dubliners and both under
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