WI BIO - Dane Co - O'MALLEY, James, Joseph & Thomas
Biographical Review of Dane County, WI. Chicago: Biographical Review Pub. Co. 
1893, Vol I, pp 162-166; Vol II, pp 353-355 

Biography of Thomas O'MALLEY - pp 162-166 [brother of Joseph and uncle of 
James, whose biographies follow]

Thomas O'MALLEY, resident for nearly a half century on his present farm in 
section 13, Westport [Dane County], Wisconsin, was born in Ireland, 12 
January 1815. His father was Michael O'MALLEY, born in County Mayo, Ireland, 
and his father, the grandfather of our subject, was born in the same place, 
and these early settlers of Dane County, Wisconsin, named the town of 
Westport for their old home of the same name. The name of the grandfather 
was Patrick O'MALLEY, and his wife was Mary STANTON, of the same 
neighborhood. The family had been a family of farmers for generations, and 
the occupation of the descendants since has been the same. The grandparents 
of our subject had six sons and four daughters, whom they reared on their 
farm in Ireland, and Michael was one of the older children. These old people 
died at a venerable age in their comfortable home in Ireland, he at the age 
of eighty-two years, and she after a few years died at about the same age.

Patrick O'MALLEY and some of his sons were active and efficient in aiding the 
French in the war between the French and the British. The wife of Michael 
and the mother of our subject, was named Mary O'NEIL, the daughter of Martin 
and Hannah (FADDEN) O'NEIL, and they too were farmers in Ireland and died 
there, having reared a large family. Our subject and his brother John were 
the advance guard of the family to America, sent by their father and with the 
privilege of returning to the old home and sharing in the estate if they did 
not like the new world. He furnished the means for the journey, and they 
sailed from Westport [County Mayo, Ireland] with four or five hundred other 
passengers in a sail boat, and after a pleasant journey of seven weeks landed 
in Quebec.

For this port they went to St. Catherine, and worked for a farmer until 
spring. Mr. O'MALLEY had but $8 in harvest time, but no promise for the 
winter, and the first boat that made the passage in the spring to Wisconsin 
carried our subject to join his brother, who had accompanied their uncle 
Thomas there. This uncle had come with the boys to America. These two sons 
at first bought 120 acres on Big Foot Prairie [state?], on which they lived 
in bachelor style, and then went on the Mississippi River to New Orleans, 
working their passage and chopped white ash wood at $1 per cord, and lodged 
on a flat boat on the bayous and small rivers. The country was wild in the 
extreme and the weirdness of the scene was heightened at night by the howl of 
panthers, which infested the place. While down there they also worked at 
ditching on sugar plantations, and they celebrated St. Patrick's day by 
picking blackberries in the woods. [p 163]

When our subject came to Dane County, in the spring of 1848, he entered 
eighty acres for pre-emption, where he now lives, and bought eighty acres of 
the Government adjoining. Here he built a rough log cabin, 16x20 feet, one 
and a half stories, and the steps to the upper room was a ladder. This house 
he roofed with stakes, which he rived and these pins were made of red oak 
from a fine large tree on an adjoining piece of land. The old log house was 
of the simplest kind, made in the most primitive style of architecture. In 
addition to the unskilled labor it required but a small outlay of money for 
lumber, hardware and glass to construct those humble log abodes, as the first 
floor contained two small windows and one door, hung on wooden hinges, and a 
gaping fireplace, as stoves were something yet unknown. The dwelling was not 
spacious nor elegant, but supplied all the needs of a comfortable home for 
the hardy dwellers who settled among the hills. This log cabin was very 
durable, as it stood erect until six years ago [1887], when it was torn down 
to make room for an orchard. The timbers were hewed by his own hands, and 
for the remainder of the material he hauled logs ten miles to a mill to be 
sawed into lumber.

One long summer he lived alone, but he remembered a bright Irish girl from 
his old home that now lived in Milwaukee [Milwaukee County, WI]. She and her 
parents, Peter and Bridget (BOLAND) WALSH, came to America one year before 
the O"MALLEYs. They also sailed from Westport, landed in Quebec after a 
voyage of seven weeks of storm. Their passage to Quebec cost five pounds, 
but to New York would have been much more. Miss Catherine appreciated the 
lover who would come 100 miles to woo her, and became the wife of our subject 
[Thomas O"MALLEY] on 06 January 1848, the marriage ceremony being performed 
by Father McLAUGHLIN. Three years after the location of our subject in 
America his parents also came to this country. Mr. and Mrs. O"MALLEY settled 
at once in the little but comfortable house which he had built, and she 
appreciated his care to have a home before he asked any one to become his 
wife.

Our subject is a man possessed of real manly courage. To built a home at 
that time in that wild, forsaken spot, he also must be endowed with good 
physical strength and endurance to withstand the many hardships necessary to 
removed the heavy forests and convert the rough lands into such a fruitful 
farm as may be gazed upon today. Mr. and Mrs. O'MALLEY are now living in the 
full enjoyment of their hard-earned possession. They performed their mission 
well; and when departing leave to posterity a good inheritance, and their 
honored names, homes and deeds that their children of today or future 
generations should long cherish in grateful remembrance.

This is a couple who left kindred 'mid tears,
Who quitted the scenes of their earlier years,
With hearts full of hope for their future success,
Who labored for years amid want and distress
In the depths of a desolate dark wilderness.

For the first two years after our worthy couple settled in their wild home, 
the nearest neighbor was three miles distant, which was the father of our 
subject, excepting Indians, there being as many as six camps to be seen about 
half a mile away. Mrs. O'MALLEY, not being used to such society was very 
much afraid of her new associates at first, but in a short while she grew to 
rather enjoy their company in her lonely hours, and now takes great pleasure 
in relating her dealings with them, and even going to visit them in their 
camp. Once during Mr. O'MALLEY's absence from home a rail fence took fire 
through the means of hunters, and had it not been for the faithfulness [p 
164] of the Indians in assisting Mrs. O'MALLEY to extinguish it, the loss of 
property might have been great, as the flames were fast approaching the barn. 
Ofttimes the Indian women brought pieces of gingham and calico to swap for 
meat, potatoes and turnips, etc., and after making a satisfactory bargain to 
both parties, would sit down usually and make the goods into aprons for Mrs. 
O'MALLEY before leaving the house. She relates one very amusing incident: 
while she was in the cellar filling their bill, they helped themselves to a 
cradle quilt, which was over the sleeping baby. She did not miss it until 
she discovered a corner of it hanging from under one of their blankets, as 
they were a short distance from the house, she said nothing but with hastened 
step overtook them, and the first thing they knew she gently drew the prize 
away. They only laughed and seemed to enjoy the joke as much as she did. 
However, this did not lessen her dealings with the Indians or her regard for 
them, but it certainly was the cause of doubting their honesty, and ever 
afterward kept them well in sight. Wells and cisterns in those days were 
unknown in this part of the world, and two years passed before digging a 
well, during which time for household purposes, water was drawn three 
quarters of a mile from a boiling spring, to which place Mrs. O"MALLEY often, 
during the summer days took the clothes of the family and did a large washing 
rather than bring such an amount of water as was necessary, so long a 
distance. She even boasts of washing some of the best butter that was ever 
eaten in the same spring.

In these early days deer and wolves were very numerous. Mr. O'MALLEY often 
sent his dog to hunt a large flock of deer from grazing on his fine field of 
winter wheat, and enjoyed the sport of watching them jump so gracefully over 
a high rail fence. (All the fences on his place in those days were made of 
rails, split by our industrious subject.) On no rare occasions were wolves 
known to come to the door of this humble dwelling and helo themselves to 
slaughtered pork or the like, hanging outside, if not taken indoors by dark. 
Mrs. O'MALLEY, on returning from the home of her father-in-law, where she had 
been visiting, barely escaped with her life from a large gray wolf, who 
followed her three quarters of a mile. The first year of Mrs. O'MALLEY's 
pioneer life, when her husband was called from home on business and had not 
returned by nightfall, would take a wrap, go out and crouch in the corner of 
the fence close by to await his return, which ofttimes reached the lonely 
hours of twelve and one o'clock, owing to the great inconvenience of travel, 
rather than remain in the house, lest the Indians would happen in find her 
alone and kill her. Who now among us in these days of pleasure and plenty 
would willingly face the privations and many dangers of these early pioneers; 
yet they have lived through it all, Mr. O'MALLEY in the seventy-eighth year 
of his age, healthy looking, with a constitution of a school boy, Mrs. 
O'MALLEY in her sixty-fifth year [thus she was born about 1828], was a woman 
of wonderful strength and endurance, looks well, with an intellect as bright 
as a girl of sixteen, delights to relate to her children and grandchildren 
her experiences of former years.

When Mr. O'MALLEY first came here [Dane County, WI] he went thirty miles to 
the nearest grist mill. Here they lived for some ten happy years. In 1861 
our subject built the present large and comfortable home. Prior to building 
the barn, Mr. O'MALLEY proposed a new house, but his wife was practical and 
proposed that the barn should be built first, and this was done, and it is 
still in good condition. It is [p 165] 40x60 [feet] with a basement for 
stables. The barn looks well now by the side of the new barn, which was 
built in 1880, at a cost of $800. In the old oak barn he stored his wheat 
and oats for some years, and stacked his hay outside. His first crop of 
winter wheat remained in the stack for three years, there being no market for 
it, and as there were no threshing machines. He then made a bed and trampled 
the grain out with oxen; this he hauled to Milwaukee by a slow team of oxen, 
taking a whole week to go and return. Traveling accommodations being very 
poor at that date, he camped out over night on the journey. He sold his 
wheat for 60 cents a bushel, and in order to make the trip profitable, he 
would take with him on his return a load of merchandise for the few 
storekeepers, who had just opened business in Madison. There were better 
times in store for our subject, however, and lately, during the Russian war, 
he sold his wheat for from $1 to $2 per bushel. Milwaukee was also their 
nearest place of worship for six years, when a Catholic Church was erected in 
Madison. Priests being very few, Mass would not sometimes be held oftener 
than once in three months. At that time the settlers traveled fifteen miles 
to reach Madison, which is not only nine miles, there being then no bridge 
across the Catfish stream. In those days the priests used to hold Mass in 
the different farm houses in turns, occasionally offering up the Holy Mass, 
to give the faithful an opportunity to attend to that all important part of 
their souls' salvation [the sacrament of Holy Communion], which was 
appreciated by those God-fearing people.

Some years ago they buried a daughter, (1) Bridget, aged nine years, and one 
named (2) Catherine, who became a Sister of Charity, bore the name of Sister 
Felicitia, and was one of the noble volunteers who became victims of fever in 
New Orleans, 26 September 1878, aged only twenty-three years [thus she was 
born about 1855]. She was a volunteer from Baltimore in the yellow fever 
scourge in 1878, and had been a Sister three and a half years.

The living children are: (1) Mary, who now is a Sister of Charity in 
Buffalo [Erie County], New York, where she has been for four years, and is 
known as Sister Mary Francis. She took the veil at the age of seventeen 
years at Emmettsburg [Emmetsburg, Palo Alto County, IA? Emmitsburg, 
Frederick County, MD?], and about a year later was sent to New Orleans, where 
she remained for twenty-three years, and in 1867 barely escaped with her life 
from an attack of fever. (2) Hannah is the widow of Thomas WELSCH and 
resides in Milwaukee [Milwaukee County, WI], where she removed from her farm 
in Springfield Township [Dane County, WI], in order to educate her children, 
of whom she has six. (3) Martin is a farmer on his 280 acres in this 
township [probably means Westport Township, the geographical context of the 
bio, not the just mentioned Springfield Township] His wife was Anna CONNOR, 
of Toten Creek [means Token Creek, which in 1893 was ten miles from Madison, 
Dane County, WI], and they have two sons. (4) Michael is a physician in 
Milwaukee, a graduate of Rush Medical College [in Chicago, IL], and married 
Lizzie SWEENEY, of Watertown [Dodge or Jefferson County, WI?]. (5) Annie is 
the wife of Garret SULLIVAN, and lives in New London [Outagamie or Waupaca 
County?], Wisconsin. (6) Bridget [the second of that name] is a maiden at 
home; (7) Ellen is a teacher at Marinet [means Marinette, Marinette County], 
Wisconsin. She was received into the order of the School Sisters of Notre 
Dame at the mother house in Milwaukee on 14 August 1887, at the age of 
twenty-four, and is known as Sister Laetitia, and is a very accomplished 
woman. (8) Thomas is a young man at home on the farm; (9) Vincent is the 
youngest of the family and is now twenty-four years of age [thus born about 
1869].

Mr. and Mrs. O'MALLEY and son Vincent, in January 1882, took at trip to New 
Orleans, to see their daughter, Sister Mary Francis, who was at that time 
nursing the sick in Providence Retreat Hospital, whom they had not seen since 
her first departure from home, in 1866. They also knelt at the vault [p 166] 
which contained the dear remains of their daughter, Sister Felicitia, and on 
their return visited many friends in Chicago, who they had not met in years. 
Mr. O'MALLEY always had a great desire to view once more his native land, so, 
after receiving full consent of his wife, who preferred remaining on land, 
set sail for his old home in Ireland, 14 June 1882, landed the 21st, after 
seven days of very enjoyable voyage. While all around him were seasick he 
boasts of never missing a meal. He was also accompanied by his son, Michael, 
who was at that time attending college at the Seminary of Our Lady of Angels, 
Suspension Bridge [the Brooklyn Bridge, completed in May 1883, thus Brooklyn; 
at 4th Ave & 74th St.], New York. Time had wrought wonderful changes in that 
old home since Mr. O'MALLEY's boyhood days. Of the companions of his youth 
few were left to greet him now, some dead and others gone to lands unknown; 
not a trace of the house in which he was born, but he recognized the very 
spot where it stood, every hill he had climbed in youthful days, as well as 
other places of interest which he had known. He arrived home in August 
[1882], after an absence of two months, fully convinced that there was no 
place like his American home.

Mr. O'MALLEY now owns nearly 400 acres of land in one body, and has more than 
half of it under cultivation, and the balance in timber. He has 150 acres in 
corn and oats, keeps forty head of cattle, [and] a number of work horses. He 
feeds all of his corn to stalled cattle and hogs, and turns out as high as 
150 hogs and from fifteen to twenty beeves [head of beef] yearly. In his 
politics Mr. O'MALLEY is a Democrat, and is one of the most highly respected 
men in this county.

Biography of Joseph O'MALLEY - pp 354-355 [brother of Thomas; uncle of James]

Joseph O'MALLEY was born in Westport [County Mayo], Ireland, in December 1841, 
a son of Michael O'MALLEY, who was born in the same place, and there his 
grandfather was also born. Our subject was less than four years of age when 
his parents came to America, in 1845. They settled on 160 acres of 
Government land, being a part of our subject's present farm of 320 acres.

The town of Westport [in Dane County, WI] was named by Michael O'MALLEY, in 
honor of his native town. They first built a rough log cabin, into which 
they moved with their children, the brothers and sisters of our subject being 
named as follows: Thomas, John, Patrick, Ellen, Catherine, Michael, Martin, 
Dominick, Mary, Hannah; James, who died when an infant; James [the second of 
that name], who is now a Catholic priest; and [Joseph] the subject of this 
sketch.

Our subject [Joseph] was reared on this place, and it has been his pleasant 
home ever since. He has had good school advantages, staring at the age of 
seven years to the common schools taught in the rude log houses, with rough 
slabs for seats, and where he desks were merely slabs fastened against the 
wall, upon wooden pins driven into augur holes in the logs. At the age of 
nineteen he quit the district school which he attended from two to four weeks 
in each year from his seventh, and then went to Sinsinawa Mounds College, 
then a college of young men and later to the college of the Lady of the 
Sacred Heart, at Niagara [Niagara County, NY].

Although our subject has never engaged in any business except farming, he has 
seen much of the world. In the summer of 1878 [p 355] he took a trip to 
Europe and visited his native land, being well pleased with his old country. 
He traveled through Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales, and bought a fine 
young Clydesdale stallion in Scotland from Gloucestershire, and also a large 
Cotswold ram for his farm. Previously he had traveled in Canada and imported 
from there in 1870, three Cotswold rams, which were the first brought to this 
country. He had engaged extensively in the breeding of fine horses, sheep 
and cattle since that time. A fine Durham bull is also kept. For the past 
ten years he has rented his tillable land, and during the summer he keeps a 
herd of cattle on his range, and sells in the fall. Formerly he fed stock 
for the market, shipping to Chicago, taking to market several carloads per 
year.

The parents of our subject died on the farm, the mother surviving the father 
some ten years, dying at about the age of seventy-six years. His brothers 
and sisters have become good people, all of the brothers embracing 
agriculture except James, who was educated for the priesthood. He was a 
student at Sinsinawa Mounds and also Milwaukee and Toronto, Canada, then 
attended college at Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and lastly at Niagara Falls. 
Father O'MALLEY has been very successful in his calling, is a leading 
temperance reformer, and is the beloved and popular priest of St. Peter's 
Church at Oshkosh [Winnebago County, WI], where he has a congregation of 400 
Roman Catholics, and also many Protestants who admire him. Drunkenness is 
unknown in his parish. He was president of the Catholic State Temperance 
Society, of Wisconsin, for years, and the cause of temperance among the Irish 
is very strong. Father O'MALLEY is Vicar General of the Green Bay Diocese.

Our subject [Joseph O'MALLEY] has traveled some in the U. S., having spent 
the winter of 1885-1886 in New Orleans. He has a fine home in Waunakee [Dane 
County, WI], where he spends his winters, closing the farm house, but when 
summer comes he goes back to the old farm. He has no family, having never 
married, but contrives to make himself comfortable with plenty of hired help. 
The farm house is an unpretentious cottage, but is most delightfully 
situated among the native trees, which form a beautiful driveway from the 
door to the main road.

Biography of James R. O'MALLEY - pp 353-354 [nephew of Joseph & Thomas]

James R. O'MALLEY, a successful farmer of Dane County, Wisconsin, is a son of 
Patrick and Mary (WELSH) O'MALLEY. The father [Patrick, who was a brother of 
Joseph and Thomas, whose biographies are above] was born in County Mayo, 
Ireland, in 1819, a son of Michael O'MALLEY, a farmer of that county. The 
latter [Michael] reared a family of seven sons and two daughters, and his 
death occurred in Wisconsin at the age of sixty-three years. In 1846 Patrick 
O'MALLEY, the father of our subject, purchased eighty acres of land on 
section 14, Dane County. Three years later, in 1849, he [Patrick O'MALLEY] 
went with his brother, Martin, to California, but returned one year 
afterward, via the Isthmus, having made considerable money. He then added to 
his original purchase in Dane County until he owned 280 acres, where he 
remained until 1880, and in that year removed to the farm our subject now 
occupies. At his death he [Patrick] left an estate of about 700 acres of 
land and a large amount of personal property. He was engaged in general 
farming and stock raising, but gave his attention principally to the growing 
of short-horned cattle. He sold large numbers every year, and also kept [p 
354] many on his farm. Mr. [Patrick] O'MALLEY was a prominent and respected 
citizen, was a Democrat in his political views, was a member of the School 
Board for twenty-seven years, a leading member of the Catholic Church, was 
one of the founders and builders of the St. Marys of the Lake; was buried on 
the family lot in the cemetery there.

Patrick O'MALLEY was first married to Elizabeth O'KEEFE, and they had six 
children: (1) Mary, now Sister Mary Alfonzo, at Plattsmouth [Cass County], 
Nebraska; (2) Catherine, now Sister Mary Dominic, of Washington, D. C.; (3) 
Ellen, formerly a teacher, died at her home at the age of twenty-three years; 
(4) Cecily, formerly a pupil of St. Clara's Academy, of Grant County, 
Wisconsin, is now a teacher of Green River [Sweetwater County], Wyoming; (5) 
Michael O., is one of the most extensive farmers and perhaps the most 
successful of this county [Dane County, WI]; he is married and has two 
children; and (6) Francis, a graduate of St. Clara's Academy, has taught for 
the past six years, and is now at home. The mother [Elizabeth (O'KEEFE) 
O'MALLEY] died in March 1865, at the age of thirty-six years.

The father [Patrick O'MALLEY] afterward married the mother of our subject, 
Mary nee WELSH, who was born in County Wexford, Ireland, and came to America 
with her parents in 1849, at the age of twelve years. After a long and 
stormy voyage they landed in New York, and came at once to Wisconsin, where 
the father [Mr. WELSH] died, at the age of sixty, and the mother at 
sixty-five years.

Mr. and Mrs. O'MALLEY [Patrick and Mary (WELSH) O'MALLEY] lost one child by 
death, a daughter, Hannah, an infant. Their children who grew to years of 
maturity are: (1) James R., our subject; (2) Charlotte, a pupil at 
Sinsinawa [Grant County], Wisconsin; (3) William, attending the St. Thomas 
Seminary at St. Paul, Minnesota; and (4) Dominic, aged sixteen years, is at 
home. The father [Patrick O'MALLEY] died 21 Dec 1882, aged sixty-three 
years, and the mother [Mary (WELSH) O'MALLEY] on 27 November 1890, at the age 
of fifty three years.

Submitted by Cathy Kubly