Mystery Monday - Patrick William Creeden

I've run into a bit of a brick wall in trying to find information on Patrick William Creedan. He was born in Clinton County, Ohio around 1865 to my 3x great-grandfather Patrick Creedan and his second wife, Hannah Hoover. The family is in Clinton County, Ohio in the 1870 and 1880 census records.

Patrick is 5 in the 1870 census which was taken on June 23, 1870 in Wayne Township in Clinton County, Ohio.

Patrick W. is 16 in the 1880 census which was taken on the June 6, 1880 in Wayne Township.

In 1883, his father Patrick died and left a portion of his estate to his son Patrick William. That's the last definite trace I have of Patrick William.

I've found several more records that could be for Patrick William, but the name given is William or W. P. Creeden. My guess is he may have gone by William since his father's name was also Patrick.

The marriage record shown above states that W. P. Creeden married Mary C. Snyder on August 24, 1885 in Clinton County, Ohio. Several Ancestry.com trees have this marriage as May 16, 1885 in Ross County, Ohio, but there are no sources. I've been unable to find any Creeden marriage records in Ross County.

In 1887, Quaker records from Clinton County show that a John and William Creeden were received by request. The record lists John's wife Minerva and his son Hiram, but no family for William. In 1889, there is a disunity record for John, Minerva, Hiram and William, meaning that they left the Quaker group or were asked to leave for some reason. Although I can't tell for sure who William is, the John in the records is a match for the son of Patrick Creedan and brother of Patrick William Creedan.

In the 1900 census, William and Mary C. Creeden are living in Darke County with their children Minnie, Elsie, Orval, Ralph, Elzworth, William, and Mary O. They've been married for 15 years. The entry right above them is for a John and Ida Creedan and their children Flora and Stella. This is a match for Patrick William's brother John and John's second wife Ida. William's birth date is May 1864 according to this census record.

Kansas had a state census in 1905 and William and Mary C. Creeden are living in Sedgwick County as of March 1, 1905.The same children are listed, plus Violet. It looks like Mary O. from the 1900 census goes by Opal in this census. John Creedan lived out his life in Darke and Mercer counties in Ohio and died in Mercer County in 1923. William died in 1909 and is buried in Pratt, Kansas. His gravestone says he lived from 1862-1909, so that birth date is a bit earlier than any of the census records.

There is another William Patrick Creeden of about the same age in Ohio during this time. This William was the son of Timothy and Ellen Creeden in Hamilton County. A marriage record for him showed that he married Margaret Nolan in 1883 and consent was given by his father Timothy.

In the 1900 census record shown above, William and Margaret Creeden are living in Hamilton County with children Thomas, Michael, and Laurence. William was born in Feb. 1863. Timothy and Ellen also had a son named Laurence, so that name seemed to run in their family. I mention this William since I've seen records for him confused with the William who went to Kansas.

A death certificate and/or obituary for the Kansas William might help clear this up, but so far, I've been unable to find one online. According to the Kansas Historical Society, death certificates weren't kept by the state until 1911. Records before that may have been kept at the county or city clerk's office, but not all of these survived. The historical society has microfilm for some vital records, but I don't see anything for Pratt or Sedgwick. I'll post an update if I locate any additional records.