Mary Bergen and Timothy Kennedy

So let's move on to another of William "Pop" Bergen's siblings.  Today's post will be what I have learned about his sister Mary Bergen.  By the way, I would never have made any of these connections if I wasn't searching my stuff for "blog fodder".  In my post about Thomas Bergen and Margaret Carroll, I posted a picture of Thomas's obit, which mentioned that he had a sister Mary (which I knew), but it gives her married name as Kennedy - another brush with fame?? I think not.

Anyway, I found that I had previously gotten a copy of the pages in the church ledger book for the marriage of Thomas Bergen and Margaret Carroll.  I got this through familysearch.org.  When you find any info on their site, it usually lists a FHL (Family History Library) Microfilm number.  Then you go the the closest Family History Center (mine is in Eatontown,  NJ) and order the film.  You will get an email when it arrives and you can go and check the film at the Family History Center on their microfilm readers.  Then you can either print a copy or save a digital copy on a flash drive.  So that's what I did with the following results.
On the left side of the ledger (from St. Mary's Church in Jersey City) it gives the date of June 14, 1896, the names of the bride and groom and their parents names (with mother's maiden name):

They are the last marriage ceremony listed, so the information is in the last two lines on each page under the number 2812. On the right side of the ledger it gives the names of the witnesses and the Priest who performed the ceremony:

Pretty good right?  Well, look at the witnesses (again the last two lines):  Timothy Kennedy and Mary Bergen - could it be this easy?  I have had this info for several years and never realized what I was looking at.  By the way Thomas Bergen and Margaret Carroll were married by Father James Mooney.

So now I started searching for Mary Bergen and Timothy Kennedy on familysearch.org.  The first thing that I found was this:

This is the birth of Timothy Kennedy on 19 Jul 1898 to Mary Bergen and Timothy Kennedy.  Okay, so I am hoping that they were married before this, but I could not find anything.  Then I realized that when I searched, I used the time frame of 1896 (the wedding of Thomas and Margaret) because Mary was listed as Bergen and I assumed she was still single.  Then I pushed the search time back to 1890 and the first record I found was this one:

Well, that was close.  Here is Mary Bergen and Timothy Kennedy's marriage in Jersey City 16 Aug 1895.  This also lists parents of the bride and groom:  Edward Bergen and Mary Maloney (every other record says Malone) for Mary and Denis Kennedy and Mary Egan for Timothy.  This also gives a birth year for the bride as 1863 and Timothy as 1869 - does that make her a "cougar"?  Sorry mom, please forgive me for that comment I meant no disrespect.  I think the term they used back then was "spinster" - and you earned that title if you were an unmarried female at age 16 - YIKES!  Anyway, she was 32 and he was 26.

She must have used her maiden name to be a witness for her brother Thomas' wedding because she was already married at the time.  Good thing she did too, cause I may never have made the connection if she hadn't.  I am thinking that she was looking for me to find her someday - but she wasn't too eager because these are the only documents that I found so far.  No more children, and no census records - just a marriage and a child.  So I will just keep looking - cause I'm sure there is more.  I'll keep you posted.