My family tree

About the Snell Ancestry: Family lore produced by a descendant of William Snell (b.1790) says that Edmund (b.1845) and Michael (b.1843) Snell are brothers, and that William Snell b. 1790 is related to some UNKNOWN way to the brothers. The death certificate of Michael Snell (q1843-1905) says that his father was John Snell and mother's name was unknown. Family lore says that Ed Snell's father died when Ed was 2 years old, hence placing the date of the death of John Snell at 1847. It is only conjecture that William Snell MAY be the brother of John Snell, and that their father's name was Michael Snell. Michael's name is the only Snell found in available records of the area who could be the father of Joh, but it is far from proven fact. --Source: Delores McDonald 5975-B Harrell Place, Ft. Polk, LA 71459 on 12 Jan 1985.

Edmund was an orphan when he came to America with his brother, Michael. At the bidding of his uncle William Snell, he came to Seneca, Wisconsin about 1862. It wasn't long until he met and married Mary Crawford on May 3, 1868.

Edmund Snell and several of his older sons left Wisconsin for Nebraska in 1878. It is believed that the postmaster in Columbus, Cornelius Snell, was instrumental in getting Ed Snell to make the move. Cornelius was the grandson of William Snell of Seneca, Wisconsin. With the help of Michael Sullivan the Ed Snell family located a homestead six miles southwest of the Cedar River in the Freeman Valley precinct of Greeley County, Nebraska. They built a sod house, and six months later, Mary and the younger children from Wisconsin arrived by train in Columbus. It was a 70 mile trip on horseback from Columbus to their new home in the Cedar Valley. Homestead papers were filed at the land office in Grand Island, Nebraska on May 30, 1879, for 160 acres of land. On May 5, 1884, Edmund Snell became a U.S. citizen in Albion, Nebraska. Edmund Snell died in 1895. In 1902, his widow, Mary, and the family moved to the Belfast area, about eight miles northwest of Greeley. She and her son Michael Snell filed on adjoining 640 acre homesteads. Mary Crawford Snell died while working in her yard on December 18, 1915. Edmund and Mary Snell are buried in st. Michael's Cemetery in Spalding, Nebraska.

Written by a great-granddaughter Joan Glaser: The Edmund Snell Family " Edmund Snell and several sons arrived in Halifax, now Spalding, in 1878. From Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, they herded livestock and drove hose and ox drawn wagons containing farming equipment and furniture. Their first home was dug-out. Mrs. Snell, girls and younger sons arrived in Columbus by train a few months later. Mr. Snell met them for the 70 mile trip to their new home in the Cedar Valley.

Pioneer hardship of the Snells included hauling water from a neighbor's farm for several months by ox team and fording the river every time they went to the postoffice in Halifax or Mass in the Sullivan home. A trip for supplies to Columbus took a week.

Edmund Snell was born in Curraghmore,County Cork, Ireland in 1845. His parents died when he was 2, and older members of the family went to America. They sent for him when he was 17 years old. He arrived in New York in 1862.

Edmund Snell died in 1885. His wife and their son, Mike, Filed for homesteads when the Kincaid Act went into effect wherein a secion of land could be homesteaded in the Sandhills. Her homestead was a mile west of Highway 281 and the Spalding turn. She died while working in her yard in 1915. They are buried in Calvary Cemetery at Spalding."

Two children were born in New York and nine more in Sisconsin. In 1878, Edmond preceded his wife and children to Nebraska, settling about fifteen miles northeast of Greeley-to-be.

Of the children, Margaret, Dennis, Michael, Frances, Ella and Stephen were members of Sacred Heart parish for some part of their adult lives. Will was a newspaper publisher in Columbus. Ed left on horseback for the west in 1898, and was never again heard from. Steve was injured in World War I. The last mamber of this family died in 1973. Mike's wife, Ruby, died April 7, 1978.

Alternate marriage date: 3 May 1868, Wisconson.