Introduction

The picture of Hugh Warren in a borrowed photographer's studio version of the Union Army uniform is a simultaneously a symbol of our knowledge of our Warren ancestors and one of frustration that we have been unable to discover who his parents were. Like many Americans of his era, he did not spend a lot of time thinking about his ancestors, or, at least, telling his children about them. His discharge papers survive and they indicate he was born in Pittsburgh around 1830. The census records collected during his life are consistent on his place of birth, although his birth year is a lot more flexible. He worked in and around the coal mines of Allegheny County, first as a miner and then as a coal hauler. He married a Baptist, but lived just down the road from St. Agnes Catholic Church and owned a burial plot in its cemetery. His sister Mary attended Mass at the church and was buried in the cemetery, but none of Hugh's children were baptized there until his daughter Kate, then a young adult, converted shortly after her mother's death. One of his sons claimed his father was born in Kentucky, another that he was born in the Irish Free State, which did not exist during Hugh's lifetime. His grandson told a story about Hugh being born in France of English parents and running away to sea. These stories probably tell us more about Hugh's descendants than about the man himself.