This article was in the Pensacola News Journal as part of the St Michaels Cemetery restoration.

There are also 2 other articles on Dunn.

By the 1850s, about 3 million Irish and Scottish immigrants had come to North America to create a better life for themselves and their descendants. Among them were the parents of Edward Thomas Dunn, citizens of Ireland who settled in the United States, and the parents of Mary Frances Connolly, residents of Scotland who immigrated to Canada.

On May 14, 1840, Edward Thomas Dunn was born in St. Albins, Vt. His future wife, Mary Frances Connolly was born in Quebec on Jan. 22, 1846. Their first child, Maud, was likely born in Canada. In 1868, Mary Frances gave birth to their second daughter, Clara, in Quebec. Shortly thereafter, the family moved to Pensacola where Mary Frances gave birth to their first son, Frank Mark, on Feb. 11, 1871.

Once in Florida, Edward worked as a stevedore, one who loads and unloads ships, in the area’s thriving maritime economy. During the yellow fever epidemic of 1876, he formed a company J.P. Jones, Dunn and Co., with his fellow stevedores. They specialized in removing ballast and fumigating ships putting into port in order to stem the spread of yellow fever.

(Larry Feldhaus note:  I believe the writers took literally what Henry Davision is reported to have said below to indicate an actual company had been formed by the Mayor of Pensacola and Edward Dunn.  I think he was being sarcastic when he made that statement.)

William Henry Davison, a Boston-born civil engineering graduate of Harvard, served as the port inspector of the Pensacola quarantine station during this time. His duties often brought him into contact with Edward Dunn. Davison’s diary records many derogatory observations of Edward and his co-workers, including insights into Edward’s close business relationship with the mayor of Pensacola. At one point, Davison comments negatively on Jones, Dunn and Co. who in their leisure, run the city of Pensacola.� He also suggests that Edward seems to think that he has the supreme command of quarantine.� Despite these criticisms, Edward Dunn was probably concerned with supporting his growing family.

After Frank, more children followed: John J. in 1877; Florence in 1879; and Webb in 1885. The family lived in a house at Palafox and Garden streets. Edward and Mary were doting parents, purchasing a piano for Maud and Clara to enhance their musical talents. Since their arrival in Pensacola, the Dunns had become an important part of the community and owned multiple house lots in the city.

In 1885, Maud married John Williams (Larry Feldhaus note: She actually married Edward Heath Williams, my great-grandfather) on March 17 at St. Michael’s Catholic Church. In 1891, Clara became Mrs. Zere Middlebrook in a simple civil ceremony presided over by the county judge, the Hon. L. M. Brooks. According to the Pensacola Daily News,

Edward and Mary did not approve of their daughter’s suitor. However, Clara and Zere Middlebrook were too in love to remain apart. Though a new resident of Pensacola, Zere Middlebrook’s employer, Louisville and Nashville Railroad, reassigned him to Montgomery where the newlyweds set up residence. The couple’s newfound happiness and the foundation of the Dunn household shattered in 1895 when Mary took ill at their new home 30 W. Wright St. and died from congestion of the brain on Nov. 9. This early medical term referred to a variety of possible diseases, including hydrocephalus, meningitis, and cerebral hemorrhage, among others. Many residents of Pensacola attended the funeral. Her remains were laid to rest in St. Michael’s cemetery in the Dunn family mausoleum. Edward’s period of grief was relatively short. He married Ada Quigley nine months later, on Aug. 17, 1896. For the youngest living child, Florence, these changes may have been too stressful. In 1897, Edward transferred her guardianship to his oldest son, Frank. Florence did not remain under Frank’s guardianship for long. At age 18, she became Mrs. C. B. Hall. (My note: See Florence's picture on Maude Dunn's web page and the note relative to her meeting and marrying the sheriff while visiting her sister Maude in Arkansas.)

Following her marriage, Frank married Laura Helen Marsh, daughter of a prominent local medical doctor, in the Marsh home in the Pensacola social event of November 1902. Father McCafferty of St. Michael’s Church performed the ceremony and more than 200 guests attended the reception.

Only two years later, shortly after the birth of his grandson, Charles Mather, Edward died at his residence on Wright Street at 2 a.m. Dec. 22, 1904. The Pensacola Daily News described him as a man known by nearly everybody in Pensacola.� He was buried with Mary in the Dunn family mausoleum in St. Michael’s Cemetery.