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My great-great-grand-father Jeremiah O'Sullivan was walking along on the board sidewalk one day and an English 'Peeler' was walking on the same sidewalk in the opposite direction. The Peeler demanded that Jeremiah step off the boardwalk into the mud so he could freely swagger along on the clean boardwalk. Jeremiah responded; "This is Ireland, and I am Irish. You get out of my way". The Peeler raised his Billy club and Jeremiah introduced him to the working end of a shillelagh. The Peeler woke up stuffed in a garbage can. The Judge gave Jeremiah three days to get out of Ireland. Jeremiah replied he only needed one and left Ireland.

It appears Jeremiah was head of the household in Ireland, since Jeremiah & Mary (Hammil) O Sullivan, Jeremiah & Catherine O Sullivan, Patrick O Sullivan, Lenora O Sullivan, and Patrick William Hammil left Ireland as a clan. Upon landing in Boston, Jeremiah denounced everything Irish and dropped the 'O' from the last name.

It seems the others did likewise. Since, before the 1850 census, they all moved to Pike County, Indiana. They lived as neighbors in three out of four houses in a row. Most Irishman living in Pike County, Indiana worked on the Wabash-Erie Canal, and attended Catholic Church in neighboring Daviess County, Indiana.

Jeremiah was born in about 1808, in County Cork, Ireland, his wife Mary was born in about 1819, also in Ireland. After they settled in Indiana, they had five children; Mark, Flurey (Florence), Patrick, Jeremiah Jr., and Honora. Sometime around 1854 they moved to Illinois where they had two more children; Christopher and Cornelius.

During the 1850 Indiana Census of 1850, Jeremiah & Mary were registered as Jerey and Mary Sulavan, but Jerry's name was corrected by the time Jeremiah, Jr. was born in 1853. Jerey was a family farmer and died in Washington, Carroll County, Illinois. Mary also died in Washington, Illinois.

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