PHILIP M. WOLFE (1810–1901)

Philip Maurice "Old Phil" Wolfe was born in 1810 in County Limerick, Ireland, to Maurice Richard Wolfe and Mary Danagher. His siblings included Bridget (b. 1795) Bartholomew "Batt" (b. 1809), Michael Maurice (b. 1813), and Mary (b. 1849).

Little is known of Wolfe's life. He farmed near Athea, Count Limerick. At some point he married Elizabeth Herlihy, and they had a number of children, including Maurice H. (b. 1839), Joseph Philip (b. 1841), Mary (b. 1849), Cornelius (b. 1858), Philip (b. 1859), Michael H., and Patrick (b. 1866).

Wolfe's obituary in the Cork Examiner notes his descent from James Wolfe (ca. 1651–1704), whose family fled "from the city of Limerick in 1653 under the Cromwellian code, and who settled down at Inchreagh, on the banks of the Gale, which was then but a wild uninhabited moorland." The obituary also describes Philip Wolfe as "a grand type of Irish farmer, straightforward, honourable, industrious, over willing to sympathize and assist those in trouble or difficulty."

Elizabeth Herlihy Wolfe died on September 19, 1897, at the age of seventy-eight, and Philip Wolfe on April 14, 1901. He was ninety-one, and according to his obituary "walked upright as at early manhood, and possessed his faculties fully to the end."