Don,

I think you are a distant cousin of mine on my mother's side! I have a Patrick Connel/Connell born in Ireland around 1829 coming to Canada and marrying a woman named Charlott/Charlotte who was possibly of mixed French Canadian and Native American/First Nations extraction (or so the family lore goes).

Patrick went on to have at least eight children that I have been able to document. I am descended from one of the youngest, Patrick Hugh (he is my great-great grandfather by way of Edward Patrick, who was born 1893 in Grand Rapids, MI).

However, the John E Connell is John Elmer, and I have him as a brother of my great-grandfather, born in 1889 rather than 1879. Do you think these could be the same individual?