SLIG in Review

My 13th Salt Lake Institute has come to an end. It was an interesting week.
(1) I found a new Mayflower line!
(2) I disproved the new Mayflower line!
(3) I feel reasonably confident that the Martha named in a handful of deeds is indeed the wife on Samuel Clark and mother to Isaac. [Reasonably confident is sometimes as close as you get in genealogy.]
(4) I narrowed the year of death of Samuel Clark to the time between Butler Co. taxes were assessed between 1834 and 1835.
(5) I have Butler Co. Clarks to identify with the wonderfully uncommon given names of James, John and Jonathan. [sigh!]
(6) I have about nine months to decide on my project for 2014.

Salt Lake Update

The wifi at the hotel has been a bit tempramental the last couple of nights, so tonight is a triple-header.

Wed.: My assignment for Wednesday was to offer a "proof argument" for Martha Jane Doty being Samuel Clark's wife. That's the new Mayflower line. Oops! A closer look at signatures on deeds turned the assignment around. The person who transcribed the deeds interpreted a fancy mark for a J or I. In reality the mark was just that, the mark used instead of Martha Clark's signature. Jane could sign her name, Martha could not. The clincher was finally locating the Hamilton Co., OH marriage for Samuel Clark & 'Jeane' Doty in 1798. The Mayflower went down! I spent the day on other records, trying to find a fit for Samuel in KY, MD or PA. I also spent some time working on the Butler Co. tax lists.

Thurs.: My assignment for the day was to map out the various Clarks in Butler Co. Butler has wonderful tax lists. The land description is given for each entry. Some years the list is by township. I used the 1816-1829 tax lists. I located a nice county atlas for 1836, 1875 and 1885. Using the county map with the township sections labled, I was able to plot out the Clarks. Fairfield Twp. had a large contingency, as did Reily Twp., the latter was home to my Samuel and Isaac. [John, John Jr., James and Jonathan were neighbors.] There was a scattering of Clarks elsewhere. I also returned to the tax lists after noticing Isaac was a landowner in 1836, but Samuel was missing. The last year I found Samuel on the lists was 1834, so a death date has been narrowed down! I also located an Isaac Clark [possible name of Samuel's father] in Franklin Co., PA during the 1780s. Franklin borders Maryland! Also found a Samuel Clark in Nelson Co., KY from 1790-1795.

Fri.: I spent most of the day searching Butler deeds, tracking Samuel until his death and Isaac until his move to Indiana. John Colletta was the banquet speaker tonight. As usual, he was highly entertaining!

Salt Lake - Tuesday & The Mayflower

It's always good to reread your material. Yesterday's discovery was better than I thought! A read-through of the Butler Co. deeds verified the fname of Samuel Clark's wife - Martha Jane Doty.

Doty is a "Mayflower name." So, part of the day's search was to check the series of "Mayflower Families through Five Generations" for Edward Doty. Volume 11, Part II provided the following lineage:
1. Edward Doty [servant to Samuel Hopkins] & Faith Clarke [2nd wife]
2. Samuel Doty & Jane Harmon [settled in Piscataway, NJ]
3. Joseph Doty & Sarah Badgley [resided in Essex Co., NJ]
4. John Doty & Sarah Clark [moved to Ohio]
5. Jane [Martha Jane] Doty & Samuel Clark

Of course the book does not list their son, Isaac, and other sources checked have suspect information. Personally, I think it's from a lack of following up on what happened to Martha Jane.

Unfortunately, the books on the Doty family held by the library have the same info or cover different lines of the family. There are several sources cited in Vol. 11 that need to be checked. One with the ominous title Loyalist Clarks, Badgleys and Allied Families [Estelle Clark Watson] happened to be offered on-line at familysearch.org. A quick look at the book gave me Sarah's parents and grandparents. It appears that Sarah's brother, Anthony, was one of the Loyalists, as he moved to Canada.

I found a John Doty in Madison Co., KY in 1790 and Garrard Co., KY in 1800. Garrard was formed from Madison and the northern tip of Lincoln Co.
 
Tomoorow I hope to tackle the Butler Co. Tax Lists from 1816-1836 to see when Samuel Clark no longer appears [narrowing his death date] and the same for Isaac [move to Indiana].

The other folks in the group seem to be making strides toward solving their problems as well.

Salt Lake Institute - Monday

We had our general Problem Solving Meeting this morning at 8:15. After introductions and Q&A, we broke for our group meetings. The format is simple: Each person has 20 minutes to go over his/her problem and receive suggestions from the two consultants. The other group members are free to chime in.

For my project, I'm trying to verify that the father of my ancestor Isaac Clark was Samuel Clark and determine exactly where the family lived before settling in Butler Co., OH. Possible target states are Pennsylvania, Maryland and Kentucky.

My "assignment" for the day was to check reconstructed Kentucky tax lists for 1792-1800; check Carol Bell's book on Ohio Wills and Estates to 1850; Jack Stammons' Pennsylvania in 1780 for Samuel Clark; and Butler Co., OH deeds and probate records.

Eight Samuel Clarks turned up in 1780 PA. There were three Samuel Clark entries for Kentucky in the 1790s : 1790 Fayette & 1792 [50 acres] & 1793 Nelson.

Samuel Clark started appearing in Butler Co., OH tax lists in 1806.

There were 7 Clark entries on the 1812 Butler Co. list - 2 for Samuel!

The Butler Co., Ohio Land Recods Vol. I [1803-1816] & Vol. 2 [1816-1823] provided several interesting entries. The Enyart surname showed up. [Isaac married Polly Enyart.] Two deeds mentioned Samuel's wife, Marthy/Martha. [A Martha Clark married James Bartilow in 1827 & a Martha Partlow was living with Isaac in 1850.] One entry had Samuel's wife as Janey. [Martha Jane?] Those wre the highlights.

It was a short day since the Family History Library closes at 5:00 on Monday. A group of us went to the Cheescake Factory for supper. [Good shrimp!] I elected to skip the evening activities to get ready for Tuesday.

Salt Lake Institute - Sunday

I arrived in Salt Lake about 10:30, checked in at the Crystal Inn Downtown, unpacked and had brunch. The rest of the day was spent relaxing and checking over the consultants' evaluations. The SLIG had registration and a social from 6:00-8:00 at the Radisson to renew old acquaintances and meet a few new folks. Back to the hotel for the rest of the evening.

Oops! I reversed the website for GSMC, it's www.genealogyindy.org.

Another one of my frustrating families is my Crail bunch. James B. & Mary A. [Jones] Crail are missing from all of the pre-1880 censuses. Sons Sylvester, John and Aaron begin to appear in 1860 with spouses and kids. James and Mary appear in townlot transactions in Shelby Co., IN in 1851-1854, then vanish. Widowed Mary appears in the Indy Directories from 1875 until her death in 1887. There's a possible 4th son named George B. Crail, but he doesn't appear in any family records including Civil War pension files.

It appears that James was probably the eldest son of James Berry Crail Sr., but my James doesn't appear with the rest of the family. There is one link, James B. appears in a Hamilton Co., OH tax list with a couple of possible brothers at the time he should be there.

And yes, I've checked for Sylvester in 1850. You'd think he'd jump off the page!

Next post from the beautiful Crystal Inn Downtown, Salt Lake City!!

Faucett Family Wish List

Countdown to Salt Lake: 2 days. Both consultant evaluations have arrived, so I can do some preliminary online searching Sunday.

The Genealogical Society of Marion Co. [Indy] meets tomorrow at the Eagle Branch Library from 1:00-3:00. We will have a roundtable on "Brick Wall Problems." All are invited to bring a tough research problem for attendees to try to offer assistance in solving. [www.indygenealogy.org]

I still have a couple of Faucett family wishes.

1] Find the parents of John Faucett, who was born in 1751 in the Greenbriar Valley of Augusta Co., Virginia. [Now Greenbriar Co., WV]

2] Track down the marriage record of John Faucett & Eve Fry in PA, VA or OH.

3] Find out where Thomas Faucett fits in the mix. He is recorded as John's son [Ohio deeds, John's will], but isn't listed with the kids of John & Eve.

Billiou - DuBois Mysteries

Marie/Maria Billiou was the 1st wife of Arent Jansen Prall. They married in Kingston/Wiltwyck, NY in 1670. She was the daughter of  Pierre Billiou, one of the 1660 proprietors of Staten Island. Her uncle was Louis DuBois, one of the leading settlers in the Kingston-New Paltz area. There are two mysteries, of sorts, surrounding Marie.

(1) Speculation is that Marie accompanied her aunt and uncle to New Netherland to help care for her younger relatives. There is no record, to date, as to which ship the DuBois family arrived on, so we don't know if Marie was with them. Accounts of the capture of Francoise DuBois and her children do not include mention of her niece. The first mention of  Marie is her marriage record, with Uncle Louis granting permission. Had she come to America with her uncle's family? Most likely. The passenger list for the Billious does not include a daughter of Marie's age. [Arent was a wheelwright in Kingston. The Pralls moved to Staten Island as their family began to grow in the mid-1670s.

(2) Pierre Billiou's will [1699] mentioned the 8 children of his deceased daughter Maria Prall. There were nine children named in Arent's 1721 will. No one seemed to pick up on that little discrepency. Arent named one of his sons-in-law and a brother of son Peter's wife to look after son Johannes, who suffered from some physical or mental disability. Some early Prall researchers believed that Arhave to do.ent's 2nd wife was Tryntje Christopher [mother of Peter Prall's wife Maria.] I believe that Johannes was the son of Arent and Tryntje, not Arent and Marie.

It would be nice to uncover documentation to clear up both mysteries. Until then, circumstantial evidence will

Countdown to Salt Lake!!

The trip to Utah for the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy is a mere six days away! I managed to secure non-stop flights for both legs of the trip. As soon as the consultants' evaluations arrive, I can begin preliminary planning for the research on my Clark family. I'll spend a leisurely Sunday afternoon at the Crystal Inn Downtown, then attend the registration and social in the evening. The real work and fun begins after the Monday breakfast and orientation. A two hour consultation session with my problem solving group and then off to the Family History Library for the rest of the day!

Missing Family & A Famous Lineage Mystery

Yippee! I received a response to my query on my missing Prall link. More on that in a later post.

One of the lines I'm working on for my girlfriend is the Stone family. The line is proven back to Marshall Stone, who was in the Revolutionary War from Maryland. [c1748 VA - after 1791 MD] Marshall is possibly descended from Colonial Maryland's 1st Protestant Governor, William Stone [1609-1660]. So far tracking down a complete online lineage for Gov. Stone that accurately covers up to the Rev War is a serious challenge! If anyone can help, drop me a line.

A Possible Interesting Start to the New Year?

One of my challenges has been tracking down the son of my grandfather from his first marriage. I was able to locate his birth record and his parents' marriage record. I had previously located the divorce record. I was doing a follow-up search on Ancestry.com earlier today and came up with a family tree. I sent a message to the person who posted the tree and will, hopefully, be able to contact some descendants.

That is one of the few remaining gaps in my Prall lineage. Maybe that gap will close!