Civil War Soldiers Who Didn't Come Home

 During my first round of research [1990-2018], I found my Mom's great-grandfather, Aaron Crail, and two of his brothers Sylvester and John as Civil War soldiers who made it home.

 Aaron had contracted consumption during the siege of Atlanta. He returned home and died from the disease in 1868, leaving a wife and six children.

Sylvester was wounded and captured, serving a brief time as a POW. He retuned home and died at the Indiana State Soldiers Home in 1898. His wound led to complications later in life and he died a shell of the young man who joined the Union Army.

John served with Aaron during the Atlanta Campaign. Conditions there led to a cold that settled in his back and, like his brother Sylvester, was in extremely ill health until his death in 1906.

Research Round 2 [2018-present] focuses on my birth family. There were quite a few Civil War volunteers, all  Union.

James Clark, Thomas Arbuckle, Charles Everhart, Hiram Boyles and William Hogue all served in Indiana regiments.

Only Charles Everhart and William Hogue returned home. None fell to Confederate fire. All fell to various diseases and were buried in National Cemeteries far from home.

[to be continued.....]

1950 Census Observations

 Like most genealogists/family historians, I was looking forward to the release of the 1950 census. Tring to maneuver the Enumeration District was a challenge, bit I managed to find most of my birth and adopted family and my wife's family.

Once the indexed images were available, I started the hunt for my birth parents. 

My birth father's identity isn't set in concrete, but a first cousin is fairly sure of which George brother is the most likely candidate. Interestingly enough, all three brothers were living together in Indianapolis. 

The search for my birth mother was a different story. Nada! I knew she had to be in Indianapolis. However, not one search was successful. First name, middle name, last name. 

The story that was passed on to me by cousins is that my birth mother and a couple of brothers or brothers-in-law moved to Indy about 1949-50. I haven't found her brother in the '50 census either.

That leads me to believe that all of Indy hasn't been indexed as of yet.

I did turn to one of my favorite sources, the city directory.  The 1951 City Directory for Indianapolis shows my mother and uncle living in the city. So I know they were there.

Her address is given and her occupation - "helper." That's about as general as you can get! Unfortunately, her place of work is not given.

The waiting game for ALL of the 1950 census to be indexed continues.

Eastern Kentucky Roots

 Quite a number of my "birth families" settled in eastern Kentucky after migrating from western Virginia and the Carolinas. My ancestors called Greenup, Boyd, Lawrence, Floyd, Johnson, Morgan and Carter home for a few months to several years. A few families resided in several counties and never moved, as their home county broke off to for another county, them reformed again.

Interestingly enough, nearly all of my birth families end up in that eastern Kentucky region. A Virginia to western Virginia to Kentucky route was most common. Virginia to the western parts of North and South Caroliina into Kentucky was another common migation route. A few families arrived in Pennsylvania , New York or New Jersey before migrating south. All of the families eventually settled in southern Indiana.

There were a few exceptions of course. The George family moved to the coal fields of Ohio before my grandfather opted for the coal mines of Knox Co., Indiana.

The Hogues traveled from New Jersey south to Virginia, but took the Ohio River to Indiana, bypassing Kentucky settlements. The Phillippis, Evilsizers and a few other families followed a similar path to Knox Co.

The Colegroves were an exception to the rule: New York to Indiana.

Online research in these Kentucky counties is tricky. Family Search has some records available for home-based research. The fact that Kentucky [and some other states] have preserved early tax records is a blessing.

Hopefully, those eastern Kentucky counties will put more records online!

Another suspicious family!

 I am trying to return to the blog, hopefully! So here goes......

Yesterday I began re-examining my paternal Alleine family. One would think that if just about every source in print and nearly every family tree available have the same information, then you'd think there would be no issues. Right? Not so fast.

Isabelle Alleine [1655-1740] was the daughter of Joseph Alleine [1633-1668] and his cousin Theodosia Alleine [1635-1681].. Joseph was a renowned pastor in Taunton, England.

Isabelle married John Rutherford [1653-1737/40]. 

Rutherford was a Presbyterian minister in Scotland and later in County Down, Ireland.. John and Isabelle had a daughter, Catherine, who married John Walker in Wigton, Scotland and later immigrated to.Pennsylvania.

All nice and tidy, except for a few issues:

1) In his will dated 18 Oct 1667, Joseph Alleine did not name ANY children. Wife, brother, niece, nephew, and other family members were named, but no daughter Isabelle.

2) In Alleine's writings and those of his wife, there was no mention of children.

3) I have found no references to the Alleines living in Scotland or Ireland [or Rutherford in Taunton], necessary for Isabelle and John Rutherford to meet.

4) None of the primary sources confirm a daughter, Isabelle, born to Joseph and Theodosia. 

Conclusions: 

1) The Alleines had no children or Joseph, for some reason, did not name his daughter.

2) The Alleines had no children.

3) If the Alleines did not visit Scotland or Ireland and John Rutherford did not visit Taunton, then Isabelle Alleine, daughter of Joseph, did not marry John Rutherford of Scotland and County Down, Ireland.

4) Joseph and Theodosia apparently did not have a daughter named Isabelle.

How could all of those sources naming Isabelle Alleine as the daughter of Joseph and Theodosia be wrong [if, indeed they are]? Someone back in that wonderful era of "fuzzy genealogy research and publication" printed it and all who followed piggy-backed on the first. 

Could they be correct? Yes, but doubtful.

Final conclusion: John Rutherford may have married a woman named Isabelle.

And I thought this one was going to be simple......

 Have you ever started working on a family that you KNEW was going to be an easy one on which to compile the research? AND it wasn't?

I started working on my Stillwell ancestry the other day. I was familiar with the Stillwell Genealogy from connections to the Billiou family, one of my adopted families. So, I figured to rely on that work to cover the first two Stillwell generations - Lt. Nicholas and Captain Nicholas.

What a terrible idea!  Stillwell researchers and passers-down of family lore have spent the late 19th and early 20th centuries confusing the story of immigrant Lt. Nicholas Stillwell.

Who were his parents? Siblings? When did he leave England and for where? The Netherlands, New Netherland or Virginia? Who was/were his wife/wives? 

These and other questions have multiple answers depending on which Stillwell genealogy you read.

Well, I'm sorting out facts from lore and trying to piece together a solid account of Lt. Nicholas Stillwell. I know the name of the wife of Captain Nicholas is open to debate, but hopefully that will be the only major stumbling block.

Hopefully.........

Getting Started on the Birth Family Research

 In researching the birth family, I had to decide where to focus my attention after a flurry look-ups on both sides of the family to flesh out the Ancestry tree that was generated for me by the lady at Ged Match who was helping with sorting out my DNA results.

That tree, entitled "A Big Tree," is a work in progress. Records are added that fit and some are removed because they don't match the person to which they are attached. So there may be quite a bit of incorrect information on the tree until I get a chance to check on a particular family and correct it. 

"A Big Tree" is serving as sort of a holding pen for records and documents as I transfer information to my "Everhart-George Tree" on my RootsMagic software program. This is where the fleshed out details will go home to roost. Still, I hope to make the Ancestry tree as accurate as possible.

I decided to make my maternal line the starting point. I have several families "completed," though subject to additions and corrections. The list includes AKERS, ARBUCKLE, BLAND, CLARK, EDDY, EVERHART, GRAHAM, JOHNSTON, MONTGOMERY, ROGERS & RUSSELL.

Akers is still lacking, and needs some onsite research in Washington Co., IN, as does Russell. My Montgomery research has come to a halt until I can manage a trip to Clark Co. for some work there.

A trip to the Indiana State Library derailed the research - indirectly. I managed to find considerably more information on the paternal families of HOGUE, PHILLIPPE & STEFFY than any of my maternal lines.

The next round of posts will follow the stories of my maternal families, unless something pops up of special interest that is worthy of a post. 

Scots & Scots-Irish Naming of Children: Creative They Ain't!

 So far, in researching my ancestors from Scotland and Ulster, I've learned one thing - those folks were not extremely creative when it came to naming their children, especially the boys. Cases in point.......

Arbuckle: James, James, Thomas, James, Thomas, Thomas, Thomas & James. [Matthew, William, John]

Hogue: William, William, Zebulon, Zebulon, Joseph, William & Irwin. [George, Solomon, James, John, Alexander]

Graham: John, James, James, John & John. [Moses, Thomas, Elias, Joseph, Henry, Edward]

Montgomery: William & William. [John, James, Robert & Thomas.]

[Common siblings names are in parentheses.]

A few strangers pop up here and there. Elias game from a maternal line. I'm guessing Zebulon did as well, but no proof.

With large families, researching can be confusing with such creative naming. I have a James Arbuckle and his nephew James [about 6 years apart] being confused by several researchers for being the same person.

It's not until the most  recent generations that the names get a bit less traditional, Irwin Hogue, for example.

The girls' names are quite similar: Elizabeth, Jane, Ann, Mary, Sarah, Margaret, Frances, Nancy, Susan/Susannah and a few others are found in nearly every generation. Add to that the common nicknames: Betsy, Sally, Fannie, Polly, etc

For  those of you doing Scots & Scots-Irish research hoping to find a plethera of "traditional Scottish given names" such as Donald, Malcolm, Neil, Stuart, Lalan, Alistair, Aec,  Ailsa, Bonnie. Catriona or Eilidh. Hope away! 

I have one Malcom from c1635 and an Ailsa from 1820. 

Expect James, John, William, Thomas, Sarah, Ann, Nancy and Mary to come crawling out of the Highland, Lowland, Borderland and Ulster woodwork!