I feel like I've been suffering from research-block for a few days. The family that I need to get my data sorted out on is the Reels. The data is somewhat of a jumbled mess. Dates from various sources don't work [parents born about 1740, 1st child born about 1750] & other details don't sort out well.
What I needed was a bit of good genealogy news. It came with the online publication of the April 2013 issue of the NE Historical & Genealogical Register. There was an article by Jerome Lafayette Santken entitled Origins of Mathias and Nicholas Sension Determined. Oh boy! Family!
I had worked on my St. John/Sension line during the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy a few years ago. A fellow St. John researcher felt that Samuel St. John, who was identified as the son of Mathias III in the St. John Genealogy by Orline St. John Alexander [1907], should rightfully be the son of Mathias II. I conducted the "reasonably exhaustive search" required & came to agree that Samuel was assigned to the wrong parents.
The Santken article was my first reunion with my St. John ancestors. Early research tried to tie them to English or Welsh nobility or even Norman origins. Nothing could be further from the truth! Santken came across about 110 variations of the St. John name. As it turned out the family was of Dutch origin.
The family was taken back another two generations & expanded considerably.
Just when you need it, a bit of new info magically appears!!
Mr./Ms. Prall (I apologize!),
ReplyDeleteI am the author of the article and it pleases me to know that my work will have added something substantive to your(our) family's history.
With Best Wishes,
JL Santken