Ancestor ethnicity roll call! Check in, everybody.

[CBHagman]

How were your ancestors identified? Do you even know? Check in here.

The object is to find out where your research is directed and what resources you still lack. The more we share, the more we find out.

So who's on your list of People to Find? Hessian mercenaries from the Revolutionary War? The Choctaw? Celts? Or -- gulp -- the whole ethnically messy crowd in Central and Eastern Europe?

What resources do you employ? Do you even have any?

I've wanted to zero in on one small branch of my family, an Irish branch, probably from County Mayo, but despite posting on various message boards, I'm not getting anywhere (yet).

As for the rest of the family -- oy, don't get me started. We're Swedish, English, and some kind of Hungarian blend (And no, that last is not an item at Starbucks!). ;-)

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Some very easy, some hard

My "black holes" deal mainly with orphaned relatives. My husband's grandmother was born just before the 1900 census was taken in AR, and was orphaned at an early age, according to the family. I can't find her in the AR, OK, or TX censuses for 1900-1920. Apparently the family didn't like answering the census. Anyway, her death certificate gives NO mother's name, and a father's name of Joseph Smith! I've tracked down EVERY Joseph Smith in AR in 1900, and looked up to families in 1910--none fit. I was told the family had moved to OK--no information there, either. And even though her husband's obit gave a date and location of their marriage, there is no marriage record to be found there. Really a stumper.

My great-great grandmother, according to my grandfather, had a certain surname and certain parents. But when I started looking things up, I found out her so-called "parents" were married 5 years after her birth, and 8 years after the birth of her brother! In the Illinois 1880 census both are living with the "parents", but have a different surname. I've searched and searched for where they came from--neither "parent" was married before, and no sibling of either married and died, leaving two orphans. Cousins I've come across say they've always heard there was a story behind those two---but no one knows the story!

I've also had trouble finding information in Germany, especially Saxony, but when I started my research the locations I needed were in East German hands. I really need to get back and check out information online about these places.

[CBHagman]

2. Oy, orphans.

I really feel for you if you're in that sort of situation. And I notice everything is affected by who's filling out the death certificate/census form. Have you had any luck with things like death notices in the newspaper? Sometimes family information comes out that way. I got my great-great-grandmother's maiden name from the obituary of her youngest daughter (!). Great-Great-Grandma's birth name wasn't listed anywhere else, not even on her death certificate.

What's the ethnicity of your husband's grandmother?

There really should be a toolkit for those researching orphans...

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

3. "Black Dutch"

That's what she told him. He has found out since then that it is a code word for Cherokee. She was taken in by a family whose surname was used by the Cherokee--and who were located in the part of Arkansas where the Cherokees lived until they were finally pushed West to OK. He is really bummed about not knowing anything else--he wasn't interested in genealogy before he met me, and by that time his grandparents and parents were dead. Only one aunt was living, and she gave me the information I have. She has sinced passed away. His whole tree is very troublesome--one grandfather lived in NYC, his wife a Russian Jew, the other grandmother probably Cherokee-the only line I've traced is of his maternal grandfather, and earlier generations were easier than the later ones! No information on the Cherokee grandmother in an obituary-and the death certificate was signed by my mother in law. Her husband's obit gave her maiden name as the name of the adoptive family, and said when and where they were married--and there is no record of the marriage in that location!

[IA_Seth]

5. Ok, now really check Illinois..

That family of mine I referred to in my last post were Cherokee. They claimed to be in Arkansas but were on the Illinois census records.

Good luck!

[Cybergata]

28. Trouble finding our Native American Ancestors

All Hispanics from New Mexico have lots of Native American ancestors both from Native groups in New Mexico and Mexico. The worst part is that there was those generations after 1850 who decided to consider themselves Spanish instead of what we really are, a mix of Native America/Spanish/Afro-Hispaño. I love this mixture, but even my father's generation referred to themselves as Spanish.

The earliest López ancestor I can positively claim, Diego López was listed as coyote on the 1750 Spanish census records which means 3/4s Native America. Somewhere in his ancestry there was some man named López from Spain, but everyone else was born in the Americas for generations before him. There is probably no way I'll find any of their names, but I'm pleased to know that my roots in the Americas go very deep. BTW, his wife Juana Candelaria is listed as Mulatta on the records. Later generations were listed as Spanish for some reason, maybe because they all considered themselves subjects of the Spanish King.

I teach U.S. History as well as New Mexican History to middle school aged folks. Diego is a great example of how New Mexico's colonial society was unique from the rest of the world's class minded society. I often find my ancestor Diego López referred to as don Diego López and his wife doña Juana Candelaria. In Spain, don and doña are titles given to the noble class, but in New Mexico it was given to people who had a bit more wealth than usual and were leaders of the community. Nowhere else in the Spanish empire would you find a mostly Indian man and his mulatta wife called don and doña.

Geezzz, school has just ended for me and I can't let go of teaching history. Don't worry, I'll calm down after one more week of rest and relaxation.

[yellerpup]

62. One of my great grandmothers claimed to be Black Dutch

and my mother said that there were some in her family (all very small people) who claimed to be Black Dutch also. There was a Cherokee named Tachee, who was known as Black Dutch (Tachee & Dutch are not far off in pronounciation if you speak Cherokee or Tsalagi as it is spelled in the language) who lived and was on the run often in what is now Eastern Oklahoma but was then part of the Cherokee Nation.

[eowyn_of_rohan]

66. "Black Dutch" has been used very loosely!

My "Black Dutch" ancestor was an early Quaker, born in England, and of English and Welsh ancestry. He settled in Pennsylvania in the late 1600s. His great-grandson moved to Kentucky in the late 1700s. At least one descendant stated the family was "Black Dutch". I was puzzled by that term, and found this:
"Black Dutch may be synonymous with Pennsylvania Germans who settled in the area of Pennsylvania in groups together. When asked where they were from, they said "Deutsche" sounding to us like "Dutch", but actually meaning "German" in their own language. Because they weren't blonde and blue eyed but darker, they were called Black Dutch.

In my case, all four generations of male ancestors (from the immigrant down to the one who moved to KY), AND their wives were English, not German/Deutsch... But the area they lived in in Pennsylvania had many German settlers too.

Maybe your husband's ancestors had native American blood, but maybe not -- so many errors in family lore, as I am sure you have found for yourself!

[sybylla]

67. My family called them Black Germans or Black Swiss

This is my take on it, based on my grandparents use of the term and their own explanations of it.

My mom's family is entirely European - German and Swiss, all traced back to the continent. All of them immigrated since 1832 (most since 1870) and came to areas of the country settled by Germans/Swiss and without Native American influence on the population. My maternal grandparents, both born in 1921, grew up speaking the language.

My grandparents said the term was common in their households and used to refer to people of Germanic ancestry whose complexion and hair coloring was very dark - like Native Americans. They used the term when referring to one branch of the family in particular. That branch actually came from Wuertemberg. I have a photograph of two of my great-great aunts when they were young women and they look very Native American. Their sister, my great-grandmother had the dark complexion and dark eyes but looked less like a Native American than her sisters. (If my photos weren't all packed away for a remodel at the moment, I'd share them.)

My opinion - Germanic societies were very tribal and disunited until the late 1800's. The stereotype is the blonde and blue-eyed German. I expect a "community" of dark complected, dark eyed Germans stood out at least at one point in the past and they earned the name Black Germans (and Black Swiss as they moved across borders) - which eventually became a common term for someone fitting the description.

[kestrel91316]

78. OOOHHHH, this reminds me of something. In going through some very old

family photos I found one of some people in early-mid 1800s attire who were quite swarthy, and we don't have ANY of that complexion anywhere in the family that I know of. But that photo may be of some of my Vandermark ancestors and that's a Dutch name, so maybe they were "black Dutch"........

I couldn't figure out who the hell those people were. All my grandmother knew was that they were in her branch of the family and passed down from her grandmother, Ida Vandermark.

[kestrel91316]

77. Sounds like what I know of as "black Irish". As opposed to the Irish who

are the frecklefaced redheads or blondes.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

99. Just found out through DNA testing

that my husband has NO Native American ancestry. So I thank you very kindly for your information--I'm thinking it is the correct route to go with doing research.

[IA_Seth]

4. Arkansas

Ya know, I had family that swore they were in Arkansas back in the day, but they ended up being in Illinois (the very southern edge, but they were in Illinois)... I dont have my paperwork with me at work, but I'd try your luck with Illinois or another neighboring state.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

6. I know EXACTLY where the Cherokee were in S. IL

as I used to live there when I was single. Drove by their camps and knew several folks who were descendants of the stragglers. Hadn't thought of looking for her there. Will do!

[IA_Seth]

7. I've never been there myself...

My great grandmother was originally from the area, my grandmother swears its Arkansas to this day :)

If you find who you are looking for please let us know!

[fudge stripe cookays]

8. Pennsylvania Dutch.

Amazingly, from all I've found in Northampton and Monroe Counties in PA, I have not been able to connect my Schmidts (Smiths) up with any of the other Schmidts than the ones who appear on one LDS film.

There were several of them who sponsored each others' kids in baptisms, which is a dead giveaway of brothers and sisters. My main guy married a Hufford.

There is a huge book that was written on the Huffords years and years ago, but I cannot find any connection to my Nanzi in it.

I need to get to eastern Pennsylvania and really get my hands dirty in courthouses and archives. This stuff isn't online. I'm going to need a hardhat and a dust mask for the basements I'll probably need to explore.

[IA_Seth]

9. Pennsylvania Dutch...

Hey, not that you aren't crazy busy with the huge amount of research you are doing, but do you have any records for Moomey or Mumme in your database? My Moomey line has been researched by a few people/groups with differing results, but if I recall correctly one theory has them owning a lot of land near the Penn Dutch portions of Pennsylvania.

Just curious!

[fudge stripe cookays]

10. Unfortunately, no. :(

Have you checked Genforum? It's one of my favorite websites.

Before I go do a bunch of research on a new line, I always check here for the last name to see if:

#1, Anyone else has already researched the line
#2, If any distant cousins are looking to make a connection

Here is the Moomey link:
http://genforum.genealogy.com/moomey/

Other links:
http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~padutch/
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~chousmith/

[momophile]

30. really Ohio Germans?

my husband's father's side is called Pennsylvania Dutch but were really Ohio Germans. Don't know if that's common or not.

Good luck!

[fudge stripe cookays]

32. I think it was just a common name for the group.

Many of them (being Protestant) came from the Palatinate in Germany when a Catholic ruler took over there at the end of the 18th/beginning of the 19th century.

Since William Penn founded Pennsylvania with an idea of religious tolerance, many of them landed there and then branched out from the initial area where so many settlers started.

For instance, mine started off in Northampton Co, PA which is heavy heavy PA Dutch, but then ended up in Tompkins County, NY from there. And then one son (my GG grandfather) struck out for Illinois and Wisconsin when he fell on hard times.

Ohio, being so close to PA, was just a natural next step for your folks to take further west. Good luck with finding them!

[madinmaryland]

84. That's interesting. I'm PA Dutch also. We came through Philadelphia

in 1738 and settled in Berks County, PA. I believe that we may have been caught up in the Salzberg Exultant (exodus) in the early 1730's.

:hi:

[dropkickpa]

11. Got a couple roadblocks

Mostly in Ireland. Stuck on one family, I know the various towns they lived in and baptisms etc around Dublin, but can't find beyond that without a lot of on-site work (a cousin got us back this far on a trip a few years ago). My Northern Ireland (Armagh) line is dead ended. I suspect the male ancestor who's putting the kibosh in the works may have immigrated from Scotland based on his name.

I have one family I've traced back to their town in Bohemia, nothing past that. 5 siblings came over and they are the sole progenitors of the name in the states.

I am also stuck relatively close to now on my mat gfathers side, his grandfather was adopted by his stepfather at age 1 after his widowed mother remarried. Don't have his bfathers name (though hints in his own name) and stepdads family peters out because they immigrated from ireland to the US via Canada, I've not been able to get anywhere with them.

Been stuck in this rut for about 3 years. It's a wonder I have any hair left! Thank god for the Amish propesity for record keeping, I've been able to trace those lines very thoroughly.

[k8conant]

12. Dead end on gggrandfather Peter Sommers =

who were his parents? Did they come from Germany? (this is early 1800s) Did he die around 1855 or get divorced?

His wife Lydia Trow = mother Emmaline but father? (from Vermont b. about 1800)

Were ggggrandparents George White and Gennett Finney White really "kidnapped from Ireland" as their tombstones in Fayette County, PA, state?

What happened to William Julius Katins (ggrandfather) after 1880 in Butler County, PA? Did he die or go crazy then die?

Where in Ireland did James Kevan (gggrandfather) come from? (Early 1800s)

When did my first Bailey ancestor come to Pennsylvania (early 1700s)? Who was he?

Did the Sommers have any connections with the Mulungeons? or did the Davises or Bells go back somewhere to the Cherokees ?

In any case, I know that I've got German (Hannover, Prussia), Scottish, Irish, Ulster, Swiss, French, English ancestors at the least.

I've been searching ancestry.com for over 8 years. Once in a while something new comes up.

[CBHagman]

13. Any luck with local genealogical societies?

Have you tried local libraries or organizations to get a toehold on the records? Or do you mostly use online resources?

Have you located everyone in the Census? If not, what has blocked your way -- a lack of a record, changed names, etc?

[Joe Chi Minh]

18. I think Somers is also an English name. They weren't tartars for spelling in

olden times, so many variants arose, didn't they.

[Thirtieschild]

14. A mix

1/2 Pennsylvania Dutch (Mennonite, Amish, Lutheran)
1/2 Southern, which means a mixture of Scots-Irish, English, Scottish, Welsh, + 1/64th Irish

Have looked everywhere for a Native American, no luck
Most of the deadends come from the Carolinas and Virginia (Hall, Warren, Lawless, Nesbit, Forbes, Warnock)

DH is close to half German (some PA Dutch, some later immigrants from Germany), half English, with Scots-Irish showing up occasionally.

DH and I are eighth cousins through three different lines. His parents are also eighth cousins, and so are my paternal grandparents. Almost certain ny maternal grandparents are also eighth cousins, but will never prove it. Sigh. My guess is that if your family has been here long enough, you are going to find at least one common ancestor: not that many people around early on, and we all have bunches of ancestors at that level.

[Joe Chi Minh]

15. My mother went into a second-hand bookshop in a part of England,

where ancestors of ours, either some of the Blathwaytes or some of Winters had set down roots, and asked the man in the shop if he had any books on whichever family she was was enquiring after (the Blathwaytes are descended from the Winters, Wintours, Wynters, etc); to which he replied that it was strange that she should ask that, as another person had made the same enquiry, just recently.

So, he looked in his book, found the man's name and address gave it to my mother. She contacted him, and he sent her great scrolls of the tree (the most interesting one, as potentially we must have thousand, if not millions of course), that he had researched, himself, a copy of a two pages of The Landed Gentry) and 50 or 60 pages of trees - which he also kindly faxed to me.

He visited us about a year ago, bring with him a small suitcase full of genealogical material, much of it apparently collected as a school project by school-children in a town in Devon, I think, where Winters had been the local squire. The De Winters, who I believe, were the local nobs in Daphne Du Maurier's novel, Jamaica Inn, were apparently based on them.

There are so many implausible-sounding characacters in the tree, yet seemingly authentically traced, one of which was Lady Godiva, who I was reminded of in a post here the other day.

Sorry, it's not helpful, search-wise, but I thought some of you might be tickled.

[fudge stripe cookays]

16. Very cool!

To be related to the saucy wench on the horse! Tickled indeed!

A few weeks ago I FINALLY found a celebrity connection in our family, albeit minor. Susan Seaforth Hayes, who became famous with her husband Bill Hayes for being on "Days of Our Lives" for many years, is my fourth cousin once removed.

http://soapoperadigest.com/features/days/interviews/spendingdayshayes/

[Joe Chi Minh]

17. Wow. Great to have such a nice a photo of her, and an interview, too, FSC!

Have you managed to get their book? And do you see any resemblance between your cousin and yourself in that "younger" photo of yourself? It's odd how family resemblances, prepotent physical traits can be found from hundreds of years ago, and apparently right off at a tangent.

But you sound like you'd come from a family that would be anything but uninteresting.

For that matter, how little any of us knows as regards how interesting, famous and/or terrific in other ways our ancestors were? Even professional genealogists would probably only know a very small amount about their ancestors. The names alone wouldn't necessarily convey a lot. But I must say that one probably gave me more of a buzz than any other. If I remember correctly, I think her husband was a Saxon toff called Thorold of somewhere or other. Must check.

[kestrel91316]

79. Wow, that's close enough you could ALMOST call her up and say hi!!

[NOLALady]

20. Devon

My husband has a branch from Devon...Naydler/Nelder, Pierce/Pearse, and Honeywell

[iverglas]

21. Devon is a tough place for records

Apparently, the Devon Family History Society doesn't like to share -- but they're happy to sell:
http://www.devonfhs.org.uk/

Many FHSs have made their transcribed records available on line, to search, and consult for a very modest fee:

https://www.familyhistoryonline.net/

but nooo, not Devon. I'm stuck on a Devon family of my own -- at least I know from censuses that my grx2 grf was born in Devon sometimes 1815-25, and I have two birth certs for children born there in the 1840s, but beyond that nada.

My Devon surname is, I am pretty sure, the most common surname in Devon in the 19th century. And I don't really know what parish or even place the birth and marriage I'm looking for between 1813 and 1837 would have happened in. So with no searchable database, I'd be stuck ordering just about everything they've got!

The FHonline site is really good for some other places though. I found loads of stuff about the Cornish side of that family there. It seems that one of my grx5 grfs was a real-life parish clerk! Obviously in the blood. ;)

[iverglas]

19. English, English, English, English!

Just thought I'd start in this thread to say hello, and shock anyone who knows me from elsewhere at DU. Yes, I'm a genealogy geek.

All my grandparents immigrated to Canada from England -- two as children, two as a married couple. The families are from Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Wiltshire? via Kent, east London, south London, Cornwall, Devon ... some sedentary from the 1700s and likely long before, some apparently more peripatetic.

I have a couple of mysteries that I may never sort out. For starters, once I discovered FreeBMD and Ancestry.co.uk (don't get me started) almost two years ago, I very soon figured out that one of my gr-grfathers was not at all who we thought he was, and that, among other things, he had a sister who was an actress and married a very wealthy heir of a minor politician (whose sister married the only male heir of a family in a very wealthy branch of a Scottish clan, whose sister's daughter married a baron ...) and had three kids around 1880 ... before disappearing, after which her husband changed his surname and came up with a newer younger wife ... before he and the kids disappeared ...

Meanwhile, my great-grandfather himself was a factory worker. Talk about picking the wrong ancestors. But that mystery -- why he and his sister changed their name, who his father's family were ... I'm afraid I'm going to take the questions to my grave, just as he took the answers to his several decades ago.

And along the way, I've met a scad of long-lost distant cousins in the UK, the US and Canada, some of whom I've been able to give info I've dug out, and more of whom have provided me with reams of info, largely because they're on site in England and have been able to consult original documents, and also didn't lose the oral history / contact with other family members the way we here in Canada did after the immigration. I think my record at the moment is someone with whom I share grx8 grandparents in Leicestershire.

Anyhow. If anyone needs directions or assistance with Canadian genealogy info, I may be able to help. I can consult the non-free stuff, and also point to free resources on line (e.g. the 1901 and 1911 Canadian censuses, WWI enlistment and casualty records, BMD records for some time periods in some provinces, "Home Children" records). I'm fascinated by any genealogical mystery, and out of sheer curiosity I've solved a few for some complete strangers. A descendant of that Scottish clan branch in Australia now knows who her family was and has a whole batch of cousins, in Australia and Scotland (the present-day baron descended from my gr-grf's sister's husband's sister!), that I found for her. I also discovered that in another line she is descended from the founder of the De Havilland dynasty, in the 1100s (thanks to research that people have made available on line). And my family is still factory workers and housemaids and agricultural labourers (read: one meal away from the workhouse, where some did end up). And my branch of her illustrious family seems not to have reproduced after the 1890s. Of course, WWI and the obscene loss of young men in the war, including one of my actress's nephews, was one reason.

What I'd love is if someone could occasionally check a US census record for me. I do it by hit and miss -- guessing places and spouses and DOBs and the like -- but can't access the individual records because I refuse to pay the big whopping whole-world subscription fee. Speaking of which -- if anyone is considering paying for Ancestry, check out the Ancestry.co.uk and Ancestry.ca portals and do the currency conversion first. Sometimes the fees are lower there -- or if your family is recently from the UK, for instance, like mine, you might just want the UK databases, through .co.uk, and not all the rest.

I do pity you with the Irish search, CBH. That records fire, what a sad shame. My mysterious gr-grfather might in fact have had some connection to a prominent English family in Ireland for several generations, whose name was the one he changed his to and whom he told tales of being descended from on the wrong side of the blanket, but that info, if such there were, is probably lost to me.

One more obscure source that might help someone someday -- English soldiers in the Boer War. Kevin Asplin, a very helpful military historian, has put his whole database of the Imperial Yeomanry (and other British military info) on line:
http://hometown.aol.co.uk/KevinAsplin/home.html
-- I found my actress's son there by complete coincidence (googling for his given name and unusual alias surname -- he wasn't using that given name, but someone else on the page had it as a surname, so bob was my serendipitous uncle).

Oh yes, and for Anglo-Indian records (not defined as Anglo, but mostly Anglo): http://www.fibis.org/ -- good for some periods in the 1800s. Volunteers are wonderful people.

And free access to transcribed Channel Island censuses:
http://members.shaw.ca/Jerseymaid/

I haven't browsed the forum to see whether anybody else has mentioned some of these things, so forgive me if I'm being redundant!

[NOLALady]

22. Canadian Research

There's an Andre Nadeau/Nadaud/Nadeaux of Louisiana who states his birthplace as the French Islands of Sts Pierre & Miquelon per SLC F13 22. He was born c. 1750. I'm certain he's part of the Nadeau clan of Canada but I cannot connect him.

If you have access to any info which may shed some light on this Louisiana Nadeau, I'd appreciate it.

[iverglas]

24. eek

I opened my mouth!

I'm completely useless on Quebec records. BMDs were the province of the RC church until very recently, in fact. And as far as I know there just isn't any transcription of them.

Well, there are some after all, in fact. I just found one for marriages. Do you know his wife's name? There's one André Nadeau here:
http://mesaieux.com/an/default.htm
(free registration)
who married Marie Gosselin in Saint-Charles-De-Bellechasse in 1793 -- probably a little late, but the earliest they have.

I'd probably be telling you stuff you know way better than I do if I looked around much more ...

Quebec Family History Society
http://www.qfhs.ca/

http://www.bcgs.ca/Quebecgrp.htm
"We have finally received our order of "R.A.B. du PRDH, Repertory of BMD, Early Quebec", CD. It was funded jointly with the Quebec Group and The BCGS.. It is installed on Member3 computer at our Resource Centre in Surrey.

What is the R.A.B. du PRDH ?
(An excerpt form their Website:- http://www.genealogie.umontreal.ca/en/pubRAB2.htm#commander)
The R.A.B. du PRDH is a repertory of the 690 000 baptismal, marriage, and burial certificates registered in the Catholic parishes of Quebec prior to 1800. Added to these are more than 20,000 certificates of various other types: census records, marriage contracts, confirmations, lists of immigrants, and so on. The repertory reproduces, in a standardized form, the basic information contained in these documents: type, place of registration and date of the certificate; and the family name, first name, and characteristics of the individuals cited. Sophisticated search tools make it possible to find certificates by name of person (individuals or couples) and certificate characteristics (type, date, or parish)."

-- and there's a list of Quebec genealogy resources at the BCGS link above. Most look kind of standard/old hat. I tried the name here:
http://www.genealogie.umontreal.ca/en/
http://www.genealogie.umontreal.ca/en/public/RechEtatCivilIndividu.asp
for 1750-1799 and there are a bunch of results; you might want to look around there if you haven't. Subscription needed to access details. André Nadeau events during the time do seem to centre in the Bellechasse area -- oh; I see they largely overlap with the LDS records. The AN who married Marie Gosselin shows up as André Nado at familysearch.

This site:
http://www.grandcolombier.com/communaute/genealogie/liste1600.php
(seems to be a list of names on StP&M from various sources for the period 1686 - 1713)
has:
Nadeau, Charles. Pilote de Saint-Pierre et Miquelon lors de la restitution de 1763.
(a pilot in StP&M when the islands were returned to France in 1763)

There's a forum there:
http://www.grandcolombier.com/cgi-bin/discus/discus.cgi
GENEALOGIE & ETATS CIVILS (genealogy and civil status)
-- I could post a message in French for you if you tell me what to say!

[sybylla]

26. I'm very familiar with the French-Canadian records

And I get to the state historical library here where they have loads of them every couple of months.

If you can't find him in Iverglas' websites, let me know and I'll see what I can do next time I get there.

[CBHagman]

25. The more resources, the better!

I appreciate the link to FamilyHistoryOnline in particular.

:hi:

[CBHagman]

53. Which Census years are you searching?

FamilySearch has the entire 1880 U.S. Census online -- a real boon for researchers, though there are transcription errors, some of which can probably be traced to WPA transcriptions for the Soundex listings (at least I think it was the WPA).

Through my local library, I have home access to HeritageQuest listings, though those have transcription errors and other fun surprises. My Great-Grandpa Istvan of course became Stephen or Steve in the Census, which was rendered STONE in the HeritageQuest version. I had a good laugh over that one.

[iverglas]

56. grrrrr

I apparently just closed the tab where I had a whole post composed ...

Last things first -- what I was doing was playing with this:

http://www.dpbolvw.net/click-923503-10467614

Link to a free trial Ancestry sub offer, no credit card needed. I can't seem to access it myself. Even if I log out of Ancestry.com and Ancestry.ca, that link greets me with "hello, {my Ancestry username}", and doesn't let me have any free offers. So I can't tell whether it's current or not. I did see the offer mentioned here quite a while back.

I never actually need the US databases for myself -- no family in the US until some of my mother's cousins moved there in the mid-1900s. Oh, except for some I would like to find, but I have to wait until I know their names -- my father's father's sisters; 2 of 3 apparently emigrated from England to Michigan in the 1920s or so. But it was after marriage, and I don't know what their surnames were. So I have to wait for FreeBMD to progress up to 1920 or so. They've got my grandparents' 1918 marriage there now, I see.

I've searched for them by given name and date and place of birth, but I have no way of knowing which might be mine yet. I'll holler here when I've got something to go on!

I use Ancestry for the 1880 US, because the search function is so much better (fuzzier) than at the LDS site itself. It's free at Ancestry -- as is the 1881 English census at Ancestry.co.uk, or through the .com portal too, I guess. Also the English BMDs (1837 forward) are free at Ancestry, and fuzzier than at FreeBMD -- http://www.freebmd.org.uk/ -- where the transcriptions come from. (They're better than Ancestry's census transcriptions, but not perfect; I've corrected several dozen.)

Ancestry doesn't have the 1881 Cdn at the Ancestry site, but does have it at the LDS site. If you thought the transcription of US data was bad, you should see the Cdn BMDs and 1901 and 1911 censuses. Yikes. It has to be admitted that the original entries are appalling in many cases, and the images are often bad. Fortunately, the Cdn population was relatively small, so fuzzy searching doesn't get overwhelming results lists.

I do a lot of database-searching for other people I run into on genealogy forums, just because I have the subs ... and I'm really really good at it. ;)

Of course, the one place I don't look too often is One World Tree!

[NOLALady]

23. Brick Walls R Us

A GGMother said she was from the Blackfoot Sioux of Mississippi. I have found her GMother in the 1870 Census listed s a "Native" from GA. I have a heard time believing that Blackfoot Sioux is correct as they were from another part of the country.

My Swiss group arrived in Reading PA 1788. They lived in Berne but it seems they were originally from Germany. The other German branch arrived in Louisiana c.1855 with the surname of Beecker/Becker. I don't know if Beecker is correct or if it's an anglicized version of something else.

Then there's the French Datchurut/D'Atchurut c.1725 of Missouri/Louisiana. The surname does not appear before him nor after his GChildren. I'm at a total loss about his origins.

Too many brick walls to list.

[fudge stripe cookays]

33. Could your Datcherut be...

something like D'Atcheroux? Or D'Atchereau?

We have a fun French one like that on my mom's side. Urbain Baudreau de Gravelines was a syndic in Montreal in the 1600s, and the family originally came from Clermont. Several of them were adventureurs who ended up down on the Gulf Coast. My mom actually went to the dedication of a highway marker between NOLA and Biloxi dedicated to one of them several years ago. And there's a plaza in Montreal named after Urbain.

He had about a bazillion kids, who also had a bazillion kids, and along with the 1700s-era Quebecois obsession with naming every freaking newborn after John the Baptist or Mary Magdelene, we also have innumerable bazillions of branches, each one with a different spelling of Beaudreau, Baudreau, Beaudreaux, etc and Graveline, Gravolin, Gravline, Gravlin...you name it! It pays to branch out in how you think of the name. Try any possible sound variation you can!

This family has already been researched out the ass. I wanted a challenge. Give me Smiths, or give me death! :D

[NOLALady]

59. Are your D'Atcherouxs connected to your Gravelines?

I have found a D'Accarette line that made it to San Doming. I will check on the D'atcheroux and D'atchereau lines also. Thanks for the tip.

I have a cousin in law descended from a Ladner of Mississippi. Nicholas Ladner was married to a Marie Magdeliene Paquet daughter of Magdelaine Pany Baudreau Dit Graveline. Could this be some of your folk?

[sybylla]

27. My biggest problem area was formerly East Prussia

Specifically Silesia/Schlesien area of old Germany. I have Uber and Zeiske families there from a village formerly known as Bolkenhain. Since WWII, this area has been under Polish control and the village is now known as Bolkow, Poland. Records from the area have been shipped to other cities in Poland, some have been lost in floods. I'm new to researching the area, but have been told I'll be lucky if I find anything. Still, I am enjoying learning a great deal about the history of the region.

So many of my finds have been pure luck so I remain hopeful.

The most helpful places for information on roadblocks and brickwalls in German genealogy have been the RootsWeb Lists. I've signed up for the Wurtemberg list as well as the Deu-Schlesien, Prussia-Roots and two Swiss lists. There are some real experts, including English speaking natives, out there with loads of information on German history, resources both online as well as published, and tips on how to conduct research in the different regions. I'm sure the same can be said for lists covering other regions of the world. RootsWeb also has lists for surnames, though over the years I've found them less helpful especially for large families or the more common names. The lists are definitely a new stop on my path to Europe.

The easiest country I've found for research is Canada - specifically Montreal and Quebec. There's just loads of information available from published church records to national genealogies to online census records. I have nearly all of my Great-Grandmother's French-Canadian ancestry traced back to France as far back as the 1500's. I wish every country were like Canada.

Since Silesia is beginning to look like a hard slog, I'll probably start focusing on my Swiss ancestors. As I'm more than half Swiss, that will be a pretty big project. Thankfully, I've heard through one of the Swiss lists on RootsWeb that the Swiss began a national registry of its citizens about 1856. Most of my families immigrated after that date so finding them in Switzerland and collecting their information should be relatively easy.

[Cybergata]

29. Fairly recent German Immigrants

I've been searching for my husband's, niece's and nephew's elusive German Immigrant ancestors who came to the U.S. My husband's ancestor Friedrich Michalowski and Emilie Pofalla who both immigrated at the turn of the century. I found Fredrick's passenger information, but not Emilie's. Even more difficult is my niece's and nephew's Reiter family. The earliest I have is Nicolas Reiter who immigrated through Ellis Island in 1897. I don't have much else, but I have their Jernigan ancestor named Emma Jernigan who was born about 1882. Her mother was named Nancy and was born in Georgia about 1860. The is the name Cowart from Georgia somewhere in the mix.


My other brick walls:
Ana Gregoria Maése born 1733 in New Mexico (in fact all Spanish surnames that follow were born in New Mexico) married to Ygnacio Durán y Cháves

Casilda Tórres born 1760 in New Mexico, possible parents Francisco Tórres and Gertrudis ?, husband José María Moya whose parents I also can't find.

Maria Manuela Miera y Pacheco born around 1740-1760 married to Juan Antonio Lucero Godoy

Salvador Armijo born around 1748 and married to Francisca Tórres
Antonio Ballerac about 1741 and his wife Nicolasa Obaldo

My brick walls that people outside of New Mexico could possibly help me with:

Sarah Ross born about 1802 in Meadville, Crawford. Pennsylvania, daughter of Francis Ross. Francis Ross moved to West Virginia where he died. Sarah Ross was married to James Walker and they lived in Waterford, Erie, Pennsylvania.

Matthew Cole, born in New York about 1782, married a woman named Sabrina, had two sons I know about named Matthew B. Cole and Ira Cole, then they all moved to Waterford, Erie, Pennsylvania and show up on the 1850 census there.

John Woods, born in Massachusetts, about 1768, married Eunice Jewett on 22 May 1788, and died around 1802 in Maine. They had a son, also named John Woods who was born 11 Dec 1788, Massachusetts, died in Maine and married Lucy Weston on 11 Jun 1812 in Maine. They had a daughter Sarah Ann Woods who marred John Fletcher Atwood in Maine. They moved to Wisconsin, and both died in Nebraska.

[jwirr]

50. On the Reiter have you tried spelling it Rueter or Reuter? Both can

be pronounced the same as yours.

[kestrel91316]

31. 99.9% very boring WASP. A tiny bit of Swiss Anabaptist, Scandinavian,

and WAAAYYYY back some Spanish and Russian.

I'm descended from the mayor of Toledo, Spain around the time of Henry VIII.

[fudge stripe cookays]

34. Muy bueno!

I used to moan about my boring family, but who was it...Chesterton I think...who said that there was nothing more extraordinary than an ordinary man and an ordinary woman and their ordinary children? Something to that effect.

:D

[Joe Chi Minh]

36. It probably was. He came up with some tremendous insights.

They seem so obvious... but nobody thought of them or put them in words before.

[Cybergata]

35. My Wasp ancestors are hardly boring.

I have plenty of interesting Anglo-American ancestors. John Rogers who decided to challenge the church in his town, and found the Rogerenes Quakers, is so fascinating I haven't stopped thinking about his story for months after I read about him. Then there is the Weston ancestor who drug his wife and children into the wilderness of Maine, then a couple of years later, he lead the British army through Maine to attack at Quebec and froze to death in the process. So this leaves his wife with a bunch of kids in the wilderness of Maine. Unfortunately most of the stories are about him, but the real hero is his wife. She lived to be an old woman with over 200 descendants at the time of her death. There were other women like her in her day, but so much of the information is about the men they were married to.

Of course, two of my favorite ancestors is the Aztec woman, Pascula Bernal and her husband, a Greek Jew, named Juan de Griego (John the Greek). A county and a town are named after Pascula here in New Mexico. Pascula was one tough women, and women from the 1600 and 1700s in New Mexico were on a more equal footing with the men than their sisters in New England.

[Joe Chi Minh]

37. He might have been descended from a very interesting medieval

Rogers family. A long shot, but we know only a tiny fraction of our ancestor, don't we?

[Cybergata]

38. Not if you spend . . .

the amount of time I do searching them out. <just kidding> :rofl: Of course there are all those pre-historic ancestors. Oh geez, if I only had a time machine so I could meet them all.

I have found such great information about so many of my ancestors. Some of it really explains a lot about my family. None of my siblings really resemble each other, which can be explained by all the different ethnic groups I have been able to find in our family tree. I think I may have found some of the ancestors that brought the Bipolar gene into my family. John Rogers would be among them.

[Joe Chi Minh]

39. No, I meant even going back to to the 16 and 1700s.

Don't forget that for every couple you research there are likely to be endless ramifications for each sibling, and their respective progeny (if it's a toff line you're interested in, the cadet branches will likely become of less interest - except the one that leads down to you!)

[Cybergata]

40. One of the things that I found very helpful was . . .

researching the siblings of the ancestor I linked to. By doing this found information I would not have found otherwise. The relationships between siblings can't always be clear from the records, but the position in the family can tell a lot. Sibling dynamics is a huge thing IMHO. I have found that often my ancestors are the youngest child, and they are often raised by older siblings or step parents. Many of them had to move elsewhere to have land to work because the land went to the oldest son.

I've found many ancestors that do reach the 16 and 1700s. I've been lucky. Plus I've been working very hard on my research in the past four or more years. My paternal ancestors all lived in New Mexico for a very long time. Some came with Don Juan de Oñate in 1598. Other came with Don Diego de Vargas in 1693-1697. After that point very few newcomers can to New Mexico except for some Spanish soldiers. The Catholic Church kept great records and the Spanish kept some excellent census. Both, always recorded woman by their birth name, not their married name. Add to that the work of local genealogical societies who have the example of Fray Angelico Chávez's book titled Origins of New México's Families to build on, and all I have to do is put the time in to research. The one problem I've encountered is finding the Ancestry of my early Native American female ancestors.

My maternal grandmother has a great many ancestors who came to New England on the Mayflower/Anne and within the next 100 years after. I'm lucky because people have already done all the hard work of finding the records for most of these people and of course the New England Historical and Genealogical Society has done tremendous work. Even for my maternal grandfather, I've found records for his German/Swiss ancestors who came to North America before the Revolution. I have only been able to trace his Blair ancestry back to 1790, so this is another brick wall like my female Native American in New Mexico.

It also helped me that my grandmother had a profession genealogist find a couple of her lines back to Europe. All I had to do was research the other lines. My father also gave me the line of his father for 4 generation and mother for 6 generation, and what he gave me made it a lot easier to connect to their families in the records. I think it has been a great help that most of my European and African ancestors came to North America very early.

I've put all my work on-line so I could share all my work with distant and not so distant cousins, who BTW, have given me amazing help along the way. http://cybergata.com/roots/

[Joe Chi Minh]

41. But do you get my point? Each couple will have their respective trees

ending (temporarily, at least) with them, but if you researched all your ancestors on both sides, they would soon run into millions, because each spouse will normally contribute a whole nother tree.

I've got twenty or so charts going back many years, some in three parts, and some duplicates and more abridged versions, as well as about thirty or forty mini-pedigrees of different families on the tree, but for each each generation the people represented will be tiny in relation to the trees represented by each spouse. Hence, they are mini pedigrees. So that in effect, we're following a few threads among millions.

As in your case, all the donkey-work on more recent centuries had been done for us, yet the very kind gentleman who sent us all the guff thanked me for pointing out where the earlier ones led even further back, though that was easy, because they were big shots and figured in history books.

At the top of this chart was a man called Lambert Barbutus of Lens, but it seemed to me it was mentioned in some kind of significant way on the chart, so I tracked him down and found terrific stuff going back centuries earlier. Two main sources were the trees of Americans obtainable from Cyndi's List: Paul Bailey McBride and Homer Beer James, with both of whom I share a fair number of ancestors.

I'd heard of some of the more famous figures at school, but because I didn't know I had some kind of family connection, and history was taught to us in as boring a way as possible (focusing on memorising dates), it was my least favourite subject. And since I didn't like schoolwork, anyway, I didn't score too well in History in my exams, to put it mildly.

Having blethered on about my searches, I must say it sounds as if you have some very interesting ancestors who came over on the Mayflower.

The sad thing is, we all know that when we see things in the light of eternity, i.e. as they really are here and now, few of the many giants will have figured in our history books, they will have led anonymous lives of quiet desperation, and facing agonising vicissitudes with immense courage and true nobility. No tomb, no headstone. A pauper's grave.

However, hidden lives, that is to say the lives of most of us, are by definition, ordinary in any kind of historical sense of exerting an identifiable impact on society, so we like to find big shots in our tree who did. Never mind that the chances are they were likely to be at the sociopathic end of the spectum of humanity, rather than Joe Gargery's.

When I was a youngster, I used to assume everyone's grandparents and great grandparents had splendid graves and tombstones - the kind we would see in the local graveyard. Yet I don't believe my wife or I have actually been able to trace even one belonging to ours; Though she too has a fascinating tree, going back to Sir John Hepburn, Marshal of France, who founded the Royal Scots, the oldest Scottish infantry regiment, and much earlier a countess of Caithness.

The reality is, however, that you had to be better off than most, to have such memorials. Most of our forebears a few generations or so back from today worked at the "Big House", as servants in one form or other, or as farm smallholders or labourers. If they were professionals, they were not the type money stuck to very well.

My wife will have to scatter my ashes from a cocoa tin, like Dude and Walter did with Donny's, after trying to beat down the prices asked by the crematorium for one of their urns. I want her to scatter my ashes, and, like Walter, declaim: "Farewell, sweet prince!"
But try not to do it into the wind, so they blow back in her face. Still... on the other hand, she does favour wearing sun-glasses, so the resemblance to Dude in that moving scene would be quite dramatic.

[Cybergata]

42. Of course I get your point!

Do you get my point about how genealogy has been an obsession for me for the past four years, and I love researching. I'm a middle school History teacher that teaches both the first half of U.S. History and New México History, the history of both my Hispanic and Non-Hispanic parents. In the summer I do a lot of research, and it is a great escape from the craziness of working in public school during the school year. The age of the kids, 11-14, is challenging, but the administration/politics would drive most people insane.

Anyway, twenty pages! I guess you didn't check out my website. Twenty pages are the tip of the ice berg for me. And yes, we are all but specks of dust in this universe, as was every single ancestor. Who besides me could care less that my search for records for Celia Walker show that she married late to the boy next door, her husband died soon after, she was left with a daughter, she moved with her daughter to Nebraska when it still was a frontier, a lot of her siblings didn't leave the home of their father, and she ended up back in Pennsylvania, where she was born, in an insane asylum! Oh yes, she was named after her grandmother Sela Cooley, and my grandmother's middle name came from her. But for me, piecing together as much of the puzzle and the story is very special. Also, the stories of my Hispanic ancestors are as fascinating at the history of the state I live in. Most people wouldn't have my perspective. I simply love History, and genealogy is the perfect road to travel back into it. . .so I've found a lot of my ancestors. I have some brick walls, but I've connect a lot of the dots. I even found a common ancestor for my husband and myself.

[Joe Chi Minh]

43. Yes, if you're a natrural enthusiast as we both appear to be, genealogy

can be all-consuming in terms of our interest and attention. I've got most of it out of my system now in the sense that I only occasionally browse through it.

Actually, I said twenty or so charts, thirty or forty pages on different families, but there are a lot more pages my own researches have brought to light and genealogies I've got from the library, tying up individuals from one source with others from another source. Trying to fill in gaps and often getting confused. Then there are grey areas I have to be less sure about.

Something very intriguing happened. I discovered that one of my later grandmothers from the line of 'big shots' married an ordinary seaman who served in Nelson's navy (in which, incidentally, there were a some Africans, many Irish, many Americans and men from various other countries) at the Battle of Santa Cruz and the Battle of the Nile.

In that day, social moblity wasn't that notable, so I wondered about it, and found out that Nelson's sailors were the 'pop singers' of their day. Mindful of the value of motivation, as well as having a certain empathy with his men, Nelson insisted to his superiors that they share in the booty they were able to get from the enemy ships they were able to overpower. So, it explains how he was able to buy a farm in South Wales, marry this women, raise a large family and die in ripe old age.

Funny you should have told us about your Mexican forbears. Earlier this evening I'd been saying to my wife what a geat film Mariachi is, and how Hollywood spoiled its sequel. Literally overkill. Minute-guns galore.

I will be looking at your genealogy site for sure. It's wonderful to have such a consuming interest, isn't it? It's bizarre how you feel connected in spirit with the later generations, almosts as if you felt they were watching over you and enjoying your interest. Fudge Stripe Cookie and I were talking about it some time ago. Others too. Also, improbable 'deja vu'-type discoveries.

[jwirr]

51. The McBrides are linked to my Blacketter family.

[OnionPatch]

101. LOTS of McBrides in my tree. Two different lines.

But maybe the two lines converge somewhere way back. :shrug:

Where are your McBrides from?

[Joe Chi Minh]

44. Another facet peculiar to the personal genealogies of Americans is that they seem

quite likely to trace back to family members who were pioneers and frontiersfolk, and/or to Native American ancestors. Adventurous times, if hard and dangerous for many of European stock, and in the Native American inheritance, a wisdom that still enthralls many people who live increasingly under its most extreme opposite: a philosophy (?) of insane consumerism.

[Cybergata]

45. I just noticed you were from Edinburgh!

I would love to go there someday. My only family connection to Scotland is my Grandfather, William Blair, but I believe his ancestors were among those from Scotland moved to Ireland. If I am correct in remembering my history, I believe the English moved protestants from Scotland to Ireland hoping to seed it with protestants to out number their Catholics. My mother always told me he was Scott-Irish. His line is one of the lines I've hit a brick wall on. Fortunately I have had an easier time finding many of his German ancestry.

The immigrants from the British Isles, the Dutch from the Netherlands and Germany didn't often intermarry with the Native Americans. They even had laws against such marriages. It was the French, Africans and Spanish who broke that barrier. Most Hispanic people throughout the Southwestern part of the United States are descendants of marriages between Natives, Spaniards and Africans.

The United States has a shameful history in its dealings with Native Americans. I could easy make a long list of horrific acts by the United States against Native Americas. I'll just comment on it by saying we in the U.S. have no right shaking our finger at the genocide that occurred in other countries until we look at what was our own policy of genocide toward the Plains Indians in the mid to late 1800s.

When my state, New Mexico, was part of Spain (1598-1821) and Mexico (1821-1848), Native Americans were considered citizens of first Spain, then Mexico with all the rights that citizens of these countries had. Of course just about everyone here in New Mexico during those periods were what the Spanish called Mestizo (Native/European mix) or Mulatto (African/Native/European mix). When the United States occupied and claimed the area in the present day southwest, Native Americas lost all their rights, as did women who also enjoyed an equal footing in the frontier areas of New Spain. I also want to note, that in New Mexico, what is considered "Spanish Culture" or "Hispanic Culture" is really a mix of Spanish/Pueblo Indian culture. Where the Pueblo or Spanish influence begins or ends has been lost through the centuries.

I'm really proud to have ancestors who were Native Americans of Mexico, some Aztec, and those ancestors who were New Mexican Pueblo and Apache. They aren't easy to find, and many of them took Spanish surnames, so it isn't always easy to tell which Spanish ancestor was actually Native American. I would say generally the men were often Spanish and the females were often Native Americans. DNA testing of people from New Mexico shows that this is true. It is something like 90% of the Hispanic men in New Mexico show markings of Europeans and something like 85% of the women show Native American markings. I have to add that a good number of the male DNA is showing Sephardic Jewish ancestry as well, but that is another long story.

[Joe Chi Minh]

46. My mother is from Pembrokeshire in South Wales and my father, whom she divorced

before I was old enough to remember, was half Scottish (an Irish connection there too: O'Flaherty); up to the age of about 8 my name was Mylne. And on his mother's side, part Indian from the Indian subcontinent, part French and part Portuguese. Maybe other strains too. That's all I know. The marriage break was total to say the least. My mother brought us three very young children over from Calcutta to London during WWII, on a ship carrying injured troops back to the UK. Most of the convoy was sunk, and she didn't cherish his memory at all. I believe he went to the US in the fifties and died there quite young of a heart attack.

I love Irish connections. Apparently, there was a saying in Ireland, "God save us from the O'Flahertys". I believe I read that it's engraved on a city wall somewhere. Must check it. But I had an ancestor who was sent to Ulster to keep the Irish down, but ended up more Irish than the Irish, leading them in a rebellion, and getting beheaded.

I once saw part of a documentary on the Indian wars and the subsequent treatment of the native Americans by the incomers, I believe made by the same man as made that outstanding documentary about the American Civil War, Ken Burns. A kind American lady, who is an expert on medieval England and Wales, sent me a copy of the very interesting autobiography of Shelby Foote, who provided a lot of insights in that too.

In his very credible view, most responsible for the demonic bigotry against the African Americans were the plantation owners who held them as slaves, and the biggest mistake when slavery was abolished was to leave the people thus freed without any government help or support.

[Cybergata]

47. Have you had trouble tracing . . .

. . . your diverse ancestry? Personally, I have found it fascinating to have a mix of ancestry. I find that I'm learning the stories of many different peoples who make up the U.S. by having such a mix.

I should have added the Portuguese to my list of peoples who openly and happily married Native Americans on the American continent.

Shelby Foote is one of my favorite historians. Yes, things would have been very different, and I believe much better for this country, if the freedmen were given their fifty acres and a mule. Unfortunately the power elite always win out. The concept of property ownership being supreme in this country, even if that property was actually taken away from Native Americans (thanks to the "Indian Removal Act" pushed through congress by President Andrew Jackson).

Now Andrew Jackson, there's another president who openly abused his power. He was very popular by the people who could vote at the time, which only include white men aged 21 and older. He is sometimes called "the people's president," but for the majority of people, he was far from it.

[Joe Chi Minh]

48. My paternal grand-father was apparently a sergeant-major in the British

army out there. His brother emigrated to Australia, and has some landmark named after him. I'll try and find out what it was. My father was a Customs officer, a service in which, I believe, Anglo-Indians were well represented.

All I know about my maternal grandmother is what my mother told me, that her name was Vaillant. If so, her father would probably have had a Pondicherry connection, since that was under France, historically. The Portuguese connection would presumably have related to Goa.

As regards mixed lineage, according to what I was taught in anthropology, hybrids inherit the best traits from both parental lines - though when I look at myself in the mirror, I hae ma stro-o-o-ong doots.

[Cybergata]

49. Avoiding Recessive Genes

I believe the reason people want a wide variety of ancestors, is that there is less likelihood for recessive genes that carry some nasty traits like insanity, hemophilia, and blue eyes (hee hee). Many of the European rulers were so inbred that some of these nasty traits were prevalent in their families. Basically mutts like myself are less likely to have two of those nasty recessive genes show up because are genetics has more variety. Although I did end up with bluish eyes. I did a terrible job of explaining that, but hopefully anyone reading this took a biology class sometime in their life.

Another thing that is interesting about a wide variety of ancestors is that my siblings and myself all look different. There is enough family similarity to kind of give the idea we are related. We have aspects of different parts of our ancestry. We all have different hair & skin color. Our hair runs from straight, curly, think, thick, brown, black, blondish-brown. I love that we are all the product of all the different people in our family tree and the places they came from. Even those from Spain have a variety of backgrounds running from North Africa, Sephardic Jews, Nordic, French, Arabic, Celtic, etc. Spain was one of those centrally located places people from other places came and moved in as well as took over for a while.

The funny thing about the differences in my family is that the two people who resembled each other the most were my parents. They came from distinct backgrounds. The only way they could be related to each other besides being married is if they had a common ancestor in Spain in th 900s.

[Zookeeper]

52. Recessive genes?

I doubt that fair haired, blue eyed Scandinavians are all suffering from bad genes. Many ethnic groups have some "disease" gene that is specific to their group, like Sickle Cell Anemia or Tay-Sachs. And we know that insanity is not limited to one ethnic group.

My husband may have an anemic disorder that is related to his Jewish heritage and his French/British mother's blue eyes didn't cause it.

I think (hope) you were kidding, but you are spot on about the subject of royal inbreeding or inbreeding in general.

[Cybergata]

54. Royal Imbredding

I wasn't saying that all recessive genes are bad genes. I'm saying that the problem with marrying too close in genetic relationship is dangerous because there are some recessive genes that aren't necessarily widespread that may run in families, and carry traits such as hemophilia and insanity.

I was joking about the blue eyes, which many people may think is a positive trait, but blue eyes are on recessive genes. Since there are so many Scandinavians carrying that same recessive gene, it is highly likely that their children will also have blue eyes.

Since the Vikings invaded, raped and pillaged as well as settled in both England and Spain, they are probably where my two recessive genes come from. Or the Celts. They still wear kilts and play bag pipes in Santiago, España. O-kay, these Celts probably came later than other Celts to Spain.

[iverglas]

57. I'll never love blue eyes again

Actually, you're behind the times on those eye-colour genes!

The times hadn't yet caught up to my family, when my sister's grade 10 science teacher had them do that bb Bb BB table, and told her that our family -- mother pale blue eyes (blonde hair), father pale green eyes (black hair), 4 children with 8 brown eyes (and medium-to-dark brown hair) just, well, didn't exist. Unless my mother was fond of the milkman ... and we had the same milkman at four different addresses.

Oh, and my nephew -- son of the darkest brown-eyed/haired child -- has blue eyes and strawberry blond hair like his mother.

The theory once was that brown was dominant and blue (pale green being a variant of blue) recessive -- so if my parents had the brown gene, they would have had brown eyes.

Then came the theory that there was a recessive brown gene. Then came alleles.

A lot of the science being taught today still hasn't caught up. Last time I googled, postsecondary courses were still telling students that blue-eyed parents could not have brown-eyed children. I'm still seeing things like this:
http://www.biologynews.net/archives/2006/10/23/blue_eyes_a_clue_to_paternity.html

It then follows that if a child born to two blue-eyed parents does not have blue eyes, then the blue-eyed father is not the biological father.

It's such fun being a freak of nature.

Ah, here's the guy I was looking for -- a brown-eyed twin with blue-eyed parents and sibs:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/dispomim.cgi?id=227240

Eye color is likely to be a polygenic trait. The early view that blue is a simple recessive has been repeatedly shown to be wrong by observation of brown-eyed offspring of 2 blue-eyed parents. My monozygotic twin brother and I, brown-eyed, had blue-eyed parents and blue-eyed sibs. Blue-eyed offspring from 2 brown-eyed parents is a more frequent finding. In some Norwegian families, Gedde-Dahl (1981) found diffusely brown eyes or centrally brown eyes segregating as simple dominant traits, symbolized BEY1. Possible linkage to Km (Inv) and to Co was found, suggesting the order Jk--Km--BEY1--Co. (Co and Km are not measurably linked.) In a linkage study, Eiberg et al. (1986) scored eye color in a questionnaire as purely blue, green, gray, brown, or 'don't know.' The presence of brown areas or spots were also noted. For the purpose of linkage analysis, they assumed 2 main loci: (1) a 'green/blue' locus (GEY) with a dominant allele for green and a recessive allele for blue, and (2) a 'brown/blue' locus (BEY) with a dominant allele for brown and a recessive for blue. Linkage of GEY with Lutheran and secretor (located on chromosome 19 at q13.1) was found. They reported a lod score of 3.37 (theta = 0.0 for males and 0.07 for females) against Lutheran and of 1.79 (at theta = 0.1 in males) against secretor, from observations largely in different families. In the full report, Eiberg and Mohr (1987) reported a combined lod score of 9.19 for linkage between GEY and the Lutheran-secretor systems. They also found evidence for linkage of GEY to brown hair color (113750) with a lod score of 5.06.

Heh. That should explain it. ;)

[Cybergata]

58. I have to come clean!

The last time I even thought about blue eyes and recessive genes was in 1967 in my High School freshman biology class. And both my siblings had brown eyes, where as both my parents and myself have bluish, My brown eyed brother really resembled my blue eyed grandfather, Ramón López, plus I don't believe El Rito, New Mexico ever had a milkman in 1948 where my brother was conceived. So why did I realize this sooner.

I just thought it would be funny to stick the blue eyes in with the rest of the "evil recessive" genes, and here I am getting a whole new education. Who says an old cat can't learn new tricks. ;-)

[kestrel91316]

80. This is why I am sort of glad my sister married "out".

To go with our virtually pure English (my parents were tenth cousins - sheesh), she married into a good bit of German and Irish. Whew. And the kids are normal.

[Daphne08]

55. I'm Irish, Native American, German and English.

My husband is English/Irish, and he's half Czech. His grandmother and her parents came here right before WWII, as did his grandfather.

[vanboggie]

60. Mutt

Irish, Scottish, English, German and Dutch.

Hey, CB, my mother-in-law was a Hagerman, a derivative of Hagaman/Hagman. Family lore says Larry Hagman is a distant relative.

[CBHagman]

61. Welcome aboard.

This is the best place for those with Heinz 57 ancestry. :hi:

As for those named Hagerman, Hagaman, Hagman, and all variations, I never did check out the Larry Hagman possibilities. Surely someone -- maybe Family Tree magazine? -- has done Larry Hagman's family tree, which of course also includes his mother, Mary Martin.

But at any rate, Larry Hagman has proved a useful example when telling people how to spell my name. I even saw his smiling face on a billboard in Europe (I think it was Belgium) when I was traveling during the 1980s.

[iverglas]

63. here ya go

So ... you ask google for "larry hagman" "family tree". ;)

http://www.genealogy.com/famousfolks/lhagman/

There's a link to view the tree.

Well, back to 1845-1847 Alabama, anyhow. Not too impressive.

Other than that ... well, there are a lot of Ewing family trees on the net!

[Critters2]

64. Scots, Scots-Irish, just plain Irish, and German mostly

I grew up in a pretty ethnic German neighborhood, and a VERY ethnic German church, so I think of myself as German. But I really have more Scots ancestors than anything else.

[Cybergata]

65. I always thought my grandfather was Scot-Irish . . .

like my mother told me since his name was Blair. After researching his ancestors, I find he was more German/Swiss from the Palatine area. Welcome to Ancestry lifestyle, peer support & self-help.

[Drunken Irishman]

69. That's funny, my great, great grandmother was a Blair and her family was from Ireland.

[Cybergata]

70. Well, My grandfather's earliest . . .

ancestor to arrive in North America probably was Scot-Irish, but the last two before my grandfather married German/Swiss women. I never expected to find this, but that is what I've found.

It is amazing how many of my ancestors ended up in North America because of having a differing religion than was the state religion back in their home countries, but after a while, their descendants married people of those differing faiths, only to end up with a pagan/Buddhist/atheist descendant like myself.

The German/Swiss were either Mennonites or Lutherans. The Spanish were often Sephardic Jews. The English were pilgrims or puritans. Add in Scottish prisoners, Native Americas, Apache, Pueblo, Aztec, other Mexican Natives, and even a Spanish soldiers who were documented as "mulatto" and I'm the American melting pot. I can thank my Hispanic ancestors for giving me three continents of ancestry. I can also thank them for coming to New Mexico so early and leaving great church records.

[Drunken Irishman]

68. Irish, some Russian, Danish and English.

My great grandmother (my mom's mom's mom) was 100% Irish (Cassidy, Sheridan, O'Brien and McPadden), her parents coming over from Ireland in the early 1900s.

My great grandfather (my mom's mom's dad) was a mix of English and Scottish, with a bunch of I Don't Know. I've traced one of his lines to the early 1800s under the name Carroll. But it drops off somewhere in Massachusetts. The Carroll surname is of Irish origin, but without the ability to link that line to Ireland, I can't say for sure they're Irish -- though most likely are, since I remember my grandmother telling me her father had a mix of Irish and English in him. The other surnames listed with that family are of Scottish origin, Gray and Caldwell, but I haven't been able to link them back to Scotland.

My great grandfather (my mom's mom's dad) is a mix of Danish and Irish. The Danish line is actually pretty prominent, as his mother's parents came over from Denmark and his father's father was Danish as well. However, his father's mother was Irish. Her name was Minnie May Blair and the Blair line traces right back to Ireland, while Huey is also linked in there, as well. However, that Huey line comes after the Blair family emigrated over to the United States. I can trace that back to Robert Huey, who was born in Ireland 1715 and died in Pennsylvania. He married Eleanor Gravens of Ireland. Robert Huey was a Reverend and he and his wife purchased a farm in what is now Peters Township, Washington County, Ohio. He died in 1807.

It's interesting to note, however, that the Huey family again shows up in the family tree on the same line of my grandfather's grandmother. His daughter was Sarah Lee Huey (born in Ireland) and she married James Wilson. James' Wilson's mother is listed as being Sarah Huey. THAT line, however, has been a dead end for me. Now I know it was common for family members to marry back then, especially if they were a few spots removed. However, I don't know if this Sarah Huey links up with the other Huey family, since I have little information on her. What I know is that she was born in Virginia around 1727, about the time the OTHER Huey family was in Ireland, or relocating to America.

On my father's side, it's been easier at some points and far more difficult on others.

Trying to trace my family name has been a bitch. From what I was told the family dropped the "Mc" from the name, but research shows that this had to have happened a long time ago, because I can get all the way back to the 1700s. However, this is where I've hit a brick wall and have not been able to move beyond a few issues there.

What I do know is that my father's great grandfather moved here from Wales before 1890. I have little information on the wives, except for my father's grandmother (who was a Boston). The family name, however, I can only trace back to my great, great, great grandfather (I think I got that right). And that's where it gets even more tricky. Someone had e-mailed me some key information on the family name, stating that the last line I have was born in Wales in 1788. Him and his wife stayed there while their children moved to the United States. His son, Peter David Owens, settled in Utah, had my father's grandfather, and then left the family. Looking at Census results, I have him last living in a bording house and that's where I found out he lists his father as being born in Scotland. That's the only information I have, outside of a few UK Census numbers showing Jonathan and his wife living there at one point, but it never says where he was born. I do know, though, she was born in Wales.

Our surname is Irish and I was told by a few sources that the family was originally in Ireland. So I can speculate that they moved to Scotland and then Wales, but I have no definitive evidence to back that up.

Outside of that, the Boston line traces back to Ireland and Scotland. The Ireland part on multiple occasions (including Cassady (different from my mother's Cassidy), Hamilton, Skaggs, Compton, Lasswell, Thear and I believe McNeal).

So I'd say I have more Irish in me than anything else, especially if the family surname connects to Ireland, which I'm pretty sure it does. Both my parents met because they were one of only a few Irish people in Salt Lake, which I always thought was funny.

[Thirtieschild]

71. Deepest holes, deadest dead ends, most impenetrable brick walls

My mother's Halls (her maiden name), showed up in Hall Co GA ca 1839, came from somewhere in SC, no idea where though possibly (one percent possibility?) from Marlboro Co, though Marlboro SC to Hall Co GA isn't an expected route. Illiterate so no Bible records, no money so no will, shoemakers so no land and therefore no deeds, Baptist so no church records. The earliest family member, according to the 1850 census, was a William Hall, born ca 1753 in NC, says he was a RevSol but no record, no pension.

My father's PA Dutch are pretty much nailed down, still looking for ancestry of husband's Peter Warner, born ca 1824 Prussia, farmer in Carroll Co MD 1850, later a Lutheran minister in York Co PA, don't know if he immigrated alone or with parents.

Double sigh.

[Cybergata]

73. Hello Fellow New Mexican

Sorry I can't help. I just wanted to say hello.

[Thirtieschild]

74. And hello to you

Since we live in a small town in the SW corner of the state, and since my ancestry is Southern and PA Dutch, and my husband's is New England and Midwestern, I'd have to give up genealogy if it weren't for the Internet. As it is, I've pretty much come to a screeching halt for both of us. I'm fixing to up my Ancestry membership so I can look for the ancestry of our English/Jewish son-in-law. I have no idea how to research his Jewish ancestry (originally Amsterdam and Odessa, Russia). Fascinating people but I haven't a clue how to go deeper. I'm also stuck on the Sicilian ancestry of our ex-son-in-law - his Mafia ancestry is one huge question mark. For starters, we don't even know what the last name should be. His grandfather changed the name when he escaped Chicago (I'd guess he was running from the Feds) and landed in a village in Upstate New York. He was even able to avoid the census.

Edited for content

[Cybergata]

75. We are lucky to have a great Genealogy Library here in ABQ

For your husband's New England Genealogy I might have some leads that will help. On my genealogy website, I have a links page for lots of New England Genealogy books that can be found on google books. http://cybergata.com/roots/links.htm There are more on my sources page. I also have found books on the Internet Archive, and have a few links to books on my links website. I also have Pennsylvanian Dutch (Mennonites) from Germany and Switzerland in my ancestry who first were in Pennsylvania, then they went to Virginia, then to Tennessee and ended up in Indiana. These haven't so easy to find, but if you have any Hockmans in your family tree, I just bought a book that has a huge chapter on them. I found that I have had a difficult with finding early southerners. Our New England ancestors brought the English love for researching Genealogy with them to the Americas, so there is lots of New England information.

You should check to see in Silver City's library has access to HeritageQuest. Western State may have it as well if you can at least use their computers. You might be able to access HeritageQuest on line with your library card. I've been able to with my library card number. I even found a book from Saunder's County in Nebraska that had a biography of on my Great Grandfather living in Ashland Nebraska on HeritageQuest. It mentioned my grandmother and grandfather even as well as my great great grandmother. It was a pretty cool find.

As for Jewish ancestry, I know there are website with information on finding Jewish ancestors. We Hispanic New Mexicans have been finding out that we have plenty of Sephardic ancestry. Of course we all knew it before in a hush-hush sort of way. The reason for being hush-hush hasn't been true for a while, but it was more of a tradition until people started speaking up about it recently. Then lots of Hispanic New Mexican folks have Semitic DNA showing up when they test their DNA.

How long have you been living in Silver? Or do you live outside the city? My husband lived there for a couple of decades up to about ten years ago.

[Bitwit1234]

72. I have posted mine before but now I might have a shot at our surname

I said that our earliest ancestor came to this country about 1740's. And since he was an orphan he took the surname he used. Now someone in our family, Male, with the direct line surname had a DNA test taken and it is back. I hope he goes to the DNA websites available on the net and find out what the name connects to...I hope we may have broken the thickest brick wall you could have.

[kestrel91316]

76. Virtually everybody on both sides came from England/Ireland/Scotland.

Except the ones who came from England/Ireland/Scotland by way of Canada, lol.

Can you tell I'm white??

There are a very few renegade Catholics in there, but they came from England, too.

I don't really HAVE any ethnicity. WASP hardly counts. :cry: I'm so boring.

[pkdu]

103. Scottish and Irish n/t

[RedLetterRev]

81. Hi everyone. I'm a Murrican Mutt

I'm very blessed and spoiled that I have several cousins in the DAR on both sides of my family, and they've done an incredible amount of work for me. They're all a bit older than me, and they've just handed a lot of that work over because I took an interest. I'm very grateful to several women who have devoted almost 40 years of time to trace our ancestry. Then they just handed a complete copy of their work over to me just for the asking. This post is in honour of them and their work and in gratitude for their sharing it with me. Here goes the condensed version :)

The shortest version: I'm probably mostly English, then Scot, Dutch, Irish, a couple of Norwegians thrown in there and something Melungeon-y I'm STILL chasing down. You'd think I'd be phosphorescent white, but I'm olive-skinned and hazel-eyed. With the least sun, I tan to a rosewood color as I have this summer getting my farm started. It's in my numerous dead-ends deep in the Appalachian mountains that the fun and real work of genealogy is yet to be done. Ah, we love a good mystery :)

My matrilineal DNA haplogroup comes out as U5a (Scandinavian, Eastern European, Turkic, etc) but the matrilineal line that I have goes directly back to England as far as I know because that's what the documentation says. Now that's very interesting, because that ethnicity is everything Melungeons claim to be (without the Portuguese and Native), but I have zero proof. Except my appearance and several other traits, that is. I'm scraping my pennies up to do the patrilineal DNA to see what stones (or hornets nests LOL) that kicks over.

My dad's mom's side is GLEN/GLENN documented way back to Scotland through Antrim Ireland. My Glen line is a bastard line of a Jane Glen and the Robert Bruce. The Glen that got here was John in 1751 who fought with General Washington's troops at Braddock's Defeat, then came south through Goochland, VA, then took the wagon road and finally settled in Lincoln County, NC. In a fit of serendipity, I wound up on a property right on the old wagon road where it's very likely he walked 250 years ago, not 500 feet from my doorstep.

Horny ol' booger had three wives, but the last one did 'im in at the ripe old age of 102. One of his younger sons added an "n" to the surname and the Glenn spelling stuck from the on. Nobody knows why. Another of his sons fought at the Battle of Kings Mountain with the Overmountain Men. Another ggranddad fought in several battles for independence in NC. Two of those granddads were present at the signing (but did not sign) the Mecklenburg Resolves, the first declaration of independence from England. One was threatened with hanging by the British for his activities in the Regulators while at least two (if not more) were members of the Regulators, a group who were fighting for liberty right before the Revolution.

Liberty and democracy are in my blood. Where else would I wind up but DU?

That line has Grissoms, Berrys, McClains, Golightlys (I'd love to know more about that line), Smiths (yeah, I have tons of Smiths all over NC, none related of course) and Rhodeses down to me. I've got Allens at the edges of both sides of my family but I'm directly kin to none. There are Revolutionary and Confederate soldiers aplenty in there and many, many stories.

My dad's dad's side has Rhodeses which have been in NC since the late 1600's. I don't have all the documentation in my hands yet, but I've been promised GED files with van den Burgs, and Millers that I know of.

My mom's side is also exhaustively researched on her mom's side. On my mom's mom's side and on my dad's dad's side, my family has been in NC since pre-revolutionary times. On my mom's mom's side, I have Smiths (AGAIN! Argh!), Flakes (you think I'm kidding? Now you know! LOL), Harrris, Bellew, Kirby, McBride, Lee (not the famous one), Williams, a couple Norwegians Nelme and Liske snuck in there (how in the hell did that happen in NC???), Farrell, and me. Going back up there are Sullivans, Stumans, Sorrells (who may be Melungeon), Merritts (one accused hog thief but Rev War solder, we'll take it LOL), Williamses (Welsh Quakers with huge land grants along the Pee Dee River -- very interesting stories!) and so many more.

I have a pazillion scans of court documents that I'm re-scanning for my web site to suit the new software. I've been using "The Next Generation" on my own personal server. One of the perks of working where I do is I can use one of the IP addresses and put my own server up and have my own web site]. I'm still straightening that thing out and it will be probably the end of the year before I get it squared away and the bugs worked out (when wedding season is over -- October is the busiest month). At the moment, it's better than nothing. Enjoy!

[CBHagman]

82. That leaves me speechless!

What a story! I can't help but think you'll find more relatives and/or provide more tips here at the forum.

Anyway, welcome aboard! :hi:

[RedLetterRev]

83. Thanks for the welcome!

There are benefits to being one of the "baby cousins" :) I've been handed three huge-A GED files and boxes and boxes of copies of court documents, wills, photos, and just STUFF. It's now my job to pull all that together into one big web site where we can all get at it. Each of those cousins has at least 40 years of research in and I've put another nearly seven into combing through it and keying it all back in, plus scanning and organizing it.

It's an amazing journey, to be sure. I'm humbled to be entrusted with so much careful work that represents years of searching, travel and love.

And absolutely, I'd be glad to share anything I know.

What got me to this thread was the mention of "Black Dutch" and "Black Irish". Very often, those are euphemisms for Melungeon ethnicity. That is a whole American story in and of itself that predates English settlement. Very many times, you'll see ancestors in census reports being listed as "of color" in otherwise white families and there's no telling or idea how they got to be "of color". Black hair and blue eyes or olive complexions popping up in families like mine that are Anglo-Irish-Scot-Dutch-blahblah, and also of Appalachian origin (these together) are clues. Sometimes there is Native ancestry and often there is not; often these ancestors were "passed" as Native whether they really were or not. Nearly reliably, they were treated worse than Native, worse than African-descended, mysterious and as lowest of the low. It's extremely difficult to get any reliable information because of the way they were treated. Their children weren't allowed into the white schools (even if they appeared white); very often they had their homes and land taken away; and very often they weren't allowed to vote. It's a secret and shameful story of oppression that's only within the last couple of decades being told.

I noted another poster mentioning Melungeon ethnicity. I'd hope there's enough interest to start another thread for pooling information. There just isn't a whole lot at all. The few sites there are out there on the intertoobs are scanty and even though I've been welcomed and have corresponded with a few of the site owners, the only consensus we have is that we're all searching together.

If there are NC folks in this thread, I'm sitting on about 300+ years of NC history and surnames. I've got cousins literally from Manteo to Cherokee/Brasstown. Howdy y'all!! If your family has been in NC more than 150 years, then we're probably branch-cousins at the least :hi:

[BluRay01]

85. New to this board and to genealogy research...

I blame DU--someone posted on New Years' Eve about Ancestry.com, and now my partner and I are both hooked! In fact, I have to quit thinking about it for a little while or I'll never get my lecture prepped...

I'm a bit of a mutt. I had an Irish grandmother, a Polish grandfather, a Lebanese grandmother, and a grandfather who was said to be Pennsylvania Dutch, but who was really a mutt himself. I've preliminarily traced one branch back to Lancaster County, PA, but I'm also finding family trees that link us to the Jamestown colony, various parts of the South, and eventually, back to England. There may have actually been a little research done by another relative, at least into the Lebanese part of the family...but it looks like there is much more to do.

As for my partner, she is Jewish, with early information taking her mostly to Russia and to Turkey.

Glad to have found this board--it looks like there are many resources here!

[OnionPatch]

86. I'm also new to this group.

I laughed when I read your post because the exact same thing happened to me! I had always thought about doing some genealogy research and when I saw that post on DU I went to Ancestry.com, too. :) I had plenty of vacation time on my hands and I ended up so hooked it shocked me. I've been having a hard time ripping myself away!

I now have 500+ people on the family tree I created (which also includes my husband's tree) and have traced most lines of my family back to Europe. My family tree is split between Scots-Irish, Irish, Scottish, German and English. Most came over in the 1700's, a few in the 1600's and 1800's. I traced my husband's family back to Norway, Sweden and Germany.

I'm having a blast with this and am sure I'll be visiting this forum often.

[BluRay01]

89. I spent far too much time on this over the holidays...

We were both pretty obsessed New Year's Day and through last weekend. Work sort of took over temporarily, but I'm looking forward to getting back to it.

My partner and I haven't combined our trees...she's got somewhere around 120 people on her tree. I think that I'm around 470 on mine...but I'll qualify that response. Part of my family has been here since around the 1500's, and other people on Ancestry.com have public family trees that intersect with mine. At first, I would look, and if the names and places seemed like they matched, I just added the data to my tree. When I got back to around the 1600's, I think the accuracy dropped a bit. So I'm going back and double-checking the information. The other thing is that my family...well, they seem to believe in having a *lot* of kids. My mother is one of nine, her father was one of 12, his father was one of 11 or so...and so on. I haven't even really done anything with my dad's parents or my mom's mother--they were all first-generation Americans, so I'll be seeking out Lebanese, Polish, and Irish records. It's pretty amazing to be able to find all of this information.

I'm glad to see I wasn't the only one influenced by DU that night!

[CBHagman]

87. What sort of records/resources are you using?

Are you focusing much on vital records, and/or talking to relatives, or is there some other approach you have?

For myself, I've found some of the most useful resources are libraries and local genealogical societies and/or state and county web pages. For instance, I've received very useful records from the Genealogical Research Society of Northeastern Pennsylvania. They've provided wills, at least one naturalization record, and birth and death certificates, among other things.

At libraries, including the Library of Congress, I've found that looking through city directories and the obit pages has also been a godsend. You have to make peace with the use of microfilm because, ladies and gentlemen, there are times when the stuff just isn't available to you online.

That said, however, my local library system allows me access to Census records online, and I've got a few stories about that.

Anyway, welcome aboard, BluRay01. Happy hunting to you and your partner, and do let us know what you find and/or what you are seeking! :hi:

[BluRay01]

88. So far, I've just been searching online...

the records on Ancestry have been pretty helpful, and my maternal grandfather's family has been in the US since well before it actually was the US, so there's quite a bit to be found here. I've found my ancestors on other people's trees on that site also. I'm verifying some of those records, but it looks like I'm able to trace that line eventually back to 1300's England. We'll see how it checks out. I am planning to look into the local library as well. And one of my best finds was actually through Google...I googled my great grandfather's name, and I found the website of a second cousin of mine. She's spent years researching the branch of the family that has been in the US forever, and she's sent me a lot of her work. I think the real hurdles will come when I try to find prior generations in Lebanon...or were they in Syria? I don't know...and then there's the Polish line...and Ireland...

As for my partner, she's done pretty well, with the major hurdle being relatives who changed their names. They didn't just change them when they arrived in this country--we've found them using one name in the 1920 census and a totally different name in the 1930 census. We know it's the right person--all of the other relatives are the same, all the other information is right, only the name is different. We've been able to work around it so far, but we've been helped greatly by my partner's mom, who knows a lot of background information.

If questions do come up, we'll be sure to bring them here. It's nice to find others who have been bitten by this particular bug!

[CBHagman]

90. Verify, verify, verify.

I have quite a few stories about things that can and do go wrong even with official records -- names scratched out, ages lied about, etc. Then there's the whole issue of transcription and how someone might not understand the handwriting on the manifest or the Census record when preparing the rolls for the database.

I'm pretty cautious about any online records that rely on transcription and/or posting by another party. FamilySearch has been great for tips and leads, but even that has to be backed up with other records.

[donco6]

91. Volga Deutsch. Father's side

Mixture of Hessian mercenary, Jamestown, and Dutch on mom's side.

[dalaigh lllama]

92. Hi all! Heinz 57 ethnicity here

So far, I am mostly German and Irish, but also French, English, Scottish, Welsh, Swiss, and Dutch.

I started out not even knowing the ethnicity of my maiden name because it had been Anglicized. Finally tracked down the first ones here in 1731 who had come here from Alsace-Lorraine and were German Lutherans. They eventually married into a Scots/Welsh family, the most "famous" being a rascal who wrote "The Ohio Hunter" in the 1800's.

On my mom's side the earliest one here was Lion Gardiner in 1635. One of his descendants eventually married into some French/Swiss ancestors of mine in Iowa, who had built "The smallest chapel in the world" in Festina. My maternal grandfather was my only recent ancestor who was 100% anything, and he was quite Irish.

I've got piles of genealogical records scattered all over, but I think this year I'm going to get things organized for the rest of the family. Good to see this forum here on DU -- politics and genealogy are my two main interests right now.

[Dem2theMax]

93. That is SO not funny. The name I'm stuck on? Heinze!

LOL. Augustus Heinze, my brick wall. I think it will never, ever, be broken.

Just had to put this in here. LOL.

[dalaigh lllama]

94. Oh, I'm sorry for you.

I was fortunate in that my maiden name was uncommon enough that except for a few generations, the family was fairly easy to track. They had all the church records and left wills.

I'd guess Heinze is fairly common and so harder to narrow down. I've got a Klein I'm dead-ended on right now, too, but I have some ideas on how I'll proceed once I get started researching again.

Are you stuck on Augustus here in the states or back in Germany?

[Dem2theMax]

95. Augustus, and his dear wife, Mary Ellen (Chambers) Heinze, are the bane of my existence.

I can find both of them in 1860/70, in MD., and her in 1880, in PA. He was born in Prussia, in about 1824. She was born in either PA or MD, depending on which census taker you believe, in about 1834/35.

Augustus is rumored to be buried in Dawson, PA. Can't prove it. If I could find anything on them, I'd be so darned happy. Augustus and Mary Ellen most likely married in Frostburg, Allegany, MD. But there were two huge fires that took out most of the records, so any proof of marriage most likely went up in smoke. I have called Allegany County more than once, and they actually look up the records over the phone. They don't have a thing on A & M. Doesn't it always figure? Fires. AAARRRGGGGG.

Finding these two took over one and a half years. That is because the census folk spelled their name as 'Hientze' in 1860 and 'Hinty' in 1870. Isn't that special? Couldn't find them, well, her, in 1880, until I started searching under the spelling of 'Hines.' Yeah, they are such lovely ancestors, she started going by her middle name, Ellen, and using the spelling of Hines, as no one could seem to figure out how to spell HEINZE the proper way. lol? The whole family had a VERY bad habit of going by middle names or nicknames, even on the census records. I just LOVE this family. They will kill me before I die. :crazy:

LOL!

This is all on my Mom's side of the family. On Dad's side, I'm lucky. He's a Woodson, as in 'Jamestown' Woodson's. I didn't have to do a thing but put the name "Woodson" in Google and ta da, there is the tree. LOL. He has another line that has also been researched to death. I did find some really good, juicy, not to be repeated details on some really close ancestral family members. People would kill to know what I found out. LOL. So on his side, I'm set. Mom's side? AAAAARRRRRGGGGGGGG!

And Mom's family has always thought that they WERE related to the Heinz 57 gang. I cannot find any link at all. I'm sure I'll be disappointing many a family member over that one! ;)

[dalaigh lllama]

96. Name spellings are special back then

There are probably 30 different spellings I've seen of my maiden name. I usually looked for consonants only since the vowels could be anything. Every once in a while the first letter of the last name was messed up, too -- so much fun.

Let me guess -- Augustus' first name was probably Hans or Johannes. That seemed to be the ubiquitous first name in my German ancestors. Have you found out what ship he came over on? One way to narrow it down is to look at his other neighbors from Prussia. It's possible you might find some overlap in neighbors and in shipmates. The more names in commonality you find, the better the odds that it's the one you're looking for.

Was he prominent in the community? I've found that some counties had books with little bios on prominent citizens that often had lots of clues in 'em. In one case I had a dead end with a ne'er-do-well ancestor who I knew had a brother (the family had a letter from the brother when the dad died). Turned out his brother was a prominent citizen a few counties over with a county bio with enough clues to get me back 200 years. It was awesome.

Good luck and good hunting.

[Dem2theMax]

97. "Name spellings are special back then." Weren't they? LOL.

I have lists of how someone could spell "Heinze." And I use those lists a lot. :crazy:

You might be on to something with Augustus' first name. His last son had a mouthful of a name.
Get this: John Andrew Matthew Augustus Heinze
Could he be named after his father? Could his father's first name have been John/Johannes?

In some census reports, this son went by the name of John A. Heinze.
In other census reports, he went by the name of John M. Heinze. When he died, he was using the name of AUGUSTUS Heinze!

The youngest daughter in the group, her name was Ida May - her tombstone reads "Daughter of Matthew Heinze."
She is, without a doubt, the daughter of my Augustus Heinze.

What do you make of all of that? LOL?

I know that some groups of folks, whether through religion, country of origin, whatever, have set rules on how they name their children. As in, first born son is named after so and so, second born son after so and so. Someone once sent me a list of these 'rules' for German ancestry. I THINK it was for German ancestry, I can't remember for sure. I had it saved on my computer, but the computer crashed and I lost it and have never come across anything to replace it. Have you ever heard of anything like this in your research for your family? If there is such a thing, and it does pertain to German ancestry, that would help me in trying to figure out where to go from here. I do know that a lot of the same names pop up in later generations of this line in the family.

I haven't been able to find Augustus, or whatever his real name is, in any ship info. I have had other folks search for me and they can't find him either. He is an absolute mystery. He comes to America, God only knows when, has eight kids, and poof, he disappears. Only thing we know for sure is that he was around long enough for wife, Mary, to give birth to one last child, Ida May, in January of 1873. By the 1880 census, she is widowed.

I do need to go back to Frostburg, MD., and do some serious research on the name in that area. ("Go back" as in spend time on my computer. I'm in Calif. Can't get back east, darn it.) I do have a cousin in that area. I hinted that I wanted her to do a road trip. Funny, she hasn't written to me in ages. LOL.

I will take your suggestions and put them to work. And if you do, by any chance, know of any 'rules' to the naming of German children, please let me know.

I really appreciate your feedback. More than you can know. ANY ideas I get from folks for this crazy brick wall of mine, I APPRECIATE them! :) :) :)

[dalaigh lllama]

98. I wouldn't call them naming rules so much as tendencies

Going by memory, I think the first son was named after the paternal grandfather, the second after the maternal grandfather, and the third after the father. I've seen too many exceptions to that, tho, to think of it as a hard and fast rule. I'd say the tendency to name all the boys Johann ______ was more of a rule, in my experience.

Do you know what religion they were? Mine were Lutherans and were so persnickety about record keeping that they not only had birth and marriage records at the place they lived but would send them back to the church they used to attend. Consequently, there are complete records of my ancestors both in Tennessee and in their previous home in Virginia, and the generation before has complete records in Virginia and their previous home in Pennsylvania. Right now I'm stuck at Matthias Nehs born in Preuschdorf, Alsace-Lorraine in 1673 who also seems to have been born in Luneberg and Bayern and Mittschdorf. My theory is that they started the practice of multiple-location recordkeeping during the thirty year war when churches were switching back and forth from Catholic to Lutheran to Catholic to Lutheran every other moment so they kept their records in more than one location to CYA.

I'd say your best bet on Augustus is to back up and take a look at the community he was in to get some clues as to when and where they came over. Most seemed to stay close to at least some friends and family. You also might want to check naturalization records (if those weren't burned, too).

If he came during the 1850's it's possible it was because of the German potato famine. Most are only familiar with the potato famine as it pertained to the Irish, but my husband's family came over around then and I remember reading that that was one of the major reasons for German immigration at the time.

[OnionPatch]

100. Scots-Irish, English, German and a little French Huguenot..

Throw in a sprinkling of Dutch and Swiss.

One side of my family were mostly Scots-Irish pioneers into western PA (Pittsburgh area) and the Ohio Valley in the late 1700s. The other side is mostly a mixture of Pennsylvania Dutch (Germans), Quakers and Puritans from New England.

I've been most interested in the Scots-Irish although they are not the earliest Americans in my tree. I guess it's the pioneer/frontier aspect of their existence that sucks me in. That and the fact that there is very little genealogy work done on that side of my family, so I feel a sort of ownership. The Puritan/Quaker side has already been well-researched .

[pipi_k]

102. Mostly French Canadian with a dab of Micmac

That's on my dad's side.

My mom's side is giving me the fits. She has said that her dad was adopted. His surname is English, but in appearance he resembled someone of Native American/Eskimo origin. She said she has his adoption papers but unfortunately has managed to misplace them...

In addition, my mom's grandfather on her mother's side is proving to be a bit of a pain in the ass. I have like three different dates of birth for him. I contacted the town where he was supposedly born (according to his WWI draft card info) and they have NO record of his birth. Said he may have been born at home and that if I want them to search some more I need to send them more money (I can't travel to do the research myself due to disabilities).

My mom's entire family is a mystery, and to make it even worse, there's the problem of "Americanization" of various surnames and I can't find enough information on them anywhere to be able to connect the dots.

On the plus side, I did connect with a couple of cousins on my dad's side I never knew I had, and they filled in a whole lot of empty spaces for me, even as far back as the 1600s...the original French settlers in Canada.

Very cool stuff

:)

[carpetbagger]

104. Scot, German, Swede, French, Danish, and some unknown

I have two big stumbling blocks, one is that I know nothing about one great-grandfather's family, he emigrated from Sweden.

The other is that I know nothing about the only great-great grandparent I have born to American-born parents. It's very odd, since I've heard the story of how our family goes back to the original Dutch settlers of New Amsterdam, and I have a third cousin who heard the same story. Yet I know nothing about her except for a name, birth year and state, a rough estimate of when she might have gotten married, a death certificate without parents listed, and of course the story of how our family goes back to the 1600s in New York. It's been 9 years of trying without any luck. I hope they index the 1875 NY census, that should have her married and list her county of birth. Otherwise, I might just go through all the Kings County (Brooklyn) films. Yawn.

But the score right now of immigrants is this: Scotland 5/16 (two great-grandparents and one gg-gf), Germany 4/16 (four gg-grparents), Sweden 4/16 (two gt-grandparents), France 1/16 (two ggg-grandparents), Denmark 1/16 (one gg-gm), and 1/16 unknown.

[sybylla]

105. I've got a New York Dutch immigrant problem as well.

Eliza Mariah Terwilliger. It's a name that appears in all the New York Dutch research and was supposedly originates this side of the ocean - so I know exactly where this line should lead. The problem is she married Dutchman - whose family I've had no trouble tracing back to the Netherlands. Her husband, according to one county history, worked for the Erie Canal company supplying fresh venison for the workers' meals so they traveled a great deal then and even after the canal was completed.

Having been born before 1840 makes it impossible to find her on a census. Her first name comes down to me as Eliza but even if she appeared on a census, it could be Elisabeth, Elizabeth, Lizzy, Mariah, Mary, etc. I've looked at every possible Terwilliger household in a 5 county area in New York in 1850 and have come up with a few possibilities - but have yet to find a sure thing.

Ancestry has been zero help at least up until last winter. Of course, I've only been looking for primary source records. Maybe I should start looking through family trees. I even signed up for the Terwilliger list at Rootsweb for several years and had no luck.

Does the state of New York have an online vital records search function yet? Last time I was there I saw no sign of an index.

[carpetbagger]

106. About New York 1800s records

There's no statewide online search. The city has fairly good indexes from the 1890s up to the 1940s for deaths and marriages. Upstate, I'm only familiar with Albany (city and county) system, and there's very little online. I know Monroe and Westchester have some online records, and Rensselaer's had some folks making indices of some of the records.

Family trees seem to be expanding exponentially online, and there might be something on Ancestry or accessible from some of the other sites that wasn't there even 12 months ago. The trees themselves are restricted to subscribers, but you can see if there's anyone with the name in the tree.

The 1865 NY State census is up on pilot.familysearch.org, and if you have a clue about the township or county, you might be able to find something on the raw images (I found one g-g-g-grandmother and her family in Albany County, as well as one of her sons after looking at about 30 pages, although my other ancestors are going to be a bit more difficult to find in Brooklyn).

If you PM me with the name , the husband's name, and any timelines and places you have, I'll try to take a look and see what I can dig up.

[CBHagman]

107. More New York stuff.

In case anyone else with New York relatives is reading this, don't forget the Steve Morse's web page with various indices, some of them from New York. New York can be awful to deal with, genealogically speaking, but I did get a leg up from using Morse's website.

http://stevemorse.org/

By the way, don't let some of the graphics fool you; I found my Hungarian-born great-grandfather in a New York City death index -- on a page supposedly for Italian immigrants.

[denbot]

108. Chiricahua Apache (Bedonkohe clan) from my mother's and Yaqui from my father's side.

On my mom's my great great grandfather was a French Canadian "Indian Fighter" now buried at Ft Bliss TX. He married an Apache woman and had one son, my great grandfather who settled in New Mexico and also married an Apache woman. My maternal grandmother married my grand pa who was Tarahumara, so I am about 1/16 European. On my father's side my great grandfather was Yaqui and my paternal grandmother said that he kidnapped his wife (my great grandmother), but could not remember what tribe she was from, but noted that she was "very sad".

I have a pretty good record going back to the 1870's and that's where my line drops off the census.

[frogmarch]

109. English, Scottish on my dad's side

and English and East Indian on my birth mother's.

I found my mother's family when I was a young adult by writing to the orphanage in the U.S. where my older sister and I temporarily lived upon coming to America when we were very young. We remained there till our dad, who was in the U.S. Army, was stateside again. Our mother had died in India when I was 10 days old and my sister 2 1/2. Our mother's sister had written to the orphanage to ask about us just before I wrote to the orphanage. The orphanage put us in touch with each other.

It was right here that I got my first big start in finding my dad's family. Because of the help - including links to vital records documents - I received here, I am now on a roll. I've since located a cousin of mine. Our dads were brothers. My cousin is very good at genealogy, and as it turns out, has records of our family that go waaaay back.

Here are two pages from a genealogy book pertaining to the McKays, our paternal Scottish ancestors: (By messing with the url, I'll try to make sure they don't open here.)

//i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd45/TrilB/BookReaderImages52.jpg
//i220.photobucket.com/albums/dd45/TrilB/BookReaderImages53.jpg

If anyone's interested in seeing the pages, just add http: to the beginning of each url.

[goclark]

110. African American and Cherokee

On my mother's side -

My grandfather was a " proud colored man."
He was always mistaken for White.
But the "rule" was if you had one drop of Black Blood you were Black ~ still is the unwritten rule in our culture.

His g mother was a White Servant from England . When she got to Virginia she had two children by the man that she worked for ~ both sisters moved to Maryland and married Black men.

Her mother was clearly "colored."

My father's side identified as "colored" or Negro.
All but my grandfather ~ he said he was a Cherokee Indian and proud of it!

He would show me an old photograph of an Indian by the side of the river and say, " That is your great grandfather!"

When I started searching for my ancestors I found that in the census records he was listed as Negro but he must have made the Census Worker cross it out and in big letters it says Cherokee.
He had a strong personality. : )

I only saw him once but he did look like an Indian and so did the siblings. So did my father for that matter.


All that said, WE are African American.

I do wish that I could find any trace of him in the records. I tried but as yet don't know how to dig for the information.

[lazarus]

111. very British

I thought I was mostly Scottish, but it turns out I'm only a little Scottish, with some Welsh and a big ol' heaping helping of English.

I now have a rumour that one ancestor is Indian (Amerindian), so I have to track that down.

[Spider Jerusalem]

112. Mostly British Isles.

English, Scots, Welsh and Irish. Mostly English, mostly 17th century immigrants to Maryland and Virginia. Also Huguenot French, Dutch, and German. My ancestors were a moderately diverse bunch for being from within a fairly geographically limited area, it seems; the lines I've traced thus far include English Catholics who came to Maryland at the founding of the colony, younger sons of minor English gentry who set out to become Virginia planters, Quakers who received land grants from William Penn, Scots who decided America looked like a better idea after the failure of the Jacobite rebellion, staunch Cavalier royalists as well as Puritan roundheads, and not a few whose pasage was paid for by terms of indenture. Most of the ancestors I'm still trying to trace lived in Georgia and the Carolinas (where the Northern zeal for burning courthouses has done later generations of genealogists no favours), and one great-great grandfather who is a dead end (the family story having always been that he was an 'Irish immigrant, from Cork'...but people with the same surname lived in the part of Kentucky he and my grandmother lived in (which was largely settled by those Maryland Catholics, pushing further West), and I haven't been able to find much conclusive in immigrant records (Dillon being a reasonably common name).

[Mr. McD]

113. Mostly British and German

Scottish, Irish and English with some distant Welsh. Quite a bit of German. even my one Swiss line is from a German speaking region of Switzerland and are most likely of German origin.

[shanti]

114. French Waldensians, English loyalists mostly

maternal/paternal side. I can trace my French side to the early middle ages, and my English side back to 1600's in Dorset England.

Dad's paternal English side had lots of masons and there was even talk of a member of the Knights Templar way back. Two brothers immigrated to the Connecticut, but remained Loyalists. They couldn't stay in America, so left for the frontier of Canada. They were some of the earliest Canadian pioneers in Ontario, with a town named after. Left Canada in the 1800's for the U.S. and ended up in Washington state. There was also a Dutch line on the paternal side that i traced back to the Netherlands. The paternal line has died out sadly.

Dad's maternal side was French and Irish. They were early Kentucky pioneers, moving there from Virginia. I couldn't find any specific info regarding my ggf, but found the homestead on the Ohio River. Their name is in the census. GGF and his wife moved west, ending up in Central Washington. I know nothing more of this line.

Mom's paternal side is well-researched. They were French Waldensians, who had emigrated from alpine France (now Italy), to Uruguay in the mid-1800's. They only stayed about 25 years, leaving for Missouri to start a new life. Apparently, the Uruguayan government was snatching up all the young men for their little wars, and my family had a lot of sons. They settled in southern Missouri, where a church was built by the RR, but used to Uruguayan weather, the climate wasn't exactly to their liking, so some members left for California after a few years. They had small farms in Orange County in the late 1800's, but never bought a substantial amount of land, so never became land wealthy like some early European settlers in OC. My GF's farm is under concrete and has been for many years.

Mom's maternal side, is Irish (County Cork) and French Alsatian. I haven't even started on them, as the info is a lot sketchier.

Fun stuff!

[csziggy]

115. Before 1800 - English, Irish, lots of German Palatines

After 1800, English from Lincolnshire (about 1830), Yorkshire (1860s), Wales (1872), and some Canadians I haven't been able to trace back farther. The father was born in "Lower Canada"in 1818 and while some Ancestry trees show his father as being from Connecticut, I don't really believe them. The name they have may be right, but I think they found somebody with that name about the right age and tacked him onto my ancestor.

[xmas74]

116. Heinz 57, as my grandfather would say.

Too many messes. I try to stick it out with just one and run into another mess.

They came here in the 1600's and married into nearly every imaginable ethnic combination available.

[Curmudgeoness]

117. Half Polish, quarter German, quarter OMG.

That last quarter is supposedly a mix with rumors of Pennsylvania Dutch, a great-grandfather from somewhere like Scotland where they would have spoken with a brogue, and much unknown.

[CBHagman]

118. I've never met anyone from the OMG line.

:rofl:

But I like it.

I also like your user name.

[trud]

119. Denmark, Germany

Denmark, the state archives have the censuses and parish registers scanned and online. Germany, forget it, a lot of records were bombed into oblivion during WWII, and nothing is online as far as I could find.