CREATING SENSIBLE FAMILY TREES

I have been writing about family stories for a while, so today is a LESSON DAY.  Non-genealogists will just have to excuse me today, and go read another blog like FRENCH ESSENCE, my current favorite.

My Tree

Lately I have been doing some family trees for people other than my family.  In doing that, I always check with Ancestry.com to see if there are already some trees registered with that name before I start my serious research.  I realize that you MUST verify everything you find in these trees yourself, but it will give you a start, and you can see what others have already found (or think they have found.)  Sometimes you will get a hint about a question you have in mind.  Sometimes you will find (in their citations) some bit of information you did not have.  I have found much information on Find A Grave, citations where they give you a photo of the stone, or record a memorial or obituary.  I often find names I did not have, lists of children, and facts about the wife (or wives when I did not know there was another.)  But in doing this, in comparing all the trees that are out there, I find the most glaring ERRORS!  I sometimes wonder if these people even read with their brain engaged what they have recorded.  I would be embarrassed to have others see these glaring errors on my tree.

One of the most prevalent mistakes is in listing children.

Take the following as an example:

Assume the mother, Mary, was born in 1840 and was married about 1859.  Father Josiah is a poor farmer, born about 1835.  They live in Buford Township, Union Co, NC.

CHILDREN               BORN                                    PLACE

John                           Nov 1          1860                 Buford, Union Co, NC

Mary                          March 18     1862                 Buford, Union Co, NC

Robert                       June 12        1864                 Buford, Union Co, NC

George                       Nov 2          1866                 Buford, Union Co, NC

Looks OK so far.  Mother is of child bearing age, and married right before first child.  Children’s birthdates look logical, and are all in the same place.

Now the next line should throw you:

Emeline                     April 14        1867                 St. George, Person Co, Illinois

Annie                        May 3          1868                  Buford, Union Co, NC

Thomas                     April 4         1870                  Buford, Union Co, NC

It is possible but highly unlikely that this poor “dirt farmer” and his wife moved or traveled to Illinois and had a child “Emeline” there.  This is highly suspicious.  Also there is not enough time between George and Emeline – only five months.  And the next child Annie is born back in Buford, NC, and also the following child.  Unless I had unquestionable proof such as a document which absolutely showed that the family had traveled to Illinois at that point in time, I would not put this child in my tree.

Now using this same “fictitious” family, let’s suppose the wife, Mary, dies in 1874.  There is a citation proving this.

Then we have listed:

Samuel                      June 30      1879                  Macon Co, NC

This child cannot belong to Mary.  It is possible that Josiah married again.  In those days, people often married again and soon.  After all, there was a farm to run, a house to be kept, and children to be looked after.  Sometimes “romance” had little to do with it.  They needed a spouse, and FAST!  But what was Josiah doing in Macon Co, which is up in the mountains, far from Union Co?  The 1880 census shows him still living in Union Co.

I would see if future records ever showed Josiah with another wife – a will, land records in Macon Co, etc. or these same children on a census with Josiah and another woman or these children on a census with another woman with Josiah’s last name after he died.  If I could not prove he remarried, or moved to Macon Co for a couple of years, I would not put Samuel on this tree.

Let’s assume that Josiah died in 1890.  You have a Find A Grave record for this (you might find Mary buried right beside him.)

On the same family tree I have seen another child added:

John                                                1906                  no location

And even:

Roger                                              1925.                 Edgecombe Co,   NC

This sounds ridiculous, but I have seen this many, many times.  It seems that some people will grab ANY record with the same last name and stick it onto their tree beyond all logic.  I find this so often that it seems like an epidemic.  Do people really not “examine” their tree after it is done?

There is one other error I find often.  I found it in trees in my family name on Ancestry.  When I first found it several years ago, there were only two trees with this error, distant relatives living in the same location.  They were probably working together, copying each other.

Old Haywood Deed

First some background:  I have written about my GGGrandmother Catherine Wentz (Haywood) before. There is the family homeplace  on Hiwy 74 just above Monroe, NC where Catherine and Benton established themselves when they came from Lincoln County about 1832..  Over the years as land was shifted around and redeeded, there was always a portion called “The Katy Haywood Homeplace.”  It was always set aside for her and she lived her whole life there.  There is a Haywood living on that “homeplace” today.

She had her first son, Josiah my GGrandfather who was lost in the Civil War, and second son John Franklin.  She and daughter Margaret Pamela, Josiah’s widow Margaret, and John Franklin all lived on the original Haywood land, right beside each other, verified by the censuses through the years (1840 - 1900.)  Catherine was still in her house with daughter Margaret P. in 1870 when she was 65 years old, but she was living in the household of her son John Franklin in the 1880 census when she was 75 years old.  And, of course, we don’t have the 1890 census.  (Don’t you just hate that!  It is so “inconvenient.”  I have loads of events that happened during that 20 year time period which I cannot document!)

Catherine went to MorningStar Lutheran Church all her life.  It was founded by her GGGrandfather, Johann Andreas Wentz in the 1750’s. Her children were baptized there.  Catherine died sometime in the gap between the censuses.  She was there in 1880, she was gone by 1900.  Her descendants and relatives were mostly buried in four cemeteries in the Monroe NC area – Old Bethel Methodist, MorningStar Lutheran, and Shiloh Baptist Church, and Bond’s Grove Methodist, a later cemetery.  Catherine is not recorded at Old Bethel.  The people at MorningStar, as excellent as their records are about births, baptisms, and attendance, did not record deaths!  There are no tombstones apparent in the old original wooden church cemetery.  John Franklin who she was living with at 75 years of age, and a lot of his family are at Shiloh Baptist.  Catherine is not there.  She should be at MorningStar, but I cannot prove it – yet!” 

 

But I am pretty certain that after 1880 at age 75, she had NO connections with any other church or burying ground in this Union County area, OR in South Carolina!

As I stated above, several years ago I found two trees with an evident error.  They had Catherine buried in Newberry, South Carolina!  Newberry is across the state line and a good distance from Union County NC.  There is NO evidence of any connection with Newberry in any of the HAYWOOD families.  Somehow they had found this tidbit and put it in their trees.  It was bad enough when there were only two of them.  In re-researching my facts for this blog I now find that 74 people have picked up this bad information and put it in their trees!  (This is evidence of how interest in Genealogy has grown by leaps and bounds in the past few years.) 

I should have sent them a message when I first found this, but since I can’t prove anything about Catherine’s death, I did not.  I should have anyway!  Now there are 74 trees with this bad information.  Since I cannot “Prove” Catherine’s death and burial, I just don’t put any info in my tree other than Death: bet 1880 and 1900.  There is no proof about this, it is just COMMON SENSE to know Catherine was not buried in South Carolina.

Please READ your trees with a “common sense” attitude.  Don’t put in a “fact” unless you can prove it.  BE SENSIBLE!

Create Believable Trees

And enjoy

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