The ABC Rules of a Good Detective

In Karen White's novel, The House on Prytania Street, her character, Uncle Bernie, says he's

sticking to the ABC rules of a good detective....  Assume nothing; believe nothing; challenge and check everything.

I believe those are good rules for genealogists and family historians, too, don't you?  I think both groups have a lot in common when it comes to finding answers.  We don't assume that every statement in a census is accurate, that the story in the newspaper is exactly true, and we search for more evidence, additional documents, other sources to help us find the truth, or something as close to the truth as is possible, decades and centuries after the events.

I've begun researching Robert Nelson and his wife Jane (whose maiden name may be/is probably Watson).  They are my third great-grandparents on my mother's side of the family.  (Audrey Meinzen —> Emma Bickerstaff —> Edward Jesse Bickerstaff —> Emma Nelson —> Robert & Jane (Watson?) Nelson

Another researcher of this line shared the results of her research with me years ago.  Now I want to confirm her research and see the documents myself.  As I begin scouting around I see conflicts between her results and attached documents on FamilySearch Family Tree, as well as conflicts among the dozen or more attached documents in FamilyTree.  I have lots of questions.  For example,

• Is Robert Nelson's wife's name Jane Watson, as the earlier researcher suggests, or is it Jane Smith Thompson, as shown on FamilySearch FamilyTree?
• Was Robert born in Essex County, Durham County, or Northumberland County, England?   
• And where did someone find Robert's middle initial of W (as included in FamilyTree)?  I see no attached documents or evidence to suggest that's accurate, though the death certificate of one of his sons included the W.  Only "Nelson" as a last name was listed for the informant.
• In religion, was Robert Nelson a Non-Conformist or did he belong to the Church of England?  There are documents from both churches attached in FamilyTree.  (I'm sure they're not for the same person.)
  
• Where were Robert Nelson and his family in 1860?  They appear in the 1840, 1850, and 1870 census records in Jefferson County, Ohio, but are nowhere to be found (yet) in the 1860 census.  
• Robert Nelson was a coal miner (or "coal digger" as reported on the 1870 U.S. census).  Why did he and his wife and youngest daughter move over 500 miles, from Jefferson County, Ohio, to Montgomery County, Illinois, sometime after the 1870 census when he was already 70 years old?

There are so many contradictions and uncertainties.  I believe sorting this out is a challenge worthy of a highly experienced family historian, which I am not.  But I'm going to take it on and see what I can come up with.  You can be sure I'll be using the ABC Rules of a Good Detective!

—Nancy.

Copyright © 2025 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
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What Might You Find in an Abstract of Title?

In 1984 we bought a house (Lot 104 of Charles R. Cornell's Subdivision, situated at 245 E. Maynard Avenue, Columbus, Ohio) which we sold in 1999 when we bought another house.  All the paperwork for both houses went into a box then into a closet.  It's been there until recently when I began sorting through trying to decide what's necessary to keep and what we can send on it's way (sell, recycle, landfill, thrift store, etc.).

Among the papers for the purchase and sale of the first house was an Abstract of Title.  I'd looked at it earlier to see if I could learn when the house was built but when I couldn't I lost interest.  (I wasn't yet involved in family history.)

An Abstract of Title defines the property in question, details the transfer of ownership of the property, and names the owners/buyers from its first ownership to the date when the abstract was created.  Almost like the genealogy of property.  I think someone who's trying to do a house history would be interested in this.  But an abstract like this may have information other than property owners.  

This packet contains several abstracts, the first beginning in 1800 when the property was purchased from the U.S. Government and others through 1972.  I did not count the number of owners but I did notice that several of them were women.

So what did I find in the papers in this Abstract of Title?  Probably what you'd usually expect.  These, but not all for every sale/purchase.

• Name(s) of owner and buyer
• Size of property (acres, rods, poles, etc.)
• Location of property (metes and bounds in the earliest records) 
• Type of purchase (patent, warranty, quit-claim, mortgage, etc.) 
• Cost of property
  
• Amount of mortgage (if mortgaged)
• Who provided the mortgage
  
• Date of sale/purchase
• Date recorded in county recorder's office, and where
• Who abstracted the information
  

But there were some surprises.

A marriage record Finding an 1885 marriage record is fairly easy these days, but there could be years when marriages weren't recorded or weren't available for one reason or another (fire at a courthouse, etc.).  It would be great to find it in a document like this.

A court case (or several, in this document)

Though the abstract doesn't tell details of the court case, it gives enough information to find the docket at the courthouse.  Also notice the perpendicular handwriting, an early way to save space on paper.

A divorce record

This note narrows the date of a divorce and also gives information about the death of the purchaser's former husband. 

Relationships This entry states a mother/son relationship.  It also narrows the death date of a husband.  Throughout the pages of this document, it often states "husband" or "wife" when a couple bought or sold property.

Maybe you who have spent time viewing property abstracts are already aware of the additional information a record like this can provide, but abstracts are new to me, so I wasn't expecting these surprises.

This Abstract of Title points out to me that documents may include more and various records that go beyond the purpose of the document's original creation.  I would love to find an Abstract of Title for any of my ancestors!

—Nancy.

Copyright © 2024 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
 

Naturalization Documents and Name Changes or, When Was Your Ancestor's Name Changed and By Whom?

There are some who believe that their ancestors' names were change at Ellis Island.  There are others who discount this claim.  My ancestors immigrated before Ellis Island became one of the major immigration centers, so I don't have experiences either way.

My interest in this topic came about from reading others' claims and, most recently, from transcribing documents at FamilySearch for immigrants who lived in New York City and Chicago, Illinois.  I thought what I found in the documents might shed light on this discussion.  The documents I've transcribed are usually declarations of intention and petitions for naturalization. 

From year to year and location to location, the wording of naturalization documents changed, as did the information requested.  The papers in 1940 papers may not request the same information in 1915 or 1928 or 1935, etc.
 
The samples below are undated because the same forms were used for a number of years.  I present them as examples of the variety of wording.  You'll notice that the Declaration of Intention asks for the petitioner's name upon his arrival.  The Petition for Naturalization asks for the petitioner's name upon arrival and also offers him the opportunity to request that his name be changed and to what.

Declaration of Intention (Northern District, Illinois)

I emigrated to the United States of America from _______________
my lawful entry for permanent residence was at _______________
under the name of _______________.

Petition for Naturalization (Northern District, Illinois)

My lawful entry for permanent residence in the United States was at  _______________,
under the name of _______________ . . . .
I, your petitioner for naturalization, pray that I may be admitted a citizen of the United States of America, and that my name be changed to _______________,

Petition for Naturalization (Eastern District of Brooklyn, New York)

My lawful entry for permanent residence in the United States of America from _____________________ was at _____________________,
under the name of ______________________ . . . .
Wherefore, I, your petitioner, pray that I may be admitted a citizen of the United States of America, and that my name be changed to ________________.

While indexing I often see requests for name changes.  Here are a few I've seen.

Women's Given Names

• Malka to Mollie
• Chaie to Anna
• Hannah to Anna
• Hannah to Hanna
• Elke to Elsie
• Therese to Thea
• Fruma to Fannie
• Gittel to Grace
• Maria to Josephine
• Maria to Mary
• Shandle to Jennie
• Sura to Sarah
• Gudrun to Gertrude
• Bertina to Bertha
• Kataline to Catherine
• Chaje-Sura to Ida
• Rozalia to Rose
• Faura to Tania
• Golde to Pauline
• Bridget to Beatrice
• Chaszka to Jean
  

Men's Given Names

• Lykia to Luka
• Rafalio to Ralph Albert
• Markus to Max
• Alfred to Fred
• Isidore to Isedor
• Vazul to William
• Luigi to Louis
• Schaie to Sam
• Hersh to Harry
• Jurko to George
• Ivanovich to John
• Moisejos to Morris
• Ziegmont to Sigmund
• Mosk/Mosxk to Max
• Szaja to Sam (Polish)
• Wojciech to Albert
• Boldizsar to Baltazar
• Gregor to George
• Berek to Bennie
• Eutranik to Jack

Surnames

• Buterkuchen to Butter
• Gedacht to Goldfarb
• Hirschhorn to Harris
• Marku to Marcus
• Zelenaia to Zellner
• Szuster to Shuster
• Frieder to Friedes
• Raczkowski to Cohen to Rogers
• Pisani to Pinto
• Haraj to Haray
• Ozderas to Osder
  
• Paidock to Pudok
• Feilgut to Filgut
• Matusenko to Matusen
• Karlsson to Carlson
• Ismul to Charles
• Marcopoulos to Marks
• Vavrova to Vavrys
• Orlinsky to Forer
• Tchiluigurian to Chulengarian
• Rosenberger to Ross

Some changes seem to be English variants of names from other languages, such as Rozalia to Rose and Rafalio to Ralph.  Others seem to have no connection to former names:  Orlinsky to Forer and Gedacht to Goldfarb.  I'm not fluent in other languages so perhaps there is a connection between the original names and the new names.

Based on the documents I've indexed, it seems more likely to me that individuals requested name changes themselves rather than employees at Ellis Island or elsewhere making the changes without the consent of the immigrants.

You can read more at these two links

• Was Your Surname Really Changed at Ellis Island?
• Debunking an Immigration Myth

Do you have experience with name changes among your ancestors?  Can you tell when the name change happened and who initiated it?

—Nancy.

Copyright © 2024 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
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Ancestors Who Suffered the Loss of a Parent at a Young Age - SNGF

Randy's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun this week asked

1)  Do you have ancestors who suffered the loss of one or both parents early in their life?  Did the surviving parent remarry soon after one parent died?  Was a guardian appointed for your ancestor to protect their physical or legal interests?    

2)  Tell us about one or two of your "orphaned" ancestors and how this affected their life.

In five generations I have five ancestors who were young, from 8 years to 1 month, when either a father or mother died.  I don't know whether I feel sorrier for the children left without a parent, or parents left with young children and no spouse.  Either circumstance would be heart-breaking.

These are my five ancestors who became half-orphans.

1. Lee Doyle, my father, and his twin sister, Leila, were born in February, 1913.  Leila died soon after birth.  Lee was about a month old when his mother, Beulah Mae (Gerner) Doyle, died in early April.  She was 24.  She left behind her husband, Gust, and little Lee, about a month old.
   
   I believe my father's life was difficult without his mother.  His father remarried a woman who was, perhaps jealous of my father or of his mother.  From what I've heard, she was somewhat abusive and Gust did his best to keep Lee away from her.  My father once said he knew about the stepmother in Cinderella.
   
   He spent time with his grandparents, William and Tressa (Froman) Doyle.  But a grandmother, no matter how loving, cannot replace a mother.
   
   Additionally, my father's father, Gust, died when my father was 21 and Gust was 44.
   
   
2. Elizabeth (Armitage) Meinzen, my great-grandmother, was born in 1852.  She was 4 years old when her mother, Eliza (Hartley) Armitage, died of consumption in 1856 at the age of 44.  Eliza left behind her husband, Abel, and two daughters, ages 6 and 4.
   
   
3. Edward Jesse Bickerstaff, my great-grandfather, was born in 1871.  He was 7 when his mother, Emma (Nelson) Bickerstaff, died in 1878.  Emma was 33 years old at the time of her death.  She left her husband, Ellis, and three children, ages 15 to 7.
   
   
4. Tressa Rose (Froman) Doyle, my great-grandmother, was born in 1867.  She was 4 years old when her father, John Froman, died in 1871.  He was about 30 years old at the time of his death.  John left behind his pregnant wife, Catherine (Saylor) Froman, and six children, ages 10 to 1. A baby born 2 months after his death.
   In this case, John left the family in debt and the children were provided a guardian, S. W. Mannheimer, whose identity or relationship I've been unable to determine.  Catherine's father, Jacob D. Seylor/Sailer/Seyler, was the administrator.
   
   
5. Andrew Doyle, my great-great-grandfather, was born in 1836.  He was 2 years old when his father, William Doyle, died in an accident in 1838 when he was about 36.  William left behind his pregnant wife, Martha, and five children ages 12 to 2.  The baby was born six months later.
   
   

It is surprising to me that two of these fathers, John Froman and William Doyle, were both coal miners.  William died after being run over by a cart wheel.  Were both accidental mining deaths?  Also surprising is that both of their wives were pregnant at the time of their deaths.

Thanks for the genealogy fun, Randy.

—Nancy.

Copyright © 2024 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
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Results of Grandparents' Surname Searches at FamilySearch Full Text Search for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun

For Saturday Night Genealogy Fun this week, Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings suggested this:

How many "Wills" for your grandparents' or great-grandparents' surnames are on the FamilySearch Full Text Search feature (see https://www.familysearch.org/search/full-text)?

I finished my list then realized that lists may contain results for much more than wills.  FamilySearch has expanded this collection so the results may include the following:  Legal Records, Censuses, Religious Records, Genealogies, Funeral Home Records, Miscellaneous Records, Military Records, Periodicals, School Records, Vital Records, Business Records, Government Records, Reference Materials, Voting Records, Migration Records, and Medical Records. 

I didn't go back to narrow the results to only wills so my results include all of the records FamilySearch found for each surname.

These are the results for my grandparents' and great-grandparents' surnames.

• Doyle:  350,391 results
• Gerner:  4,314 results
• Meinzen:  63 results
• Bickerstaff:  4356 results
• Froman:  13,413
• Bartley:  79,132
• Armitage:  30,570
• Thompson:  3,374,976

And these are the results for my second and third great-grandparents' surnames.

• Laws:  3,374,976
• Saylor:  8,497,986
• Stahl:  47,367
• Smith:  11,710,373
• Hartley:  158,093
• Nelson:  2,200,328
• Bell:  2,835,995

I admit I was surprised at the high number of results for some of these surnames.  Talk about common names!  Thank goodness I can narrow the results by adding a first name; by country, state, and county; or by kind of record.

Thanks for the fun, Randy.
—Nancy.

Copyright © 2024 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
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Ideas for Dealing with an Impasse in Research

After participating in Randy Seaver's most recent Saturday Night Genealogy Fun in which we were invited to write about our most frustrating research challenge, I decided to edit, update, and publish this post based on one I wrote a number of years ago.  (Reminders are good, right?) 

When I come upon an impasse in a family history search I often fall back and consider possibilities.  I prefer to call it an impasse — just a little hitch in progress until I figure out the next steps, the next places to search for a solution.  These are my suggestions for next steps when dealing with an impasse.  

First, I consider all the records I have — civil (census, birth, marriage, death, court records, etc.), parish, undocumented family records, and any others — and ask myself these questions.

• Have I carefully reviewed every document for every scrap of information and recorded it?
• Have I missed anything in those documents and, if so, what?  How will it help me?
  
• Did I misunderstand or misread some record or some information given to me?
• Was the record from a different time period with words I don't understand?  If so, I find the definitions so I do understand, and if I still don't, I ask for help.
  
• Was any of the information I received transcribed from another document/record and, if so, how many times had it been transcribed from the original (knowing that every transcription allows for further misinformation to be passed along)?  Can I find the original?
  
• Which information that I've received might be inaccurate?  Undocumented family records and word-of-mouth information are high on this list in one line of my family.

 
Next I consider the possibilities.

• If there was a fee to register the birth/marriage/death to create a civil document, might the event have been registered later than it actually happened?  Might it have been given an inaccurate date so it falls within the registration deadline?  I can imagine this could happen if the registrants didn't have money to pay the fee at the time of the event.
• If an ancestor had to go to a courthouse to record an event, how far did they live from the courthouse?  Would it have been a challenge for them to get there to record the event?
  
• If a child was born out of wedlock, might that have prevented the baby from being baptized/christened?  If so, there may not be a parish record for the event.
• If a child was born out of wedlock, was his surname listed as the mother's maiden name, or the father's surname?  I should check both surnames, especially if the first search doesn't reveal a record.
  
• If the child was born out of wedlock, did the child's birth require civil registration? 
  
• If the parents moved (or the county boundaries moved) between the time of their marriage and the birth of any of their children, which locations would need to be checked? 
• If the problem is a marriage and I'm unable to find a marriage record, might there at least be marriage banns amongst the parish records or a note in a gossipy local newspaper? 
• If it's a death record I'm unable to find, have I searched records in all possible death locations?
  
• What other records, both formal and informal, might help me discover information for an event in an ancestor's life?

Most important:  I need to make notes as I review the documents and records I have.  I can't rely on my memory.  I note

• the probable date of an event
• the records I have and important information in them
• any connections I see between records such as locations, possible relationships, events near the same dates, etc.
• the next records to search
• the next place to search
  
• that wisp of an idea that fluttered through my mind, no matter how improbable, unlikely, or impossible it seemed
  

A list like this and notes like these almost become a to-do list and will be similar to a research log in advance of the research.

I'm sure you, dear readers, have plenty of other suggestions for next steps when dealing with an impasse and I hope you'll share them!

—Nancy.

Copyright © 2024 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
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My Most Frustrating Research Challenge, for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun (on Sunday)

Randy's suggestion for genealogy fun this past Saturday was to write about our most frustrating research challenge.  I chuckled when I saw "fun" and "most frustrating research challenge" in the same sentence.  Who but a genealogist/family historian would consider frustrating research to be fun?  (It is, isn't it?!)  There are probably some people with other hobbies and professions who might but I don't know who.

I can't decide which ancestor presents the most challenging research.  It could be Henry C. Meinzen, whose place of origin and parents' names I've yet to verifiably discover; or it might be William Doyle, son of Andrew and Elizabeth (Laws) Doyle, whose absence of a birth record leaves his connection to his parents in question; or it may be the other William Doyle, a coal miner who died in 1838, whose parents I've been unable to discover.

Henry Carl (or C.) Meinzen, in brief
Henry is my great-grandfather, my mother's paternal grandfather.  He and his family were easily found in the 1870, 1880, and 1900-1920 U.S. Census records, living in Steubenville, Jefferson County, Ohio.  He was born in either Hannover, Prussia, or Germany (depending on the census year), in 1837.  According to his naturalization documents, he immigrated in 1866 and became a naturalized citizen in 1871.  He married Elizabeth Armitage in 1870.  He died in 1926, in Steubenville.  All information on his death certificate comes from what I consider hearsay because it was passed along from him to his children.  His death certificate gives his father's name as Carl Meinzen. 

Now come the interesting parts.

• There is a Graves Registration Card for Henry C. Meinzen.  It indicates that he served in the Civil War from August 11, 1862, to August 10, 1863, in the U.S. Navy as a Seaman on the ships "Cairo" and "Brilliant."  All information on the card corresponds correctly to known information about Henry but I have been unable to locate any information about him serving in the Civil War.  If this information were true, it suggests that he arrived in the U.S. four years earlier than he states on his naturalization record.  I have found no evidence anywhere to verify this information or his service in the Union or Confederate military.  
  
• There is an immigration record at the Castle Garden website for Ernst Meinzen with information that corresponds exactly to Henry's information -- all except the first name.  The age, arrival date, and destination could all be Henry's information.  I've found no immigration record for Henry or Heinrich Meinzen.  I continue to wonder if Ernst and Henry could be the same man.  I've not found an Ernst Meinzen born in 1837 or thereabouts, in Ohio.  Did Henry change his name or decide to use a name other than the one he used in Hannover/Prussia/Germany?  A new start with a new name?  There were no ID cards in the 1870s....
  
• A somewhat distant cousin told me the story of three Meinzen brothers who travelled together from Germany, arriving by train in Ohio.  Henry decided to stop and stay in Steubenville, Ohio.  Truth, or is it the three brothers myth? 
  
• Henry's sister, Sophia (Meinzen) Kropp, arrived in the U.S. in 1887, along with her husband and several children, and settled in Steubenville, Ohio.  Neither her death certificate nor obituary mention her mother's name and her death certificate tells me that her father's name is Deidrick Meinzen.  Of course, it's possible that it was Carl Deidrick or Deidrick Carl, or that the informant for the death certificate misunderstood the question, but there's no way to know until I find further information.
  

William Doyle, in brief
William is my great-grandfather, my father's paternal grandfather.  Family records tell me that he was born in Bedlington, Northumberland, England, in March, 1873, and is the son of Andrew and Elizabeth Jane (Laws) Doyle.  I've found an immigration record, have reviewed U.S. census records, have a death certificate, an obituary....  But nowhere in British records have I been able to find a birth record for William Doyle, born March 3, 1863.  Not in civil records or church records.  Doesn't that seem strange?

William Doyle, in brief
This William is my third-great-grandfather, the grandfather of the William Doyle, above.  This William was born about 1802; married Martha Reay in 1825; and died in 1838.  I have a church marriage record (which gives names and date of marriage) and a civil death record (which gives his age as 36 years).  Neither record names his parents, his birth date, or the location of his birth.  If only William Doyle weren't such a common name!

These are my current, and long-time, research challenges.  To be honest, research on these three has been laid to rest for several years.  Perhaps it's about time I pick up where I left off and research some more!

Thanks for the fun, and the push, Randy!

--Nancy.

Copyright ©2024, Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner.

Might One of My Ancestors Have Seen a Total Solar Eclipse?

I thought April 8th's total solar eclipse was amazing.  We travelled back roads to a little town about 45 minutes away and sat in the tiny parking lot of a store.  We listened to NASA's live presentation as we waited and watched.  We saw two minutes of totality but not total darkness as shown in this photo.  It was like sunset all around the horizon.  The temperature cooled and some of the birds began their evening song.  Really, just a once in a lifetime experience (unless I'm still alive in 2045!)

Photo courtesy of NASA HQ Photo.   Thank you, NASA.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasahqphoto/53645326260/

My ears perked up when I heard one of the NASA hosts use the word "generation."  She may have said something like, it will be more than a generation before the next eclipse comes to Ohio, but I'm not sure.  Just the word "generation" took my thoughts to my ancestors.  How many of them might have seen a total eclipse?

As I researched online, if what I read can be trusted, a total solar eclipse happens about every 18 months but crosses the same part of the earth in only about every 375 years.  That didn't give me much hope for my Ohio and Pennsylvania ancestors seeing a total solar eclipse. 

Looking at maps of past eclipses, I could not find a total solar eclipse that crossed over the localities where my ancestors lived at the times they were alive.  I had hoped we might share that in common.

However, there were plenty of newspaper reports of eclipses which my ancestors might have read.  I enjoyed the quaint language of this section of a small article from the August 7, 1860, issue of the Cincinnati Daily Press on page 4, column 1, entitled "The Late Solar Eclipse in Europe."

It reads,

    The Paris correspondent of the London
Times writes as follows:
   It wanted a few minutes to two when the
eclipse began, and whenever the sky cleared
the opaque body of the moon might be seen
creeping on in slow but sure advances.  The
greatest portion of the sun was covered about
three o'clock, and such parts of the sky as
were visible assumed a darker blue.  It was
nearly a quarter to four o'clock when the sun
got quite released from the grasp of his in-
vader.

Some past total solar eclipses happened on the dates below, but I didn't note the locations.

• June 16, 1806
• February 12, 1831
• November 30, 1834
• July 17, 1860
• August 7, 1869
• July 29, 1878
• January 1, 1889
• April 16, 1893
• May 28, 1900

Thinking of my ancestors and solar eclipses reminded me of a post I wrote years ago titled Sharing the Sun.  My ancestors and I may not have a lot in common, but we have the sun. 

—Nancy.

Copyright © 2024 Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
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