DNA Thru Lines Potential Breakthroughs

Did you hear all about it yesterday? Both Ancestry and My Heritage announced new DNA tools. That combined with Diahan Southard's 'Connecting Your DNA Matches' presentation that was live streamed by RootsTech made for a BIG day in my DNA world.

In Diahan's session, she discussed using Blaine Bettinger's Shared Centimorgan Project to help verify relationships suggested by DNA. Even though I was aware of and had contributed to Blaine's project, I had never used the results to analyze my cousin matches. During her presentation, Diahan talked about using a spreadsheet to keep track of this data. 

Thus, I tried to create my own spreadsheet based on Diahan's presentation. So far, I haven't found any 'surprises' in the amount of shared DNA. However, I am finding an advantage to this type of spreadsheet for DNA matches. This type of spreadsheet will help me keep track of how I am related to my matches. Below is an image from my new spreadsheet. I have blacked out the identifying information for my matches.

John Crawford Clue

Have you ever run across a little tiny clue that changes your entire thinking about family members?

Well, I may have run across just such a clue for my Crawford family members in early Lincoln County, Kentucky. In the 1783-1786 Court Order book for the Lincoln County Supreme Court of Kentucky (Family Search film 551323), I found mention of a deed for John and William Crawford on image 69.

Image 69
June the 18th 1785
Saturday the 18th day of June 1785
Present
The Same judges as yesterday

The Heirs of John McClelland plts
against
John and William Crawford Defts

Upon a Caveat

Ordered that the former order herein be set aside and that
the first be discontinued

Lincoln County Taxes

Do you find little clues in tax records? When I reviewed the Lincoln County Kentucky tax records, I made some discoveries that are helping my CRAWFORD research in the area.

• Discovered John Crawford -- who owned 913 acres of land
  
• Sellers families listed beginning in 1787
• Rebekah Crawford (widow) listed in 1787-1791
• James Crawford owning 114 acres of land  on Sugar Creek (same description as land owned by Rebekah Crawford) in 1794
  
• Douglas families listed  beginning in 1789

1795 Mystery

• William Crafort - 500 acres Richland Creek

1799 Mysteries:

• James Crawford -- 100 acres on Rolling Forks
• Robert Crawford -- 200 acres

1784 Grand Jury

1784 Grand Jury

Lincoln County Kentucky

as found in the Court Order Book, 1783-1786 for the Kentucky Supreme Court of Lincoln County

Image 24

March 5th 1784

Venture into Court Records

Do you try and find every record you could on an ancestor? I used to think that I did. However, I have to admit that I haven't always researched all available records for a community. I often stop with the indexed records and often avoid those non-indexed records.

It turns out I likely need to be  using those records. A local historian from the Garrard County, Kentucky area contacted me last week. She had seen my blog post about not finding land records for the SELLERS families in the area. She provided lots of hints. One was a rumor that the Sellers acquired their land in Garrard County by trading a horse for it. She said that if the rumor was true, I might not find a deed. Another hint was to dig thru the court records -- especially since there were a lot of legal battles over Kentucky land.

So, I've started my journey into court records.

I've started with the Madison County, Kentucky Court of Quarter Sessions. These court documents have been filmed and are available on the Family Search site -- and there is even an index to them!

Madison County Kentucky
Court of Quarter Sessions case files 1789-1802, indexes, 1789-1802

Case Files, 1-778, mixed dates ranging 1789-1802
FS Film 2115181 item 3 DGS 7838115

Image 45

Crawford, Mary - Poe, William 587

Barren

Have you ever re-looked at some tax records and discovered that you can now figure out who these people might be when before they were just a list of names found in that county?

Well, that has been my experience as I'm going back thru some of my Crawford Kentucky research in hopes that it leads me back another generation.

I've recently re-looked at Madison, Lincoln and Garrard county tax lists and combined with land records, I have a much better understanding of who the various Crawfords listed in these tax roles are. Since I have deeds indicating James Crawford (husband of Martha Knight) lived in Barren County, Kentucky, I decided to re-look at those tax records.

I first searched the Barren County KY tax lists some time ago. Based on the "V20-0014" notation on my notes, I'm guessing I used the American Genealogical Lending Library to research these records at home.

Barren County Connection

Have you ever questioned whether an ancestor lived in a certain place because the migration path was illogical?

Well, that is the case with our Crawford research. James Crawford and Martha Knight were married in Lincoln County, KY in 1793. James Crawford and Sally Duggins were married in Garrard County, KY in 1799. Both families migrated to Preble County, Ohio.

So when clues pointed to at least one of them being in Barren County, KY (South of Lincoln and Garrard), those clues were questioned because it seemed illogical for these couples to migrate South before migrating North to Ohio.

That gut feeling was proven incorrect when a Barren County deed was discovered. This 1821 deed was for the sale of land by a James Crawford of Preble County, Ohio. Records place both James Crawfords in Preble County, Ohio at the time. So far, no record has been found for a third James Crawford in Preble County, Ohio in 1821.

Since the deed identifies the wife of James Crawford as Martha, this deed places James and Martha owning land in Barren County, KY. Another set of deeds for the sale of land in Garrard County, KY by Rebecca Crawford and James Crawford, both of Barren County, provide additional evidence that James Crawford was in Barren County, KY (See Rebekah's Land)

Arrival in Ohio

Have you ever 'lost' an ancestor for a period of time? That's my situation with my ancestor, James Crawford.

James and Sally Duggins are married in Garrard County, Kentucky in 1799. In 1813, there is a land record where James Crawford has made full payment for the NW 1/4 of Section 14, Township 7, Range 2. Thus, I'm trying to figure out where James and Sally were living shortly after their marriage. The county history suggests that James was living in Preble county by 1810. Unfortunately, there are TWO James Crawfords living near each other. This makes it difficult to determine which James Crawford is being referenced.

Since Kentucky tax lists have been helping me figure out who was living where in Lincoln, Garrard and Madison counties. Unfortunately, the Preble County, Ohio tax lists do not begin until 1816.

However, these tax lists contain two clues that I overlooked the first time I used them.

• James Crawford owning the NORTHWEST quarter of Section 14, Township 7, Range 2 appeared on the tax lists at a later time than the James Crawford owning the SOUTHWEST quarter of the same section
• The James Crawford owning the NORTHWEST quarter was referred to as James Crawford Junior

Big Tree Same Name Issues

Do you have 'same name' issues in your genealogy research? I know I have them in mine:

• Hiram Currey
• Noah Briles
• James Crawford
• William Thompson

Thus, I'm a little sensitive when computer algorithms merge them together. 

I first encountered this with Ancestry's One World Tree when my James Crawford research was merged into one profile. 

Recently, Randy Seaver has been writing about Ancestry issues. His recent post, A Reader's Take on Ancestry Problems, Part IV: The Ancestry Big Tree discusses what he has learned about Ancestry's Big Tree. Randy also discussed the Ancestry Big Tree on today's session of Monday's with Myrt. 

I evidently browsed thru Randy's post since I didn't pick up on the Google search aspect. However, when Randy demonstrated a Google search on Monday's with Myrt, I started wondering how the Big Tree would handle my same name issues.

Thus, I started searching.

My first search was for my ancestor, James Crawford. James was born about 1772 in Virginia and died in 1854 in Preble County, Ohio. I was pleased when I found his profile - without any of the other James Crawfords mixed in.

Resolved Indexing Issue

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about issues I was seeing with this blogger site not being found by Google. (Why Not Indexed).

After several days of digging thru Google discussions of the issue, I think I found the solution. My early searches kept pointing to an issue with the sitemap. At that point all I was finding for a sitemap url was one that placed

atom.xml?redirect=false&start-index=1&max-results=500

after the root of the URL. When I would try to use my Google Search Console to enter the site map, it acted like it was taking the site map. However, when I would return to the Search Console, no sitemap would be listed.

So I kept digging and finally came across a post indicating that Google had changed the site map URL. The new URL ending is much simpler:

sitemap.xml

Thus, I entered that into my Google Search Console and waited. Each time I've returned to my Google Search Console, the site map is listed with the word 'SUCCESS'. I've also been able to search Google for my blog posts and find them -- including very recent posts.

Thus, I think my issue is resolved!

Lincoln County Mystery

Do you have same name issues in your genealogy research? Or, do you have 'mystery men' of the same surname in the same location as your ancestor?

That's what happened when I looked at the Lincoln County, Kentucky tax lists for 1787-1805.

I had found Lincoln County KY marriage bonds where Rebekah Crawford gave permission for Mary Crawford to marry James Sellers and Sarah Crawford to marry William David Sellers. Another marriage bond secured by Nathan Douglas and James Crawford for the marriage of James Crawford and Martha Knight was found in Lincoln County, KY records.

Thus, I was expecting to find the following:

• Sellers family
• Rebekah Crawford
• George Douglass -- who sold land to Rebekah Crawford and may be her brother
• Nathan Douglass -- who signed the bond for James Crawford
• James Crawford -- who is believed to have turned 21 in 1792

I was not expecting to find:

• John Crofford
• Alexander Crofford
• William Crafort on Richland Creek
• James Crawford on Rolling Forks
• Robert Crawford on Hanging Fork 
• Ellis Richard (and other Ellis families) on Noland Fork

Reading History

In your genealogy research, have you read the historical accounts?

Even though the experts recommend 'knowing' the history of a location, I have only skimmed county histories looking for my family name. I've never seriously read the history - until last night.

Last night, I read the book, The Travelling Church: An Account of the Baptist Exodus from Virginia to Kentucky in 1781 under the Leadership of Rev.Lewis Craig and Capt. William Ellis on Internet Archive. This book is about an ENTIRE church community packing up and leaving Spottsylvania County, Virginia for Logan's Fort in Kentucky.

I didn't find mention of the Crawford family in this book. I have clues suggesting my Crawford line came from Montgomery or Augusta Counties, Virginia - not Spottsylvania County. I have clues suggesting the Crawfords were Presbyterian - not Baptist.

Migration Clues

Have you used city directories to help locate a person between census years? Although I'm not finding as much detail in tax lists, I am finding that they help track migration in the early 1800s.

I've been doing FAN club research in early Kentucky. So far, I've been concentrating on the area that became Garrard County. Because of changing county boundaries, I've searched tax lists for Madison, Garrard and Lincoln counties.

• Tax Man Cometh - Madison County, KY 1787-1796
• Garrard County Tax - 1797-1806
• Lincoln County Taxes  

Since I've identified the Crawford land holdings during this time period. I'm now searching the Garrard County tax lists from 1807 to 1824 to identify the time period when the various families moved away.

Families that could potentially be in Garrard County between 1807 and 1824

• Rebekah Crawford - owned land between Sugar Creek and Boone's Mill Creek
• James Crawford, husband of Martha Knight and likely son of Rebekah Crawford
• James Sellers, husband of Mary Crawford (likely daughter of Rebekah Crawford)
• William Sellers, husband of Sarah Crawford (likely daughter of Rebekah Crawford)
• Alexander Moore, husband of Mary Crawford - owned land on Sugar Creek and on Paint Lick Creek
• James Crawford, husband of Sally Duggins
• James Crawford, husband of Rebecca Anderson -- owned land on Paint Lick Creek
• William Crawford - owned land on Paint Lick Creek

Which Alexander Moore

Do you ever check other people's trees to see what they have on someone you are researching? I know I do. I check them for hints. I also check them to see if my work supports their conclusions.

I'm in the position of needing hints from others in my research of Mary Crawford, wife of Alexander Moore.

1811 Garrard County Kentucky Land records indicate that Alexander Moore moved from the Garrard County area of Kentucky to Fleming County. (Garrard County, Kentucky, Deed Book E, page 306). Since Mary doesn't sign the deed and isn't mentioned in the body of the deed, there isn't evidence that Mary was in Fleming County, Kentucky

Crawford Brick Wall Research

I've recently been going back thru my CRAWFORD research in Kentucky in hopes of finding a clue about the parents of James Crawford. This research involves at least four counties and several different families.

As I've been doing this research, I've been writing blog posts. Below is a chronological listing of those posts.

Moore Deeds

What's your 'go-to' record type to try and identify people? For me, that resource is land records.

I've recently been using land records to figure out the various Crawford families in the Garrard County, Kentucky area prior to 1820. One of those families is the widow, Mary Crawford who appears on the tax records for Madison County, Kentucky as early as 1787.

In 1793, a Mary Crawford married an Alexander Moore in Garrard County, Kentucky. I was able to use land records to show that the Mary Crawford who married Alexander Moore is the same Mary Crawford who purchased land from Richard Cave.

Now, I'm trying to track Alexander Moore in hopes of learning more about Mary Crawford. There are two deeds for the sale of land in 1811 that indicate that Alexander Moore was from Fleming County, Kentucky.

Engaged

Forty-six years

At the age of twenty, I was not looking forty-six years into my future. But it was forty-six years ago this Valentine's Day that I said yes - to Michael Philbrick.

Our engagement was announced a year later - forty-five years ago.

Miss Marcia Crawford
whose engagement to Mr. Mi-
chael Dean Philbrick has been
announced by her parents, Mr.
and Mrs. Eugene Crawford,
2314 West Twenty-first Ave.
Miss Crawford is a snior stu-
dent at Kansas Stte Teachers
College, where she is major-
ing in chemistry and is a mem-
ber of Delta Zeta social sorori-
ety. She is the granddaughter
of Mrs. E. O. Briles, 609 West
Fifth Ave. Mr. Philbrick, the
son of Mr. and Mrs. Donald
Philbrick of Phillipsburg, also
is a senior student at KSTC.
He is majoring in physical sci-
ence.

Where Is the Sellers' Land?

Have you ever tried to document a piece of information and get frustrated because everywhere you look turns up nothing?

Well, that's how I feel right now regarding land owned by various members of the SELLERS family in early Kentucky.

My clue that they owned land comes from various tax lists. The Sellers family appears on the Lincoln County, Kentucky tax list in 1792 on images 234 and 235.

Image 234

• Sellers James - 1 male > 21; 6 horses, 10 cattle
• Sellers Samuel - 1 male > 21; 1 horse
• Sellers William - 1 male 16-21

Image 235

• Sellers Nathaniel - 1 male > 21, 1 horse, 4 cattle 100 acres
• Sellers, John 1 male over 21, 5 horses, 24 cattle, 100 acres

Where Are the Sparrows?

Does your genealogy desk sit in front of a window? Do you find yourself looking out that window watching the birds and squirrels?

If so, then welcome to the 'genealogy bird watching club'.

My computer sits in front of a window that overlooks two of our large trees. I have feeders in those trees and at various other places in the yard. We also have a water heater in our bird bath to provide fresh water for the birds (and other wildlife).

Over the years, I've participated in Project Feeder Watch to count the birds at my feeders. Below is a picture of my bird counting 'journal' from 2006.

Golden Legacy

Does your family throw a big parties? Have you had the good fortune to celebrate Golden Anniversaries in your family?

My first exposure to a Golden Anniversary celebration was for my grandparents: Leon and Winnie Crawford.

Why Not Indexed

I've been watching my Blogger stats and have noticed that Google is not listed as a referring site. Thus, I began to wonder why. I've been thru the settings and Google's Search Console and I haven't found an answer.

So, I'm going to document what I see and then reach out for help.

This morning, I tried a Google search for 'briles pauline'.

I knew I had several posts on my Wordpress blog about her and that I had re-posted at least one of those posts on my Blogger blog.

Celebrating 50 Years

Do you enjoy some of the online genealogy prompts to look at your data from a different viewpoint?

I know I do. Two of my currents sources for blogging prompts are Amy Johnson Crowe's #52ancestors and Randy Seaver's #SaturdayNightGenealogyFun.

As I was working on a blog post about love, I found I have several of my ancestors who celebrated 50 years of marriage. Thus, I thought it would be fun to suggest a 'Saturday Night Genealogy Fun' challenge:

1) How many of your ancestors were married for FIFTY years?
2) What is the longest marriage in your tree?

I'm approaching my 45th wedding anniversary and my parents were married for over fifty years.

Grandparents:

• Leon Crawford and Winnie Currey -- married Dec 1919; They were married 56 years before Leon passed away in Oct. 1976.
• Edward Osmond Briles and Pauline Mentzer were married Oct 1915. They were married 40 years when Edward passed away. Pauline never remarried.

Proof Argument

Have you ever written a proof argument for your genealogical research?

I know the Genealogical Proof Standard incorporates writing a proof argument - a soundly based conclusion that others can follow.

I try to do exhaustive research, citing the sources behind the facts attached to individuals in my tree. However, I've never written a detailed proof argument.

I'm in the middle of a lot of 'same name' research in Kentucky around 1800. To help me think through the evaluation of the records, I've been writing blog posts about this research.

One of the goals of this research is to identify parents or siblings of my ancestor, James Crawford (1772-1854) who married Sally Duggins in Garrard County, Kentucky in 1799.

Rebecca's Land

Have you ever found you have attributed a record to the wrong person? Unfortunately, with same name research that can happen too easily.

As I was transcribing deeds that I thought were for James and Rebecca (Anderson) Crawford of Garrard County, Kentucky, I began to question whether these deeds were for this James and Rebecca (Anderson) Crawford.

There were some clues in the deeds that should have led me to a different James Crawford.

The first clue was the signatures. Rebecca's name was above James'.

Garrard County Tax

Have you ever tried to figure out who is who in a community when there are multiple people of the same name?

Well, that's where I am with the Garrard County tax records from 1797-1806.

I have four Crawford families that potentially live in Garrard County during that time period.

• James Crawford husband of Rebecca Anderson who purchased land from Thomas Kennedy. James' sons were Isaac (?-?), William (1784-1864) and James (1790-1856)
• William Crawford who claimed to have purchased land from J Kennedy. His sons would not have been old enough to be listed on the tax lists while William Crawford was living in Garrard County. 
• James Crawford who married Martha Knight in 1793 in Lincoln County, Kentucky. James is thought to be the son of Rebecca Crawford. Rebecca purchased land from George Douglas.
• James Crawford who married Sally Duggins in 1799 in Garrard County, Kentucky. James is thought to be the son of Mary Crawford who married Alexander Moore.

Paying Forward

Do you have data sitting in your genealogy files that isn't of help to you but might help others tie siblings together?

That's what I've found by researching land transactions for John Crawford in Lincoln County, Kentucky. I've found three deeds naming a Power of Attorney for heirs of John Crawford.

Page 420 of Lincoln County Deed, KY,  DeedBook R identifies the following heirs in 1842

• Rebecca Ellis
• Esther Ellis
• Ruhama McCoy
• Frederick Sponseller
• Harriet Sponseller

John Crawford Heirs

In trying to figure out who John Crawford is, I turned to deeds for some help. The Lincoln County Kentucky deed index from 1780 to 1870 [Family Search film 192237] had four entries with John Crawford listed as a grantor.

Image 47:
1795: Crawford, John grantor James Feland grantee - 264 1/2 acres vol C page 13
1795: Crawford, John grantor James Logan - 42 acres Book C page 23
1798: Crawford John Grantor Wm Gooch 130 acres Hfork book D page 26

Image 52
1842: Crawford John Hrs grantor Bashford Jon C P of A S31+29 book R page 420

Crawford Land Patent

I recently found the land records for John Crawford of Lincoln County, Kentucky. He owned 913 acres of land on Hanging Fork of Dick's River.

Land-Office Treasury Warrant, No. 2690

To the principal Surveyor of any County within the Commonwealth of Virginia
This shall be your WARRANT to survey and lay off
in one or more surveys, for John Crawford
his heirs and assigns the Quantity of One thousand
acres of land, due unto the said John Crawford in
right of pre-emption as a certificate form the Supreme Court of the
Kentucky District
In consideration of the sum of five pounds thirteen shillings
current money paid into the Public Treasury the
payment whereof the Treasurer hath been duly certified by the Auditors of public
accounts, and their certificate received into the Land-Office.
Given under my hand, and the seal of the said office, this 29th
day of September in the year one thousand seven hundred and 86.

Test
Samuel M Craw Clk
John Harvie Be S O N

Creating Buddy Files

What's in your genealogy tool cabinet? Do you ever experiment with various software tools until you find one that fits your needs or thinking process?

Well, I have experimented with various tools. One of those tools I'm experimenting with right now is Tony Proctor's program to create what he calls a 'Buddy File'. This is being discussed in Dear Myrtle's Facebook group. My Buddy File post describes my learning process.

At least one of the comments discussed whether the time involved in creating the text file was worth it. I have to admit that was my initial thought as Tony made his presentation last week. 

Since I want to use the 'buddy file' for transcriptions, it dawned on me this morning that I likely already have the information to put in a buddy file. I just need to copy/paste into Notepad and save the file.

Lessons from Football

It's Super Bowl Weekend in America - the whole country (well, almost) will watch the game between the Los Angeles Rams and the New England Patriots on Sunday afternoon at 6:30 p.m. EST (3:30 PST).

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

1)  What is your favorite National Football League team?  ...

In our house, Super Bowl Sunday isn't much different than many other Sunday. My husband and I will be watching the game, but each of us will likely be doing other stuff (like genealogy) while watching.

I started writing for this topic yesterday, saying that the Kansas City Chiefs were my favorite team. However, I realized that even though they are my favorite team, I don't have answers for most of these questions. So I decided to not write on this topic.

Then I went to church today and got inspiration: teamwork and legacy.

John Crawford of LIncoln County Kentucky

Do you ever go back thru your research (think Thomas MacEntee's Genealogy Do-Over) and find a potential family member living nearby whom you have never researched?

Well, that happened to me when I was researching Rebekah Crawford in the tax records for Lincoln County. That's where I found John Crawford.

• 1787 Crofford John - 4 horses, 4 cattle
• 1789 Crawford John - 5 horses
• 1790 Crawford John - 4 horses
• 1791 Crawford John - 4 horses
• 1792 Crawford John - 5 horses, 17 cattle and 913 acres

Where's Rebekah?

Have you ever tried to track someone thru the census and just have them disappear? I have and it is frustrating!

I'm trying to figure out my Crawford family in Kentucky on the tax lists. Once I sat down to analyze the data, it was fairly easy to use land records to figure out the Madison County, Kentucky records prior to 1800. (See Tax Man Cometh)

However, the Lincoln County, Kentucky tax lists are proving to be a bit more difficult. There is a Rebekah Crawford who receives land from George Douglas in 1786. (See Rebekah's Land)

Rebekah appears on the Lincoln County tax list in 1787.

She alos appears in  1789 and 1791. I have not found her after 1791.

Photos and Google+

For some reason, I looked at email beyond my primary tab this morning. That's when I saw the notice from Google about my randomly used Google+ account.

Since I only used Google+ occassionally, I didn't think I had much content that would be affected. However, I do have some photos in my Google+ album. Thus, I want to retain those photos.

Rebekah's Land

In 1786, Rebekah Crawford purchased 100 acres on the headwaters of Sugar and Boons Mill Creek in Lincoln County, Kentucky.